buechsr

About 3 years ago a 6 footer swam over about 20 feet from the starting dock when I had a daughter about to jump in for her set. I’m not afraid of gators, but I was watching with interest!

If I’m not mistaken, the longest running water ski tournament in the country, the Lakeland Open, would be having its 77th annual this year which has been held at Paradise for some time. Sure hope it continues.

“Isaws?” In front “Ysmaws” (more) do in white and ill buy a few

They did but Kris and Rob had some “hull-attachment devices” (we’ll call them strakes) that helped as I recall from almost buying a zx1 a few years ago.

That’s awesome! Great skiers, and even better kids to be around! Great job Kyle and Karen!

I’m not seeing why the tranny output going to a Vdrive (Walter’s?) or driveshaft would have any bearing on the feasibility of the project. Same issues present themselves when putting the same new long block in a DD or VD wakeboard boat. I would agree that if it is using a 1 piece tranny/vdrive like a skivee? That would create a bigger issue but I’m pretty sure that in ‘01, tranny and VD were separate components. O, and if you ever get the chance to drive an infinity, it’s a hoot. OP, If you don’t have the external strakes, may want to look into them. Kris Lapoint could help I bet.

Got it. So a glorified horse dental impression.

what is that a horse denture?

Looks fun…tell Don Simon to let that rope out softer you’re not barefooting! I seem to see some buoys to skiers left in that 1st video 😜

Last week I saw a RTP that used a snowboard binding toe ratchet strap for the heel....on my to do list to try now. I've tried unsuccessfully multiple times to get out of double boots, never to feel confident. Of course, that leads me to ski hips back in reliance on my back foot. Really wish I could find a way to ski "on" my front leg better. Going to try to frankenstein something this weekend.

Allows me to tell my kids to put their phones down and read something with a straight face, so as to not break my own house rules which are admittedly enforced too infrequently.

Absolutely. There's strength in numbers, however small we may be. Plus you get a magazine, lol. That I actually like. Last month had article on Jaeden Eade, and articles written by Corey Vaughn, Seth Stisher, and Chris Rossi. Personally I fail to see the criticism in the magazine content. It's far from bend your knees articles.

Last qtr:

I talked to a senior driver yesterday about this actually as I pull some people in the 28-32 mph, 15-28 off range and he suggested leaving at 35 off (for practice anyway). Will try soon. @Deep11 is your boat a 19 or 20? I have a 21 and believe I was told they changed the part that year for reliability. Have access to a 21 or beyond to check the latest if yours if 19-20? I forget, can a skier request deviation from the helm microtuner setting in a tournament?

MBUU quarterly financials released an hour ago…I’m not Warren Buffett, but I don’t think this looks good: https://stockhouse.com/news/press-releases/2024/05/02/malibu-boats-inc-announces-third-quarter-fiscal-2024-results Link to earning call at 8:30 this am on malibuboats.com

Other sports’ governing organizations are not “comparable to the situation at hand”? I disagree. Everything is comparable. In fact, comparisons to healthy organizations are wise to make. What are those sports and organizations doing? It’s wise to study and emulate, just as in any other facet of life: skiing, parenting, career, etc. One example of a sport that has come out of nowhere to now be particularly prevalent, is Pickleball. I just went to USA Pickleball’s website. It is dominated with requests for tagging it in social media and introducing others to the game. Of course it should. That’s the mission. How is that so different than a simple request from Kevco in our monthly/quarterly whatever magazine? In the original post, many grievances were aired. Subsequently there has only been 1 concrete “fixable” complaint, which related to the thinning of divisions, essentially to (once again) tinker with the size of age groups. People obviously have different opinions on that so that is not an actionable gripe unless the rules committee considers those tweaks. Other than that sole example, the OP, and other subsequent posts, generally disparaged Kevin Michael’s encouragement of members to get others skiing, and somehow twists that into rhetorically asking what does membership “do for me”? If any skier, competitive or not, USAWS member or not, can’t appreciate what Kevin was saying, we think differently. If current or “former” USAWS members are concerned with the expense of tournaments (sanctioning, officials, etc) surely they/we can appreciate that more revenue through membership better offsets the expenses of the organization. What was so offending for Kevin to try to encourage USAWS members of the vital role of sharing the sport with others? It doesn’t mean every new skier has to join USAWS, it just means the larger pool of skiers will organically create new members: a benefit to the organization, current members, and hopefully the future ski careers of new members. It’s not 1995. IF people want to wax poetic about the good ol days, that’s fine, but all I’m reading herein is complaints. No concrete suggestions are being made. It’s just like the safe sport conversations. All complaints, no solutions (because there were no alternatives), other than dropping your membership. If you’re inclined to drop USAWS over a video that you could watch while changing your boat oil, fine. But there is no utility in complaining without offering any concrete solutions to that which is being complained. I’m not suggesting anyone keep their thoughts to themselves, far from it, express away, but coupling them with solutions makes it far more productive. As far as I’m concerned, there was nothing wrong with Kevin’s appeal.

You’re a plus 2, right? 👍🏻

https://support.usga.org/membership/#:~:text=A Handicap Index® is,visit usga.org%2Fgetahandicap. Apparently, not. See link. in my experience that’s done through your state association, and per the above link at the bottom. In reviewing what USGA membership “does” for you, seems remarkably lacking yet money pours in for the benevolence of golf programs and education. not a response to your post jjack, but USAWS is not a charity. That said, if we collectively look at USAWS through the lens of “what do I get out of it?”, that’s short sighted for the sport.

Although I posted that membership stat, that’s an inaccurate comparison to the issues raised in the opening post. Opening post dealt with why would one benefit by USAWS membership. The overwhelming majority of the 700,000 USGA members see no direct benefit whatsoever. It’s just a benevolent gesture of wanting to belong to an organization that supports what they like. No USAWS member has to take safe sport, Only if they will be competing. Notably, cursory web searching suggests all affiliated with “First Tee” must take safe sport…as well as US soccer, usta etc. …but is this another thread about safe sport? Or the direction of USAWS?

Just as no one is required to join the pickleball association to join the YMCA and play, no one is required to join USAWS to ski a non sanctioned event.

The USGA has 700,000 members. Exceedingly few of those play USGA events. USGA members feel a benelovent calling to support the organization that supports their sport. I’m sure “Some” people justify abstaining from joining based on what the USGA (doesn’t) do for them, but not a single one of them would criticize the President of the USGA for encouraging members to expose new players to golf or encouraging competitive progression. Many in waterskiing have and do the same, with or without supporting USAWS. That’s their prerogative. Personally, I respect the tall tasks USAWS must deal with and will gladly pay my dues long after tournament admission is needed. You’re right, there is no “need”, but they should feel a modicum of a calling.

I've not done this conversion before but as to running wires to helm, find the steering cable, follow its routing, use a hanger or other wire fishing solution, tie a string, and route it up. Tie wires, pull through.

Maybe. I sold my ZO ‘08 this year. Replaced with a USED 6 figure SN. Yes, it stung. 2 kids set PBs first set though, so I’ll take it?

I was merely saying Ferrari has very inelastic demand as its units increased marginally, revenue substantially, which means per unit pricing went up substantially. But I’m also saying it would seem their net operating profit seems to demonstrate they saw significant increase in cost of goods sold or their net operating profit would have gone up much more. “Actual net profit” in your last may be explained by other accounting factors. Perhaps even value of their F1 team now that signed LH. Embarrassingly, I actually have a degree in finance, but have forgotten most everything related to accounting, and don;t work in finance at all. So I could be way off too! Malibu’s quarterly earning call is next week. It’ll be interesting for sure. As Jody correctly said, it costs way more to build these boats than one would think so I don;t know they’re “overpriced for what you get”. It might be fair to say that they feel like their pricing is not justified in light of other types of boats and their pricing, But I’ll standby what I said before that nothing sells for as bloated prices as the large center console market in America. It is out of control. In any event. They can’t slash prices. I just looked and in Malibu’s last quarterly report, net income margin was less than 5%. About 11% EBIDTA margin. While it is of course not exact, if Malibu dropped prices 5%, it literally generates no profit. That is not going to be happening. As it relates to the expense of building boats in this market, inboard pricing is actually quite reasonable IMO. Tesla can cut prices and still make a profit. They’ve demonstrated that. The big three can’t do that, IMO. All they can do is scale back production to let market demand catch up to what they can provide for a price people are willing to pay

Just for discussion sake, I can agree that inflation and global economy issues didn’t affect their buyers which is obviously represented by significantly higher revenues, despite far less (increase) in units. The obvious conclusion is that they were able to charge more per unit than the previous year. However, that’s the (lack of) top line effect of inflation. Given that their operating margins were up just 3%, if they were inflation proof on the supply/production side, then in theory their operating margins should’ve been up 17%, in line with their revenues. Said another way, it could be argued that those numbers reflect a 14% increase in its expenses associated with each unit produced…inflation….it just so happens that their buyers can afford that absorption, but I don’t we can conclude inflation didnt affect their financials substantially.