Waternut

Can always heat and remold a hardshell boot to accommodate your needs if a heat movable liner isn't enough.

Can always heat and remold a hardshell boot to accommodate your needs if a heat movable liner isn't enough.

I think the problem with public ski schools and commercial ski lakes is they are extremely expensive and yet have very low profit margins. I believe we've done it to ourselves by demanding the latest and greatest equipment and boats and anything less is frowned upon. I would absolutely love to ski a 1-2 year old boat on a beautiful lake with a well known pro to help me out all the time. The price I typically pay for that is somewhere around $75-$100/set. However, skiing at a friends lake who openly welcomes new skiers and has a 2000 ski nautique with perfect pass and no coaching but has the occasional weed problem charges $12/set and I'll ski with him every chance I get. What happened to getting out on the boat with a group of friends who have a passion for watersports? You grab your wakeboarding buddy, someone who can ski the course at 28mph on a good day, the guy who can ski into 38off, the guy who's funny but is a terrible skier, and his girlfriend who wants to learn and you have a fantastic day on the lake. This is what I try to do several days a week and I feel like "growing the sport" is easy even in an area where people aren't active or outdoorsy.

I think the problem with public ski schools and commercial ski lakes is they are extremely expensive and yet have very low profit margins. I believe we've done it to ourselves by demanding the latest and greatest equipment and boats and anything less is frowned upon. I would absolutely love to ski a 1-2 year old boat on a beautiful lake with a well known pro to help me out all the time. The price I typically pay for that is somewhere around $75-$100/set. However, skiing at a friends lake who openly welcomes new skiers and has a 2000 ski nautique with perfect pass and no coaching but has the occasional weed problem charges $12/set and I'll ski with him every chance I get. What happened to getting out on the boat with a group of friends who have a passion for watersports? You grab your wakeboarding buddy, someone who can ski the course at 28mph on a good day, the guy who can ski into 38off, the guy who's funny but is a terrible skier, and his girlfriend who wants to learn and you have a fantastic day on the lake. This is what I try to do several days a week and I feel like "growing the sport" is easy even in an area where people aren't active or outdoorsy.

There is www.wakescout.com. It doesn't have every site and it gets littered a bit with boat rental sites but it's pretty good.

Tower or not....get the wedge and take it off and put it in the boathouse if it's a dedicated slalom boat. It's much harder to get that added since you can't just buy it from Malibu and install it yourself.

I've driven an I/O bowrider where the steering failed like that at probably 35mph. We weren't drafting a boat and were in clean water. Probably had 5 people in the boat at the time. When the steering cable disconnected itself, the steering cranked hard over and we came to an almost immediate stop. People who were in seats didn't really even shift in the seat but one guy was sitting on the rail and he got thrown out. We all figured he was lucky but he thrown well clear of the boat. IMO, sitting on the rail or standing is more dangerous than not wearing a lanyard in any kind of semi-deep hull boat.

@texas6 and @Bruce_Butterfield I totally agree with both of you but after 2-3 years of inconsistency trying every conceivable method of getting wide and rolling in that people tell me is the "correct way", I still can't make it work right. So I figured my options were to either try something else, quit skiing, or keep failing miserably doing the same thing expecting different results. I chose to try something else and it's been working for the last couple years and my consistency has gone up massively... The whole premise of my post was that sometimes when all else fails and you're getting frustrated with people telling you to do the same thing that isn't working, it may be time try something new. Not saying it's right and not saying everyone else is wrong but what I CAN do and what people want me to do are often not the same thing.

Still waiting for someone to sell me their ZO boat with 2000+ hours for the same price as an 80's Prostar with 300 hours.....ya know because so many people believe that 1000 hours is outrageous and would never buy a boat with hours that high.

I know the standard mentality on this forum and amongst high end skiers is get as wide as you possibly can. Maybe that works for most people but it's a sure fire way for me to NOT run the pass. I can get deep into 35off on a good day and still can't "get wide" even at 22 or 28off. I guess if you have a slow roll in and waste 5-10 feet, that works but I simply cannot do what I consider a normal roll in and maintain angle through the wakes if I'm that wide. I'm completely out of steam and nearly flat at the wakes and getting pulled downcourse with way too much speed at 1 ball. Definitely way more speed than I can bleed off. Angle and intensity is what I focus on for both pull out and rolling in towards the gate. In fact, if I'm consistently struggling at 28 or 32off, my fix is usually to readjust my gates and go narrower.

Guess REEsponse is better than a "Mastercard Prostate"

I know this was a slightly older thread that got revived but I skied all of last year and a half pain free. I've been skiing harder and taking more slack hits than I had in previous years too. When I'm not skiing in the winter I'm mountain biking which aggravates my elbow just as much. I typically ski open water 2-3 days a week and the course 2 days a week with usually 2 sets each day. What I did to fix the issue: 1. Tried the flexbar....maybe it helped but I never really noticed a change. 2. I thought a radius handle was the solution but it didn't do much. If anything just switching back and forth between radius and straight changes how you pull ever so slightly. 3. If you haven't changed your rope recently or you can't remember when you changed it last....do it now! If we've been using a rope too long, my elbow pains will come back. 4. Arms straight!!!! This was probably the biggest thing! This means your pull through the wake and just riding behind the boat and wiping the water off your face. I did it a lot going through the wake because it feels more defensive. Trust your ability and the boat and straighten your arms out. Also, when I wipe my face after getting up, I noticed that I would bend my elbow slightly which would cause extreme pain. I now mentally ensure my arm is completely straight.

The other option is to take the boat to a friends house (aka the shop) to be fixed for a few days several times a year. Deposit $1000 into a random account. After a few trips of that and a few years, you'll have a stash of extra money to help pay for the next boat and lots of repair bills to help justify a new boat to the wife.....the extra money may also help with the divorce. haha

I look at almost all of them especially SIA but I must say that every boat I've bought and sold has been from craigslist.

Sounds like maybe that boats first mod.... Stainless steel hinges I'm a tweaker/modder at heart but I've never been on a single boat that I thought couldn't have been improved with just a little more thought and consideration from the start. I will say the 2 rubber hinges on the late 90's/early 2000's nautiques were fine by me but the front latches were a gigantic PITA. Haven't seen a boat with just 1 rubber hinge though. Have to weigh your options because external hinges can be kicked and stepped on but those internal rubber hinges are clean and out of the way. Sleek and clean sells easier than functional and ugly.

Awesome thanks! Just ordered one.

Well there is no doubt I'm an idiot.....however, all the perfski holiday banners on this site are for ski's only. Trust me, I looked and even double checked to make sure I wasn't posting something stupid....like this. I also went straight to the site to see if maybe they were running vest sales as well but I only looked at Eagle vests and I guess they don't really have a "last years model" so I didn't see the deals on all the other brands. Thanks for the instagram link. I'll look and see if I'm interested in any of the other vests.

Curious if anyone knows if any companies out there are running some specials on comp vests. Would love to get an Eagle vest but it's tough to find deals on those.

I don't really change my ski for water or conditions but more for changes in my own ability/habits. Usually only a few times a year and it typically takes a few weeks of the same kind of problem before I'm willing to make adjustments.

@bracemaker Yes...shallow boats rock! In fact, that's one thing I absolutely hate about new boats. They're so deep and isolated from the elements, it's like you aren't even in a boat. Heck, a lot of the wakeboard boats require you to stand up and reach over the side just to touch the water.

Waterski gloves need to be wet to feel right. IMO, if it's too much work to make a fist with gloves when they're wet, it's because they're too small. I generally say that if you can put on a pair of waterski gloves dry, they're probably too big. I'm between sizes as well and the Radar ergo's run a bit small IMO. Definitely smaller than the Radar BOA's. The ergo's fit me now but it took a while to break them in. Trust me, you want the gloves to curve your fingers. Even the Radar Vice gloves that have the strap to help close your hands under load don't cause any issues with letting go. They cause issues with trust IMO though because I can't tell how good of a grip I have on the handle.

Definitely go 67". Good for now and if you stick with 34mph only, that ski will still be good. Too small of a ski will be really tough at slower speeds.

I like how @ski6jones clarified this but then again I never knew any other timing method for pull outs other than where the boat is in relation to the 55's. Generally speaking though, at -28 to -35, I'm pulling out right about the time the bow goes through the 55's. I generally just hold the outbound edge on the shorter lengths a bit longer. The only exception is my typical 32mph -28 opening pass to warm up where I pull out with the boat halfway through the 55's.

Yeah I saw Radar had a new anti-roll handle but honestly I never really noticed handle roll. However, I loved the idea of being able to spend an extra $20 and switch to a radius handle, elliptical, V shape, or straight round handle as my hands and joints decided the need. It's painful trashing 2 or 3 $100+ handles a year just because they've been chewed up and hurt your hands or elbows. Maybe Radar felt they weren't selling because people just bought one.

Are these handles completely gone now? I can't seem to find them anywhere anymore. All of the guys I ski with love them. I know one of the guys has been through about 4 replacement handles and he's re-strung it twice now. I just broke the rope on mine after 3 handle changes last weekend. I'd re-string mine too but I let go of it when it broke and probably won't be able to get it back.