kmenard

@stevezie I am trying to buy a camper and the person selling it was asking more than JD Power said it was worth...she thinks she will get more money for it as the season starts...guess we will see.

19 hours ago, Horton said:

Imagine being the guy who interviewed a PR person from Malibu and believed that the TXi was not going away.

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@DonT

My guess is the event will continue. The only question is if the name will change.  Title sponsors change. It happens.  

It will heretofore be known as the Malibu closed

I wonder what the major sport equivalent of this would be... Probably not Brady to Tampa...but...

In this industry...you either lead...or follow...

@RAWSki I think the Tige SLM is a total sleeper boat!

In only pictures...demonstrate that too many of us are getting bored while waiting for the weather to change so we can argue about what the proper way to describe waterskiing movements is. 

On 2/10/2024 at 9:32 PM, Scotty said:

So this thread really hit home with me as it does with all of you.  I’m a newb here but not new to strictly recreational slalom.  I’ve owned 4 ski boats so far and my latest is a 2001 Gekko GTR 22.  Why?, because it’s an awesome boat for what 99% of the market will ever need.

What has to be realized is that 99.999% of skiers will never ski at a competitive level, they  just want to have fun

It’s my belief that the reason skiing is dying is simple, the coast of a new boat is just too damn expensive for the average enthusiast to purchase, period.

 

 

 

As a fellow Gekko owner, I think we need to rethink the argument of the sport is too expensive....or at least the boats. The reason why less boats are being made is because they can sell MORE EXPENSIVE boats. Indmar just served me an ad today saying they are going to start building boats...the ad looked like a wake boat, and jet powered at that.

So, you have manufacturers making the decision to make more money...because they can, and who can blame them? The demand for Malibu...the value priced boat...which hasn't been touched in a few years design wise (and imho has massive variations in quality from hull to hull) is PROBABLY getting out of the niche market to sell more profitable boats...but what is the REAL difference between our sport and wake boarding and wake surfing?

Because of the latter, you can't do the former on public lakes. It isn't the boats...it is the venue. A public lake can have hundreds of people on it at a time tubing, wake surfing, pontooning, etc. A private lake can have 1,2,maybe 4 at a time. Give me a learn to ski day at a private lake and I can turn people into skiers all day long. Give me a learn to ski day on a public lake and MAYBE I can get them into show skiing or something similar, or recreational slalom skiing...but to run the course from 3am to 5am? Well...that is going to be pretty limiting.   

13yr old daughter, 2 weeks at Coble...17yr old son...skiing in college next year. I AM NOT CRYING, YOU ARE!

Check out family weeks at Coble. You can still helicopter parent your kid and get waterskiing in 🙂

Some live, some on replay...and I have learned I pretty much need to be off this site and social media before the replay.

1 hour ago, BKistler said:

@kmenard Oakham, as in Lex Carroll?

Yes.

The Goodhues are great people, so I am super excited for their whole family. For anyone wondering what the connection is, they used to own the Oakham site and hosted many ski tournaments. It was one of the most welcoming sites you could ever visit.

I am all in on snowboarding right now, but still missing my waterskiing days here in New Enlgand. So I tried to find a soundbite of 6.2l boat starting up just to get that little butterfly feeling back in my gut right before missing my opener, and I can't believe I can't find that...would have been such a great ringtone 🙂

@B_S beat me to it...I was hoping for the secret picture with the ummm....life preservers 

At this point, my guess is this has more to do with an insurance company saying you have to have than anything else. I will say it again, the fact that the most obvious SS violator has a ski full of sponsorships tells me it is all window dressing, and IF YOU GET THE QUESTION RIGHT, YOU SHOULDN'T THEN HAVE TO WATCH THE VIDEO TO TELL YOU WHY YOU WERE RIGHT! I have no problem with the 'training', I have a big problem with wasting my time. 

Got to ski with her and her dad at Cobble. An impressive skier for sure and a pretty great kid. I will be curious if she does the tour after college.

Another for In Tow

@Hallpass What else is on the list?

We have ASU and Clemson on the list. If we attended the A&M weekend his 20 year UTSeason ticket holding grandfather would have cut us all out of the will 🙂 

I seem to be the only one, but I still want to see some occasional footage of the driver and what it takes to pull a short line skier. How much is the wheel moving with Freddie or with Regina? Just a perspective we never see.

If you see an upside down pinapple....oh...different kind of swing...nm.

When someone asks what is your PB, do you give your tournament PB, your practice PB, or both?

Even knowing she got the record, I watched that one ball and thought...no way she makes this. Mid pass it looked like she was going to run it. Man I love watching her ski...perfect balance of guts and technique. 

13 hours ago, dave2ball said:

Myself and some others were talking about this issue in the officials shack during the MC pro. Not head to head but how to make the sport more appealing for slalom. One thought was you get 4 passes. That would force skiers to start shorter or opt up making the event more exciting. We all agreed in the shack that it is boring watching the top skiers run 32,  35 and even 38. And as of now with out minimum rope length starts the boat makes 6 passes. 
this thought should be taken into a new topic I believe if it gains traction.  

While eating my cardboard cereal this morning and reading this it struck me that big tournaments used to be for the spectators, and then it became really for the skiers, but now with TWBC really putting out a great product...who are they for now? Are they still for the top level skiers? Are they for the spectators? Or are they for the viewers? 

At the expense of a skull and cross bones? Where is the WTF emoji?!?