lottawatta

If you remember tying your jump skis together and soaking them before you jump.

If you remember the smell of the 2 stroke smoke behind the twin rig hydrodyne.

The passenger side throttle was for kite flying. Late 60's and early 70's was the heydey for the kite tournaments. Somewhere in my archives I have an AWSA Kite tournament rule book.

Disconnect battery as soon as possible to slow down corrosion. I am sure any good mobile marine mechanic can vacate the motor and trans of water where it is. If you are doing it yourself, need to get fresh oil circulated in the motor. Need to get it started if possible. If the electronics are shorted out and you cant get it started, you at least need to get the oil flowing by spinning the motor as much as you can. flush trans, same deal, need to get fresh fluid circulated. Drain the fuel tank. WD40 on all electrical connections.

I am a big fan of keeping things simple. I suggest a set of Wiley bindings purchased through a forum supporting vendor such as Performance ski and surf.

2013 should have had Beede instrumentation, not Medallion like previous years. The speedo is dependent on the GPS being operational. I can send you the 2013 Beede Manual (you won't find it on Mastercrafts Resource page) which shows how to calibrate the Speedo. However, without ZeroOff operational, I doubt the calibration will change anything as that system relies on ZeroOff for the speed. PM me your contact info and I can send you a PDF of the calibration procedure.

What jumper doesn't like the ramp to be a little "open" with a headwind out of the south?

I bought the techmate pro for the same reasons as you. I could not be happier. Two reasons I went with the techmate instead of computer software. First, the stand alone tool is way more durable than a laptop. Second, If one of my ski buddies or a promo guy needed it at a tournament, I could just hand them the techmate and not my laptop. Having said that, I am sure the software package works just as well.

My deepest condolences to the family. Dr. Horton was a true visionary of our sport. So sorry for your loss.

The process to bid on worlds is available on the iwwf website (iwwf.sport). Basically, you declare your intent to bid by contacting the iwwf pres and secretary general and chairman of the sport discipline council. They return to you a "list of obligations" and let you know the sanction fee (which I understand changes based on a number of variables). Then you send in an application with a portion of the sanction fee up front and they vote. Having been involved in a world championships in another iwwf discipline, I have first hand info on the process and costs involved. Although the sanction fee is huge, the biggest cost may be the fact that IWWF expects accommodations, full board, transportation for a number of dignitaries (and their spouses) way beyond those required to judge/score/drive. There are meetings, receptions, and banquets, which require space, food, etc. The costs for one of these events is WAY BEYOND what anyone realizes. That is why you don't see the IWWF 3 event worlds in the US. No one is crazy enough to do it. The requirements are so far beyond what it takes to have a RC tournament site and a decent hotel, no one wants to fool with it. It takes HUGE local support (city, convention / visitors bureau, etc.) , a HUGE crew of the local club, etc. to pull one of these off. I participated in organizing the one I did in an effort to build up to hosting an elite 3 event Worlds. But after what we went through, it would be pretty difficult to get me to want to organize another. A guess on my part, would be that the LOC of this years worlds would have had to spend north of $350k to do what they did. I don't have first hand knowledge, but I have heard the Putrajaya LOC made significant improvements to the site including breakwater and bank enhancement to improve conditions over previous world cup events held there. While I don't agree with the organizer's efforts to belittle the athletes who didn't like the conditions, I sympathize with his frustrations. Working his arse off for years to organize this and have the athletes who won run their mouth about poor conditions would piss me off to no end. 75 or more % of the time, effort, and money associated with this event was spent on things not directly associated with putting bouys and a jump in the water. I am sure the hospitality for the athletes, families, officials, world council, and dignitaries, was world class even if the water conditions may not have been. Anyone who has been to a world championships would have to admit, water conditions are only one part of the overall World's experience. For some it is a bigger part than others. It was an honor to get to that level, an honor to represent your country. Was it necessary to disparage those who put on the event to make a point to IWWF? One last thing, I am so incredibly stoked for Dane Mechler. Having watched that man grow up at local tournaments, I was so happy to see him in the mix. He is living proof that hard work and sacrifice pays off.

It is rumored that the ilmor is just a rebranded K&N filter. Holding them in my hand, they looked and felt identical. K&N is available online at jegs or summit. I found k&N at my local walmart.

There are a group of skier who maintain a slalom course on Melton Hill. They like to keep it a secret though. Sorry I don't have contact info for any of them anymore. You might be able to make contact through someone at eskimo escapades. www.eskimoescapades.org.

AWSA approved props for 2018 Prostar: 5.7 OJ709 13.9x14.25 4 blade / 6.2 OJ712 14x13 3 blade

I have 50 pound bags from leadwake. Work great, dont move, lay flat, nothing hard to stub your toe on. www.leadwake.com

Follow up: The course is there and is skiable. It was mostly straight and in a decent location. The south shut down area was in about 3' of water with a lot of weeds, the north end was deeper though. It was a little windy yesterday, but my son took his first slalom set since nationals. I would suggest getting there early in the AM to avoid wind and other boat traffic.

Another great job by Marcus. Not to discount any efforts by the officials or organizers of the nationals this year, but Marcus was the hardest working man at nationals. I don't think he ever ate, drank, or even sat down. He was all over the place cameras in hand, but never too busy to take a pic with a kid, answer a question, or give a word of encouragement. He captures the emotions of the event and puts together a professional video every skier can relate to. Imagine what this sport would look like if everyone used their talents and poured their passion into it like Marcus does. Well Done Marcus, and big thanks to HO for their support of Flowpoint TV.

Where is the course on Watts Bar? I will be going down in a few weeks, staying in the Spring City Area. I have been down there several times, and I never remember seeing a course on Watts Bar.

I agree with everyone above, Rent if this is a one time deal. However, if you have a place to store it, and you will use it a couple of tournaments a year, I have had good luck with awesome, barely used equipment I bought from Pawn Shops. Of course, I love to haggle and bargain, but the deals have been outstanding and I have found top quality stuff.

edited to combine with previous post

What if each region was allowed to designate up to 2 "National Qualifiers" in addition to their regional, which would fulfill a regional requirement. Each qualifier must be a three event competition, must be held BEFORE regionals, must be ran the same class (C, E, L, R) as the regional, must be more than 8 hours by car away from the regionals location, and if you ski the qualifier, you can't ski regionals for placement. If you score is level 8 or above, you qualify for nationals, If not, you get another chance at the regionals. Drop regionals qualifications to level 5. Just an idea. Regions could decide themselves if they needed an additional qualifier or two based on where their regional championship was. If it was dead center of the region, maybe they don't need a qualifier. The west might need both qualifiers based on size alone. This would get more skiers qualified for nationals, uphold the regional standards, reduce the excuses about travel distance, etc. etc. It adds skiers to regionals like Scarlet Arrow who would have skied with his kids last year. You wouldn't take too many of the top skiers away from regionals as many of them are officials, council people, have kids that will want the regional experience, have to attend regionals for meetings, etc.

Pretty much everyone I know would like to ski more buoys. If there was a way to incorporate instruction with the tournament and the winner be decided on who improves the most, it might make it interesting. Even guys who run deep shortline can pick up a tip or incorporate a suggestion from someone they don't normally ski with to make their pass easier or ski another couple of buoys. Here is my idea: Skiers will randomly be assigned a team with a captain who is either a great coach, or pro skier, or great ski set up guy, or industry veteran, or national champion, or ? Ideally teams will be 4 or 5 skiers and a coach. First round skiers will ski a tournament round. Those scores are added together to get a preliminary team score. Second round is a coaching set with the teams helping each other and being coached by their captain. Third round, skiers ski a tournament set and scores are added together to get final team score. On and off water theory, technique, ski set up, etc. is encouraged within the teams. Team who improved most between prelims and final wins the BOS prize pack.

It is my opinion that skiers will not pay to travel and enter to ski on a wood ski, or be forced to ski goofy foot, or start at their hardest pass and work down, or whatever else. That stuff sounds fun for a group of guys getting together at the local ski pond or a club tournament, but who is going to pay to travel to a BOS event to do that? Most of the skiers I know that ski buoys do it to challenge themselves to ski faster / shorter. Most skiers I know will still need that traditional tournament round aspect to justify the costs of travel, family time, entry, etc. Not to mention how upset someone would be to get hurt before state, regional, or nationals or whatever event they ski while screwing around on a wood ski when a binding flies off. I assume as a BOS event, it is going to have to stay appealing to the sponsors who sell skis, boats, tournament equipment. I am not sure a ski company would want to sponsor a make your own ski event, or a BYObinding wood ski challenge. My 2 cents, for what its worth.

@RazorRoss3 You ski against your average, your opponent skis against theirs. Whoever beats their average by the most buoys (or gets closest to it) wins and advances to the next round. Pretty easy to do, and you have a chance of skiing more rounds. Have a loser's bracket where the losers get their second round.

How about, "pick your poison", a Buckeye Buoy Tour format, where you pick your competitor and you both ski against your ranking list average.

@razorross, Great, let AWSA promote ZBS as an option at class C local tournaments for the weekend warrior to try to run -38 at 15.5 on a trick ski, whatever floats their boat. If ZBS appeals to a new tournament skier, great, go enter local tournaments that run under ZBS. When they get to a serious competition like state, regional, or nationals, they should be running the same speeds and lengths to determine who is best on that day. Keep ZBS out of state, regional, national championships, and the ranking list. There is no serious comparison that can be made to equate LL at 58k to -32 at 46k to someone outside, (nor many inside) the sport.