Old Guy Learning To Ski

Fun to see new skiers - you did great! The rest of this post is going to be like trying to tell someone how to drive. So take it with a pinch of salt.

You all are doing great.... Just like skiing behind the inboard, the right equipment makes it easier. The rest is practice,practice,practice.

glad to hear that you are having some success! For your wife and deep water starts, I would suggest that if you don't have a deep v handle you should look into getting one. They are very nice for learning.   When you deep start on the slalom ski, I found that it was difficult at first to control direction of the ski, but by putting the tip of the ski into the "V" of the handle, the rope tension will help to keep your ski straight as you figure out the other parts of your start.   

For starting, both Slalom and on doubles, I try to keep my bum on the ski(s) until it the ski's begin to plane, and then stand up.   trying to get up on your feet too fast can pull you off balance (ski's out the front) and will require more muscle, so patience is going to serve you well in the process.

MrMcD wrote: ......... Pick up a couple good slalom skis and use them as your new double skis you will find much more fun, faster turns and far more control..

Good slalom skis prefer to be on edge, not flat. Stay with what you got until you need a fancier slalom. Your current skis don't care about direction, flat or on edge..... and that's just fine. Double slaloms are gonna be a pain..........

As Larry said - Arms out, knees bent, don't look at the water and I would add - "Ski Proud" (chest up). Live it up!

(Having someone around that skis already would be a tremendous help getting through the learning curve).

So, welcome back to skiing albeit on water.
Some thoughts out of the gate for you-
This is new to the body - do not overdo it to soon, you will not heal as quickly as a teenager (applies to both you and your wife)
Give your body (especially your arms and legs time to condition.to the skiing position
On the starts you should only need to ease into the throttle about 1/4 tp 3/8 of the way if you are coming up on 2 skis
If your grip is not that strong right now a pair of gloves will help. However, gloves are not the answer to a WOT start.

Blainey wrote: Poorhouse wrote: Wife ended up not skiing but learned a lot about how hard to "hit it" in an inboard ski boat vs the old out boards she grew up with. What exactly does this mean? Are you saying the power of the inboard requires a little more finesse than just going WOT? I skied as a kid but haven't skied since I was about 10 years old. My boat came with an old pair of combos that I tired to get up on on my birthday and couldn't do it. Not sure what the issue was but I just could hold onto the rope long enough to get up out of the water. I do want to get to the point where I can slalom again, so I'll try again soon but I really didn't expect to not be able to get up.

Yes WOT was to much and would,pull rope out of their hands.
We were going a bit more than half throttle.

Some of you may have followed my boat shopping posts over the last couple years which lead to a purchase this spring.

We now have the boat pretty well dialed in and are comfortable driving it, so it's time to ski!

I'm making this thread to track our progress and solicit feedback, pointers, suggestions, criticisms, face palms, etc.

My goal is to get up on two skies, get comfortable on them then move on to one ski. Wife's goal is to deep water slalom ski start and get better on the slalom ski.

My wife is 44 and I turned 45 yesterday. She grew up skiing, I have never water skied, but have snow skied since I was 5. I thought my snow ski experience would help in the water. My wife wasn't so sure.

First step was buying gear. The wife handled this. Pai of thrift store skies for 10 bucks, rope from Amazon 20 bucks, nice PFDs on sale at Costco. We are outfitted for under $300. We spent more on an inflatable and rope for the 6 year old.

Tuesday of this week wife had the boat out with some girlfriends who planned to ski. This would be the first ski outing. Wife ended up not skiing but learned a lot about how hard to "hit it" in an inboard ski boat vs the old out boards she grew up with. After pulling the rope out of people's hands she got the throttle figured out. The high school girl had skied behind her dads fishing boat. She could slalom ski but not deep water start. She successfully deep water started. She said the pop of the inboard made it easy.
The other woman was a bit younger than my wife and a slalom skier. She failed to get up in about a dozen tries and didn't want to try on two skies. The other woman did not ski.
High school girl also tubed with the six year old. He is fallen in love with her.

So day one was a good outing. Gear all worked, boat did well, and wife got a feel for the boat.

Yesterday for my birthday the plan was an afternoon on the water with family and my first day water skiing. Late start had us to the lake about 2pm. The crew was me, wife, kid and my Dad to act as spotter. It was pretty windy and a lot of boats out including several surf boats so the water was churned up. I didn't think it would make much difference for me as a newly. I was right and wrong about that.

We cruised the lake to find a spot with less traffic. Found a quiet spot and the wind died down, perfect. Wife went first, she gave me some pointers on the throttle and how fast she wanted to go if she got up, 20 mph. She was up on the first try and had a nice long ride. She was about catching up to the boat when she would finish her turns on either side. She did another similar run then it was my turn.

She had given me some pointers on what to expect. I had done a few dry land pulls and watched a few learn to ski videos. I was ready right? We'll sort of. Getting skies on and manoevering in the water was trickier than I thought. It's hard to fight the urge to use your feet to kick when the skies are on. I also had a bit of trouble maintaining balance I while holding the handle in the ready position.
Time to do it. Wife's technique was to drag me for a bit to get used to the feel of the skies pushing the water then hit it on my command. This worked well. First time when she hit it I pushed my legs to much and the skies went out in front of me. Second time I popped out of the water then the skies again went out in front of me. Third time was the charm, popped up and stayed on the skies. Rode in straight behind the boat for 15 seconds or so. Such an awesome feeling! I could have kept going but I saw we were going to have to turn and I started thinking about how that would work and went down.
Took a break to celebrate.

Back out 30 minutes later. Wind was up and surf boats all over. Up again, worked on turning in the wake and wiped out. The idea of putting the ski on edge is like snow skiing but the feel is different. Next ride was a good long one. Made good turns back and forth in the wake. Tried to get out of the wake, was a bit to tense and went down. Tried again and got out of the wake and found out why skiers want smooth water. The chop and wakes made it really rough, down again.
Tried another couple times and had some bad timing. Would try to start just as a wake came by and submarines my skies and I went over the front.
Same result twice and called it a day.

Feeling good this morning. Shoulders a little sore but not bad.

Will be camping this weekend at the lake with the boat and friends with their boat. They are both very good slalom skiers.

Video of first ride coming and pic of gear.