Wakes and wet suits

Mississippi Magazine, July-August, 2002 by Joe Zentner

With the smooth tug of a rope and a quick rush of air, the water skier is up. "After that," says one veteran Mississippi water skier, "it's like walking on water." The strange and novel sensations of water skiing lure 40 million Americans to lakes and reservoirs each year. How has this sport, unknown 80 years ago, attracted so many participants?

Cutting through a wake at 20-plus miles per hour, the spray in your face and the wind in your hair, it's easy to see why water skiers describe their sport using such terms as ecstasy and exhilaration. Sensational water ski shows like those staged daily at Cypress Gardens, Florida, water skiing competitions and trick ski tournaments, and television spectaculars all publicize the fact that water skiing is fun and immensely popular.

Long after you have passed beyond the novice stage, it's still fun to cross the wake of your own towboat without taking a tumble. Every maneuver produces its own distinctive, zestful feeling.

While young people in particular have embraced water skiing, the sport actually has no age limits. It's a family activity; everyone from the youngest to the oldest member can learn to ski. Most beginners master the techniques of starting, turning, crossing the wake, and stopping after only an hour or two of practice--and even the practice sessions are fun.

Water skiing in this country began on a summer day in 1924 on Long Island Sound. Before then, people had ridden towed planks called aquaplanes, but on this occasion, a newsreel cameraman named Fred Waller needed an excuse to photograph pretty young women in bathing suits. He connected a pair of snow skis and put a girl on them. Success was instantaneous. Water skiing not only had novelty, but it looked vaguely dangerous. The sport quickly worked its way south.

Perhaps the biggest single boost to water skiing was the starring role Cypress Gardens played in the first Cinerama motion picture production in 1952. On a huge, curved screen, millions of people saw beautiful young women gliding by beneath moss-hung cypress trees, and athletic young men hurtling through thin air on skis. Curiously, the man who invented the Cinerama photographic process was the same man--Fred Waller--who, 28 years earlier, put together the first pair of skis.

At first the sport was limited to the yacht-club and polo-pony class, since it required the use of an expensive inboard speedboat to reach the minimum towing speed of 20 miles per hour. Shortly after World War II, commercially produced skis came on the market at a reasonable price. Around the same time, boats with outboard motors began appearing on lakes, ponds, and other bodies of water. Skiers have been splashing happily behind them ever since, including throughout Mississippi.

But water skiing's appeal extends far beyond the United States. In Europe, the sport has spread from the French Riviera around the Mediterranean through the lakes of Switzerland and Austria, and on to the foggy Thames River in England. It is popular in Singapore, Sweden, South Africa, Australia, and South America. Enthusiasts have skied past crocodiles on the Zambezi River, above Victoria Falls in Africa, and through the lochs of the Panama Canal.

Virtually anyone with access to a boat powered by an outboard motor can learn to get up on a pair of skis in an afternoon. Proper posture--back and arms straight, knees bent--will enable you to keep your balance and help you maneuver on the water successfully.

Don't worry about falling. All skiers fall at times. If you feel a fall coming, throw the tow bar away from you. Then try to fall backwards or let yourself slide down into the water. Some beginners ski the first time they try to get up, but most people average five or six tries before they succeed.

It takes power for a person to lift out of the water and skim along the surface--at least 25 horsepower. Most ski buffs prefer 40, 50, 60, 70, or over 100 hp. It's true, as manufacturers claim, that you can ski with an engine as low-powered as 20 hp, but use must be limited to a light boat, with a light- to medium-weight person in tow. If you plan to buy an engine mainly for skiing, consider one with at least 50 hp.

It takes patience and understanding to be a good towboat driver. Driving a ski boat on a crowded lake has been likened to "driving through a shopping mall parking lot the week before Christmas." Know the distance it takes for your boat to come to a stop, and be aware of all other vessels and markers in your field of vision.

Never forget that your skier is depending on you to steer him or her through safely. The skier is concentrating on turns and is not always aware of other traffic. The driver must act as crossing guard.

Before starting out, explain to the skier what path the boat will be taking, how far up the lake you'll go, whether you will make right or left turns, and where any hazards are located. Driving a ski boat is more than recreation. It's a job to be taken seriously. It is up to the driver to bring the skier back to shore safely.