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WATERSKI MagazineTom Ramirez offers me a ride. I look at the boat and scribble down the litany of what constitutes a proper ski-racing boat as Tom rattles off the details: 21 feet, 1,200 hp, 534 cid, twin-turbos.
I don crash helmet and an offshore powerboat-style PFD and we idle out to the start/finish line at Mission Bay near San Diego. The observer in a ski-race boat sits in a bucket seat facing backward. A foot brace and two grab rails are provided – one down the side of the seat, the other on the gunwale. Turns out you need them.
The starter flag drops, and my body turns into a concrete brace.
Just as I'm finally able to swallow, Ramirez kicks in some more juice. Holeeeeeee … when I figure we're going faster than I've ever gone on water, we hit the turn and scoot around Radar Island … accelerating!
After the run I ask Ramirez how fast we were going. He smiles down at me, white teeth flashing. “Ah. We got 98 coming up the chute. Pretty fast, huh?”
All I can manage to say is, “They're gonna ski behind these things?”
Cheryl Ruston is 27 and races in the women's open class. She's been around racing her whole life, and is on the comeback after a 95-plus-mph crash on this course in 1996 left her in the water unconscious, lungs and stomach filled with water and her face broken in three places. “Anything up to about 80, 85 is fast. Then there's scary-fast, which is in the mid-90s.”
Charlie Saunders, who competes in the men's open class and once barefooted at 111 mph, says it's “the thrill, the acceleration, the people. It's a sport made by families. And it's great for the youngsters. It keeps them busy training and competing.”
Exciting as the danger is, I can't help thinking about family either. It's everywhere. There's a brother taping his sister's ankles, moms herding youngsters to the gear inspection area, husbands helping wives into their wetsuits, wives kissing husbands good luck. Yeah, it's definitely a family sport. But it's a family sport with guts.
Ski racing is definitely dangerous, and very expensive. Boats in the open division cost in the $150,000 range. Add in travel expenses and $4.50-a-gallon racing fuel, and it gets right up there with one-design yacht racing. The skis are an inch thick and well over 6 feet long with bindings that seem to be stiffer than a steel-belted radial … and they cost as much as the highest-end slaloms. Add wetsuits that look like body armor, a slew of other protective gear and 225 feet of rope, and you understand why everyone in this sport has sport utility vehicles.
At the '97 Nationals there were over 40 boats pulling nearly 200 skiers in 23 race classes and four boat classes. Some of the drivers and observers ski too. Dave Allen, a racer in the 51-and-over class, finishes his heat, gets to the beach, jumps out, dumps his racing gear, suits up in driver's gear, jumps back in the boat and pilots out to the start line to drive in the pro social class.
By the end of the weekend you see a lot of taped and braced knees, shoulders and ankles. There will be three race-related injuries on this weekend, none serious. Fortunately, the races are attended by the San Diego Water Rescue Unit, an all-volunteer operation, composed of divers, nurses, EMTs and medics, that work events all over the southwestern United States.
In summary it's gray-haired drivers and 100-mph ski boats. Water like concrete. Kids going 70. Barbecues and family trucksters. A weekend away from the office and out with the family.
Now, that's what I call water skiing.
