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Proper Skier/Boarder pickup etiquette


malibu_flyer

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Just wondering what is the consensis for picking up a downed rider; get back there qiuck or throttle down as you turn to minimize rollers?? What is the "right" way for most times?? We spend a lot of time in a fairly small river, so getting back to the rider quick is fairly important, but it sends rollers pretty bad and I have gotten some pretty bad yells from others, but I need to get the rider, what is the right thing? I don't trust others to see my kids in the water ...

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The most important thing is protecting your rider. If someone yells at me for power turning in a hurry to get to my downed rider (depending on what kind of mood I am in) they will get an ear full or I will just ignore them. Its pretty much just common sense. If your rider isn't hurt and there isn't any boats around I just putt (sp?) back to them.

Welcome.gif to the site!!! Its great to see another Oregon rider!!! So do you call the poo river home maliflyer?

Edited by jetskipro550
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I let the conditions decide how I circle back. If I feel the downed skier/boarder is in harms way, then I certainly am not worried about the rollers. Had the unpleasant experience years ago of watching a jet skier almost hit my brother after he fell (before I could even start to circle back). A visual I hope to never see again.

Otherwise, I come off of plane before starting to turn back. Helps keep the water nice for the next pull.

Edited by 2 ThumbsUp
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I agree with Jetski. If no imminent danger, take a chill pill on the pickup. If there's a bunch of Wallys around, it's throttle down for me to protect my skier/boarder. Thank God for the Monsoon.

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The most important thing is protecting your rider. If someone yells at me for power turning in a hurry to get to my downed rider (depending on what kind of mood I am in) they will get an ear full or I will just ignore them. Its pretty much just common sense. If your rider isn't hurt and there isn't any boats around I just putt (sp?) back to them.

Welcome.gif to the site!!! Its great to see another Oregon rider!!! So do you call the poo river home maliflyer?

Thats usually what I do also-just intrested in others opinions. Yes, we spend a lot of time in the Willamette, just not this time of year--too many logs.. ROFL.gif

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if you have to get back to your skier fast, your ski'n in the wrong area.

there are times when un expected things happen, but for the most part

i would just move to a safer area.

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if you have to get back to your skier fast, your ski'n in the wrong area.

there are times when un expected things happen, but for the most part

i would just move to a safer area.

sorry mika, i have to disagree with you. I agree with everyone else re: it depends on situations. there are a lot of reasons you might need to get back to the skier faster, and frankly, based on experience, I assume other boat drivers are unpredictable. you might think it's safe, but a bad fall, or just one other boat driver not paying enough attention is all that's needed to warrant a speedy pickup.

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if you have to get back to your skier fast, your ski'n in the wrong area.

there are times when un expected things happen, but for the most part

i would just move to a safer area.

Wrong answer buzzer there mikea...many a time we've been skiing/ boarding when we were swarmed by f'ing lake like. My 5 yr old was skiing last year, out of the way when a group of 6 Sea-doo riders decided it'd be cool to ride next to and behind my daughter skiing at 18mph. WTF was she supposed to do? Drop and get run over? I ended up making some eratic turns to get them to spread out, dropped her in the water. Once she was out of the water it was game on. Good thing the wife held me back as I was ready to run right over the top of those SOB's. Once they stopped, I asked them WTF they were doing...100% oblivious to the situation they put my daughter in. Mad.gifMad.gifMad.gif

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so what i am reading is:

go ahead and ski in an unsafe/questionable area because if needed you can do a power turn and get to your skier quickly?

the question was asked.

"What is the "right" way for most times??"

I implied that i slow down, to not throw rollers and that i move to a safer place to avoid the situation.

I also wrote that there are unexpected times, when i feel that safety is a concern, that a quick return to the downed skier is nessecary.

so go play in traffic if you want, then complain about people putting you in harms way.

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if you have to get back to your skier fast, your ski'n in the wrong area.

there are times when un expected things happen, but for the most part

i would just move to a safer area.

Wrong answer buzzer there mikea...many a time we've been skiing/ boarding when we were swarmed by f'ing lake like. My 5 yr old was skiing last year, out of the way when a group of 6 Sea-doo riders decided it'd be cool to ride next to and behind my daughter skiing at 18mph. WTF was she supposed to do? Drop and get run over? I ended up making some eratic turns to get them to spread out, dropped her in the water. Once she was out of the water it was game on. Good thing the wife held me back as I was ready to run right over the top of those SOB's. Once they stopped, I asked them WTF they were doing...100% oblivious to the situation they put my daughter in. Mad.gifMad.gifMad.gif

I'm making some assumptions here, but I am guessing the jetski idiots were fat, ugly and dumb. The fat can be dealt with over time, the ugly we really don't much care about, but the dumb can not usually even be beat out of miscreants such as these. Perhaps it would have been a good time to invite d*** Cheney out for a day on the water.

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I always let the situation dictate my actions, but 99% of the time I drop the boat of off plane and ture around slow and idle back to my rider.

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so what i am reading is:

go ahead and ski in an unsafe/questionable area because if needed you can do a power turn and get to your skier quickly?

the question was asked.

"What is the "right" way for most times??"

I implied that i slow down, to not throw rollers and that i move to a safer place to avoid the situation.

I also wrote that there are unexpected times, when i feel that safety is a concern, that a quick return to the downed skier is nessecary.

so go play in traffic if you want, then complain about people putting you in harms way.

Mikea, I need to find a place like yours to ski. I'm going out on a limb here but unless you ski only on a private lake, it is not a question of "if something like this might happen", but when it will.

Rank on: Just to expand on my earlier post...after hauling my brother back in the boat, we chased the offending jet skier down the lake. The young lad had the misfortune of falling. Too bad for him because I put the boat between him and his jet ski.

After grabbing him by his life jacket, he attempted to explain that he never saw my brother fall. No shi*...all he was doing was circles as we past by him. Fortunately for him, Mrs. Thumbs (then just another girlfriend) and my brother's former girlfriend pleaded that we not go Andre the Giant on him errrrr pummel the daylights out of this kid. Hopefully, he learned a lesson that day. Rant off

So Mikea...where is this place you ski and never have a "unsafe/questionable" (your words) situation?

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I ski on one of the more under-utilized lakes in northern WI, and there are times when I have to boogie back to my skier/rider in a hurry. It's usually because some a**-hat on a jet ski is being a typical jet skier or some clown in a pontoon boat is too busy waving at people on shore and not looking where they're going.

Can't really argue with what anyone else has said. If my skier takes a bad fall, I'm usually back to them before they surface completely. If another craft is bearing down, I usually get back ASAP. Otherwise, it's idle down, slow turn, then fast idle back to them.

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We generally ski on large public lakes in SW Ohio, Ky & Tn.

Generally (80%) we come off plane and idle back to preserve the smooth water we're skiing/boarding on.

There have been occasions, where we've had to boogie back, sending rollers all over the place to get the boat between the downed rider and a wally paying more attention to his tuber/guests than to where he was going. If this happens, we generally move to a different area of the lake or take a short break until the congestion clears.

We ski glass and board butter often enough that the choppy stuff in a congested area just isn't all that appealing.

Edit - spelling

Edited by weinrdog
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Because I use the wedge, and I don't want to be buying support arms or repairing bent ones, I always come off plane, idle around, and putt back to the rider. We don't have that big of an issue with people following too close, but then again, we don't ride on the big weekends during the summer much either.

Daniel

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I agree with what others have said...the circumstances dictate the action. I'm fortunate enough to have a place to go without a lot of traffic. That being the case it still only takes one walley to create a dangerous situation.

On the other hand, if there's nobody else around and you're pulling me you'd better make darn sure the boat comes off plane before turning back. We require downed skiers to give a wave to the boat after taking a spill. That way we know their ok and there's no need to screw up the water getting back to the skier.

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Wow, powder keg here! There is an off road/rock crawling four wheel drive motto that goes "As slow as possible, as fast as necessary" that applys here. By far, most of the time on reasonable ski lakes you will Not need to do a big power turn. Other boaters, your passengers and your downed skier will thank you for taking the extra 5 seconds to come off plane and idle (or just a Little more than idle) back to the skier. Coming up to the fallen skier slowly is more courteous and just plain safer.

That being said, we all have "what if's" ect. When necessary, nobody should have a problem with getting back to the fallen skier quickly for the sake of Safety.

Now with That being said, there really is NO excuse for doing a big power (Wally) turn for no reason on a glass portion of lake or river!

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Wow, powder keg here! There is an off road/rock crawling four wheel drive motto that goes "As slow as possible, as fast as necessary" that applys here. By far, most of the time on reasonable ski lakes you will Not need to do a big power turn. Other boaters, your passengers and your downed skier will thank you for taking the extra 5 seconds to come off plane and idle (or just a Little more than idle) back to the skier. Coming up to the fallen skier slowly is more courteous and just plain safer.

That being said, we all have "what if's" ect. When necessary, nobody should have a problem with getting back to the fallen skier quickly for the sake of Safety.

Now with That being said, there really is NO excuse for doing a big power (Wally) turn for no reason on a glass portion of lake or river!

I agree. If necessary, we go to the Bat Turn area of the lake and give the lake lice something to play with.

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if you have to get back to your skier fast, your ski'n in the wrong area.

there are times when un expected things happen, but for the most part

i would just move to a safer area.

Wrong answer buzzer there mikea...many a time we've been skiing/ boarding when we were swarmed by f'ing lake like. My 5 yr old was skiing last year, out of the way when a group of 6 Sea-doo riders decided it'd be cool to ride next to and behind my daughter skiing at 18mph. WTF was she supposed to do? Drop and get run over? I ended up making some eratic turns to get them to spread out, dropped her in the water. Once she was out of the water it was game on. Good thing the wife held me back as I was ready to run right over the top of those SOB's. Once they stopped, I asked them WTF they were doing...100% oblivious to the situation they put my daughter in. Mad.gifMad.gifMad.gif

I have almost been in the same situation towing my 7 and 4 year olds tubing. I was the only boat on the lake with a jetskier and they feel compelled to bring their watercraft half a mile clear across the lake to jump my wake while I have my kid in tow. Mad.gif I ended up cutting throttle (daughter was sitting on a tube) leaving no wake whatsoever for the juveninle @ss to wakejump.

I know for a fact that wake jumping in Michigan is illegal. Sure, the proper procedure is to slowly return to the skier / rider to avoid putting up rollers; however, I will take whatever action I deem necessary to protect the safety of my all my passengers including the one that is in the water.

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What really gets me is the wally who is trying to teach someone to ski/wakeboard and slams the throttle down yanking the rope clean out of the skiers hand. He/she proceedes to power turn their stern drive sending rollers everwhere and practically drowning thier skier in the process. As soon as the rope comes tight, here they go again. After a while the skier somehow manages to almost get up then WHAM! There are those rollers.

I agree. There is a time and a place for getting back in a hurry. But for the most part it is come off of plane, turn around and idle back to the skier. For the majority of boaters it is not this way. There is only one way to circle back to the skier. Mad.gif

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Thanks for all of the respones, I figured that there would be some strong oppinions on this one. Where we wakeboard near our home the water is great when there are few boats, but 9 times out of 10 the people we have to watch for are tubers, not jet skies- the drivers seem to really have no clue how much the swerving with a tube in tow craps out the water-plus they really seem to not watch what others around them are doing. We tube some too but I always do it in the crappy choppy areas away from the skiers. Oh, yeah, there are also big cruisers/yachts that go thru there way faster than thay should sending magor wakes to both sides of the river. I was unfortunatly having a pull once and my friend decided to keep going and they nearly left the water when they hit the wake. I let go because I saw it coming and knew the rope was going to jurk out of my hands. The force of the boat hitting the other side of the wake dislodged the battey cables and killed the boat for a while - took us a while to figure out that one. No fun drifting in a dead boat with these big boats rolling by.

We also spend a lot of time at the Cove but have no real problem there because we can go to other areas because of it's size-we will leave a area if it gets busy but at home the space is smaller- cant't wait for summer- I'm white as a ghost!

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Mabey I missed it, but nobody has mentioned picking your rider up on the starboard side. I see people often picking up from port, which is dangerous...you can't see the person in the water. My .02 .

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