Ski Flying Revived?

Edbrazil

I wonder if this event could get revived. Not as a regular event, but as a special event maybe just once a year. With a proper site and plenty of time for training. At least a week-long deal, with lots of practice and even coaching. Thinking of initially just for Open Men and Open Women. FYI, the ski flying records are 312' men and 228' women. An interesting comparison is with standard jumping and snow ski flying. Waterski Mens jump record: 254'. Snow ski flying record: 253.5 meters. Now, if we could only find a lake with a hill in it.

BraceMaker

Would modern boats have the ooomph to handle it?

disland

All you need is a sponsor. $$$

bojans

@BraceMaker
Slap a blower on a 6.2 and I think you would be good to go.

Edbrazil

In a word: NO. The Ski Fly boats circa year 2000 were special boats, such as the Mastercraft Beast and the Correct Craft USA1. Art Cozier and Rob Shirley would know more details, but they were probably in the range of 500 hp. Note: Men speed 72 kph (44.7 mph) Women 66 kph (41.0 mph). High-hp boats are needed.

BraceMaker

@Edbrazil not to mention it was in a time when the "base engines" were not nearly so beastly as the hulls didn't need it to pull 36 mph slalom skiing. I would think if we're now in an era where 300 hp doesn't get a hull to 36 mph we're also in an era when those boats would need a LOT more engine to give the sort of sustained power/speed needed for skifly to return.

lazzn

Aren't there still 2 supercharged 7.4 2015 MC's running around somewhere from the MC throw down when Freddy broke the record last?

Bruce_Butterfield

I would love to see it. I think the best approach would be to bill it as the X-Games extreme sport that it really is.

Roger

The new 6.2 Nautique's that I have driven have so much power that I can cavitate the prop at will. Not sure it it's enough for ski fly, but it's way more than 36mph slalom or 35mph jump needs...

BraceMaker

@Roger What about 45 mph jump? Also how much faster would the skifly jumper want it in that second segment? AWSA lets the 35mph jump speed be ~3mph higher in second segment to allow the boat to stay with big distance jumps, that'd probably also have to be correspondingly a larger number like say +5 over nominal.

Be interesting to see if there are many mumpers out there intrigued by this.

Jody_Seal

Building a ski fly specific boat would not be that difficult all it takes is money. I know of a few jumpers that would like to see some sort of ski fly event maybe once or twice a year.
When we started the program sometime in 97 I installed a Python 502 in a bubble butt. did three more in 98. Then in 99 Ford Marine and PCM teamed up and provided us with 2 Metric 5.4 Lightning engines we ran those for three seasons until in 2002 we ran supercharged 6.0 LS engines till the end of the ski fly run.
Plenty of supercharged LS marine products and even some natural aspirated high HP marine applicable power plants that would suite the purpose..

BraceMaker

@Jody_Seal - would you be able to get the ZO/ECM work for those engines done?

Jody_Seal

@BraceMaker
Drive it by hand!

andjules

I share the temptation and excitement around this idea.

That said, after a little reflection, it's important to balance this against some rationalism:

1. How does this work for the jumpers? once or twice a year we'd like to change the specific conditions you train for in your already-incredibly-dangerous sport. We'd like to make it even more dangerous, and practice for this once-or-twice-a-year thrill-fest requires you to find a specially-built ramp.
2. Yes, waterskiing needs some innovative ideas to grow the sport and build excitement. That said, if you're not a hardcore skier, e.g. a new spectator... is it really that much more exciting to see a guy go 304' vs 254'? It's already an incredibly exciting sport to watch. Except to a few of us, I'm not sure it adds much.

Imagine once a year, there was a NASCAR race with the usual drivers, but they have to bring a rocket-powered car with skinny tires. It would be really interesting to some die hard fans, not particularly interesting to others, arguably financially silly, but above all... irresponsibly dangerous. NASCAR is exciting enough. You don't need to work harder to set the athletes up for failure.

Edbrazil

Note that the Rules (Rule 18 IWWF. Rule 18.07) only time the first segment. And allow the boat speed to climb 8 kph in the 41m segment, although that isn't measured. I wonder if ZO can be set up for a 72 kph boat speed in jump, with the current software version. May need some special ZO software. Wonder what they did for Freddy's jumps at the Throwdown event?

DW

Certainly doable, not that difficult to get the power needed for a specific event like this one. May not be a mass produced engine with full warranty, but power level needed can be done. It will be quite a bit more than when the thinner, lighter boats pulled. A marinized LSX would do the trick. Jody could do it by months end easily...

@andjules : NASCAR actually does it 4 times a year - Daytona and Talladega, that is where the term 'the big one' comes from which usually takes out about 25% of the field.

BraceMaker

@Edbrazil - So that's right on 50 mph allowed in the 41m and I'd expect the people going furthest want the most, 80 kph = 49.7MPH boat speed.

50 mph is usually kind of a special prop for these boats even to reach it footing.

UWSkier

Bring back the Response SS. Most bonkers, hardest accelerating ski boat ever made. Look at the doghouse to hold that 8.1L monster! lol

Broussard

@lazzn those MasterCraft hulls from the throwdown are still around, but the 7.4s, engine boxes, and high pylons were removed and replaced w/ standard equipment.

@Edbrazil I believe they let the boat go full throttle after the ramp for skifly at throwdown

Jody_Seal

ski fly boat!!

Chef23

It would be a cool exhibition In something like the Xgames but it doesn’t have enough athletes for it to be a regular sport in the event. There are probably not more than 6-8 skiers that I could see taking the risk.

Wayne

@Jody_Seal do you know a guy named Curtis Collie? He was one of the engineers at Ford that worked on the 5.4 supercharged engine and has one of the ski fly Nautiques. It lives on a lake here in Michigan and sees regular slalom use. It still looks like a new boat too.

oldjeep

Why couldn't you use something way more efficient than a ski boat and put a tower on it? My old 3.0l bayliner had a higher top speed than most dds

liquid d

Because that would be sacrilegious

BraceMaker

@oldjeep Higher top speed, but for instance our 5L OMC runabout goes 56mph on gps, a skier at 34 mph cutting back and forth not even wake crossing will drop it by 4-5 mph and it doesnt recover quickly at all. I/Os are efficient but dont have the traction.

Broussard

@oldjeep like BraceMaker said, it probably won’t be able to hold the speed with the load of a skier and won’t track as well as an inboard.

j2nh

How about we not do this.
Boats and ramps could be built but at 45mph, 90' spectra ropes and massive cuts the falls will be horrendous. I love jumping, can't do it anymore given my back and knees, but like slalom the thrill is in the competition and not necessarily in the distance or buoy count.

If you don't get a chill seeing someone jump 200+ @35 off a 6' ramp then I don't think you appreciate the skill, danger and dedication of the athletes doing it.

Edbrazil

Such an event would certainly need big $$$ prize money.

BraceMaker

@j2nh wasnt it done previously at the request of elite jumpers?

j2nh

BraceMaker, Scott Ellis was a major driver for Ski Flying at it's inception. There were some immediate problems as some sites could not accommodate the wider widths and longer outruns. Scott had plans for modifications for existing jumps if my memory serves me correctly.
One of the big advantages was, and again this is just from memory, was the angle was reduced for the ski fly ramp vs the traditional at 6'. Much easier on the knees.

It was an interesting experiment and I believe they even did it at the Masters one year.

All I can say is just because you can doesn't mean you should. The falls in Open division jumping are vicious. Add speed, add height, 90" skis, thin margins for error. Late cut, wind gust, any one of a million variables and big injuries can happen. My personal opinion is I just don't see the need.

E_T

Would love to see ski flying back and the bot company's would put together a boat no problem. I'm sorry but women should not be involved. After seeing 5 out of 6 crash one year I would rather see them hit a 6' ramp at men's speed