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Power Turns!!!! Stop the Madness!!!
If you dont know what I am talking about and you pull a skier or wakeboarder or a tube where people are trying to ski or wakeboard you may be part of the problem.
Power Turns as far as water sports go are when you stay on plane while turning back to pick up your rider after your rider falls.
The problem with power turns : Every time a boat makes a turn on plane it throws its wake towards where it just turned away from. The wake will continue to travel and divide into smaller and smaller swells. I have seen these swells travel almost a mile off of loaded wakeboard boats.
The overwhelming majority of us dont want to ride in swells... If you didnt know that take my word for it.
We cant do much to stop tubers from being tubers but it is really screwed up when people are wakeboarding and they are the ones doing it. I have seen people make turns where I ride in Florence that almost use the whole width of the river and have seen people whip 180 turns like they are on wave runners. They are all generating swells and they are all turning to picking up there riders wrong.
What are you supposed to do? When your rider falls you bring the throttle to idle while going straight ahead. As the boat comes off plane at idle you can begin your turn as soon as you are not generating a wake. Travel straight back to your rider. You can pull them back right where you came from or make a small turn around them and continue the direction you had been going.
Pro's of no power turns
Your rider is never left exposed to a boat that may try to avoid you when your making your power turn or any other boater who may not have realized you dropped a rider. If your rider gets hit he or she will likely be dead. It is much safer especially on the river where everyone is usually traveling up or down the river. I have had boats follow right behind me and had I done a power turn my rider would have likely been run over. I have also had boats come straight at me and the same could have resulted. Another boat will see another boat before they see a downed rider.
Your not beating up your boat doing hard turns on plane or crashing through your own wake every time someone falls. Think cracked gelcoat and stressed rudders and fins especially if your loaded with ballast
Your rider doesnt have to get up and ride in the swells you have just created nor does anyone else who is around you. Its better for beginers and appreciated by more advance riders.
When you only travel in straight lines while on plane or nearly on plane you your swells go to the shore.
Be courteous to other riders!
Dont make power turns in the middle of the run you or anyone else is using,B]ever[/B]
Dont make a power turns at the end of your run if there are people riding beyond where you are riding. You will ruin there spot.
Try to travel within the wake of other boats so your wake and theres goes to the shore and the center line everyone is running stays smooth. You cant run one side and me the other it just doesnt work. You will be in my wake on the way back and I will be in yours.
I have been out riding with three other wake boats sharing the same section of smooth water and never had a problem because we followed these rules.
I have also been out when it was just my boat, a guy fishing in a jon boat and a 80,000 x star that was driven by a guy that did a power turn everytime his rider fell. We had to wait till he left to ride. He blamed the swells on all the boat traffic when there was none... It was all him and he didnt even realize it.
if you find no sense in what I have written google it, youtube it, or get a wakeboard DVD, driving the boat is the first thing they teach usually on the DVD's and they wont be teaching power turns. Pass it on so we all can have better conditions to ride.
Thanks for reading to the end, Dennis S
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