What is wakeboarding

Wakeboarding is a sport where one rides on the surface of the water in the wake generated from a boat with a single outboard motor. It originated from a mixture of surfing, water skiing and snow boarding. Its common thought that wakeboarding is copie

   Wakeboarding is a sport where one rides on the surface of the water in the wake generated from a boat with a single outboard motor. It originated from a mixture of surfing, water skiing and snow boarding. Its common thought that wakeboarding is copied from surfing but the two actually have different characteristics.

Similar to water skiing, the wakeboarder is towed behind a boat, usually at slower speeds (around 16 - 23mph). Beginner wakeboarders start at slow speeds around 17mph and with shorter ropes (40 - 45ft lonfon). As the rider becomes more experienced, they are towed at greater speeds (up to 22.5 - 24 mph). Changes in speed drastically affects the shape of the wake in which you ride, typically the faster the speed the longer the rope that is used (60ft or longer). As opposed to two skis, riders use a single board, known as a wakeboard, which has stationary non-release bindings to fix each foot to the board, standing sideways as on a skateboard or snowboard or. Fins are fixed onto the bottom of the wakeboard to help the board and you catch the water and make precise, spectacular tricks and jumps. The boards are buoyant and usually 118-147cm long, depending on the height and weight of the rider, and up to 46cm wide (wider and shorter than snowboards). Snowboard edges taper in towards the center, whereas the edges of a wakeboard are widest in the middle of the board, with between 15-25cm of taper. Viewed at a side view, wakeboards have a concave shape; this is known as its "rocker". Continuous rocker coards have constant curves and staged rocker (e.g. threee stage rocker) are made up of two or more straight sections at varying angles that roughly make a curve. The more rocker a board has the greater the pop off the wake the rider will achieve, also softer landings and better trick manuvers can be performed.

Boats used for wakeboarding are similar to water ski boards except that the tope is usually mounter on a pole or wake tower about 2 metres above the surface of the water, and the boat is also trimmed and weighted with strategically places ballast tanks (fat sacks), to give a greater wake, or fat sacks filled with sand are places at the rear. Wakeboarding boats also tend to have the engine places at the rear of the boar as opposed to the middle. because of the "V" that must be created in the shaft for the propeller to spin correctly they are commonly called v-drives. Boats that have their engines located at the middle of the boat are called direct drives as the shaft is straight. V-drive coards create a larger wake and are therefore more suitable, the wake created is used as a ramp. Directing the wakeboard by a combination of edges into the water, the rider can move to the outside of the wake, and then cut rapidly towards the wake, hitting it and launching themself into the air. As the rider improves in the sport they come to do spins, grabs and a alot of other tricks high in the air. The tighter the rope the faster the rider rides towards the wake and the greater air they achieve. Riding up and off the wake and into the air the tightened rope launches the rider even higher.

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Written for Bob Spalding. Online retailers of wakeboards and other extreme watersport gear via their website.