Well, I celebrated too soon.

I was so psyched that I figured out how to get up on one ski; I really thought I had it. I had got up 3 out of 5 times from my friend’s boat, and then everytime when I had my lesson which was about 5 or 6 consecutive times.

So yesterday was the start of the weekly waterskiing parties. I came armed with my newfound ability. And you know what? I couldn’t do it!

I used the same technique, on the same ski, and it was even the same lake! But what worked the last few weeks wasn’t working at all. I had a different driver, but I asked her to give me a soft pull. It didn’t feel nearly as soft as the other times even though she said she was going as slowly as she could.

It took about 10 tries, but I finally got up.

But I was baffled. That is until I talked with my friend and he solved the mystery.

The boat itself was different and had a different type of throttle. This boat had a ‘fly by wire’ instead of a throttle cable. That didn’t mean anything to me, but my friend explained it’s almost impossible to drive with a smooth, slow acceleration using a fly by wire.

Instead of the acceleration being controlled by a valve in the engine directly connect to the throttle, it is all computer driven. When you push it, it tells the computer to accelerate. This means that it isn’t very sensitive and it’s impossible to get a level of control out of it that I was used to with the other boats.

That explained it, and it also explained why people were telling me to hunch over. I found that with this type of pull, I did have to do that more.

The second time I finally got up, I had to use a lot of strength to hang on before it got better.

But I’m convinced that the same principles apply as before: if I had the right position in stage 1, it would be effortless to get up.

I just have to figure out how…