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Portable Slalom Course Use 101

By Ed Obermeier

Attach your second (end) anchor to the end anchor lead at the end of the mainline as described earlier and also attach an anchor buoy line to the anchor (woven nylon rope is recommended because it will not float and therefore cannot be easily snagged by the boats running gear). This line should be at least 10' - 15' longer than the water depth so that its buoy will be washed out of the way by the boat wake while you're skiing. Drop the end anchor into the water and have the driver line the boat up with the center of the course as you pay out the anchor buoy line. Attach a buoy (preferably green so it can't be confused with any of the other buoys) to the end of the anchor buoy line.

Once the boat is lined up with the center of the course, hang onto the end of the anchor buoy line as the driver idles away from and in line with the center of the course in short on-and-off bursts, pulling the anchor along with you and thereby creating tension on the mainline as you go. It is important to have good communication with the boat driver here. Have your driver idle ahead slowly as you pull on the anchor buoy line. When you feel good tension on the mainline and the course is pretty well aligned have the driver put the boat in neutral. When you feel the tension lessen have him bump it ahead again until you have good tension again. Repeat this process until the mainline has good tension on it and the course is decently straight (it need not be perfectly straight at this point though). Then release the anchor buoy line. Allow a few minutes for the course to "settle in" and finish aligning itself under the tension you've applied to the mainline. Any rope, string etc under sufficient tension can do only one thing - that is to form a straight line. This is what happens to the mainline when you apply tension to it, it forms a straight line and thus a straight course. If after giving the course an opportunity to settle in it needs further straightening retrieve the anchor buoy and repeat the process. A little experience will teach you just how much tension you'll require to get your course to go straight.

Important Note: Never, ever, ever attach either the mainline or anchor buoy line to the boat in an attempt to pull tension to straighten the course. You're only asking for trouble. Doing this can overstress the mainline and buoy arms creating a potential for serious structural damage or at a minimum pulling your anchors loose from the bottom. If your anchors are properly locked-in you will be able to tension and straighten the course using the method described above.

Common Problems and How to Avoid Them

Here is a list of the most common problems you're likely to encounter with a portable slalom course and how to avoid them.

It is recommended that you orient your course so that any potential breeze that might come up blows along the length of the course, as opposed to blowing across it. This will help to keep your course from bowing in the center in a breeze. Center bow caused by a crossing wind is probably one of the most common problems encountered while using a portable slalom course. This points out one of the biggest shortcomings of any portable-type course, or of any course that is anchored at only two points for that matter. It is nearly impossible to tension the mainline of a portable course enough (without potentially damaging something anyway) to keep it absolutely straight in a strong enough crossing breeze. Using massive anchors and a steel cable mainline under very high tension (both of which create problems of their own) are the only way to get a portable course to even approach perfectly straight in a crossing wind. A slight bow won't keep you from practicing (which is what a portable is really designed to be used for), and if it gets too windy you won't be doing much skiing anyway! Heavy steel cable and massive anchors will render your "portable" course much less portable, defeating the purpose of even having a portable course to begin with. That's just one of the design trade-offs that must be made to create a "truly portable" portable course. Avoiding sites where you'll encounter crossing winds is the ultimate answer to this problem.

Begin your installation at the end of the course from which any potential wind might come so that when you remove your course from the water you'll be pulling yourself against the breeze as you retrieve the mainline. This will help to keep your boat from being blown over and into the mainline rope or buoy arms and tangling it in them as you're removing your course.

If your course won't go straight or stay straight it is most likely caused by one or both anchors not holding into the bottom, which keeps the mainline from maintaining sufficient tension. This suggests that you need longer anchor lead lines, better anchors, or both. Experience dictates that the ratio of anchor lead to water depth should ideally be 4:1. That is, four feet of anchor lead for every foot of water depth. Three-to-one will usually work but 4:1 or more is generally the ideal.

If the bottom at your site is just a flat plate of solid rock there won't be much of anything for your anchors to grab. This is one place where heavier anchors may help. Add additional anchor weight if you encounter this to help hold your course straight and in place.

Pulling (Removing) a Portable Course

Pulling the course is actually quite a bit less involved than setting it up because you don't have to worry about aligning or tensioning anything. Simply haul it out, pack it up, and go!

Begin by idling up to the anchor buoy. From the rear platform grab it, shut off the boats engine (you'll be pulling the boat along backwards as you retrieve the mainline) and from the rear platform start hauling the end anchor out using the anchor buoy line. Don't forget to rinse the anchor off if needed before placing it inside the boat, and do not remove it from the mainline until it's securely inside the boat for obvious reasons. Note: If for some reason you chose not to use an anchor buoy line, or if you've lost the buoy, you can start at the entry/exit gate and pull the anchor up from there. Do so by retrieving one of the end gates buoys. Pull up the buoy line until you have hold of the end gate arm. Grab the mainline and work your way back towards the anchor by pulling on the mainline until you can pull the anchor up.

Once the anchor is out, pull yourself to the entry/exit gate. Have a helper roll the mainline up onto its reel (located inside the boat) as you go. Pull the end gate up, disconnect it from the mainline, and remove and bag the buoys. Next pull yourself along to the first boat lane with a helper inside the boat reeling up the mainline rope as you go. Collapse the second arm section back into the boat lane section and once you've reached the point where the rest of the arm attaches to that section remove the remainder of the arm from it. The helpers will collapse and stow the remaining arm sections and remove and bag the buoys while you're removing the boat lane section from the mainline.

Repeat this procedure for each of the boat lane/buoy arms, remembering to collapse and lock the buoy arms into their stored positions as you go. When you've gotten one gate and three sets of boat lane/buoy arms (half of the course) gathered into the boat, bundle them up with their bundle straps. Repeat this procedure for the rest of the course and you're finished.

Warning: Unless there's still a buoy attached, none of the arm sections will float. Lose your grip on an arm section and it goes over the side, unless you have some scuba gear along it's history! Been there, done that. Consider yourself warned!

Conclusion

That completes the installation and removal process and also covers most of the common issues involved with the successful use of a portable slalom course. Hopefully this will answer many of your questions and help to remove some of the mystery that may have been involved for you. With a little experience and by paying attention to a few common sense issues you can quickly set up a portable slalom course anywhere you like, ski until your arms fall off, yank it out, and go home without giving it a second thought. As you can see it is actually a pretty simple process using a very uncomplicated system.

Should you desire any additional information or have any questions on the subject of portable slalom courses the author will be happy to address them for you. You can contact him by sending e-mail to Ed@EZ-Slalom.com or by calling him toll free at 800-216-4461 anytime from 8AM - 10PM Central Time Monday through Friday.