Visited the AWSEF Hall of Fame and Museum and it inspired him to join a local ski club.

Dave attended a summer camp in 1962 that had extensive waterfront activities, including a 14 foot runabout used for waterskiing. In the yearbook his picture shows him holding a built-with-my-own hands slalom ski, with a ten year prediction caption that said, “Dave is still waterskiing”.  If they only knew!

Since his family wasn’t into water sports, he had little opportunity to do any skiing, except on rare occasions when he came across somebody with a boat.  In his late 20s he afforded a cheap boat of his own and joined the ranks of the Weekend Wally’s sharing water on big choppy lakes.

He wasn’t aware that there was any competition in water skiing until the early 1980s while on vacation he went to Cypress Gardens. During the show the announcer was saying that the “Water Ski Museum” had recently opened nearby. He decided that a visit to the Museum on Overlook Drive in Winter Haven would be a good thing to do.  Dave remembers, “After seeing the exhibits Carole Lowe told me about the AWSA had affiliated clubs all over the United States, including some in my native Chicago area. She also gave me contacts to explore when I got home which I did”. Joining a local ski club he began his adventure to learn more about skiing.

At the age of 36 he entered his first state tournament making 3 buoys, 240 points in tricks and a jump of 32 feet.  Deciding he would never be a threat to anyone in competition he found out quickly that he enjoyed the tournament experience more by volunteering, timing the boat, dock starting or reading a jump meter than just spectating.  This lead him to become an official and supporting the sport in other ways, such as creating a home-computer-based scorekeeping program which involved him in the AWSA Technical Committee and other areas of the sport.

While he didn’t grow up in a water sports family, he found himself after over 30 years while participating as an official going places he most likely would never have visited, had it not been for his involvement with his water ski family.

Thanks Dave for your devoted time and effort to water skiing.