HISWA

Today officially marks the first day of spring. For us that means that we go into double digits in the temperature. It also means that the start of the water-skiing season is getting closer and closer! Until the start of the season on Monday the 28th of March, I keep looking for ways to prepare to the best of my abilities. There are also more and more activities that have to do with the preparation of the season, like the activity day last week. Today I went to the HISWA Amsterdam boat show. This is a major event in Amsterdam for boats mainly, but also many water sports. It can really be seen as the kick-off of the water sport season, since you can buy any accessories you need. There are many ways to promote the water sports, like interactive workshops, demonstrations and activities. There was some room for water-skiing, but I felt like it was still under-represented and I am thinking of ways to promote it more next year (any ideas are welcome).

Testing my balance on heels

For me hall 2 was like water sport heaven. Here there was a kite-surf simulator, where you could feel the pull of the kite, but the talent of keeping the kite and the board under control was not necessary. There were also two pools, one in which you could go Supping (stand-up pedalling) and one in which you could go skimboarding. What I realised spending almost the entire day in hall 2, is that in all water-sports, balance and core stability was central. In every demonstration they would test your balance. Therefore I believe that once you can do one, you have a good basis to start trying other sports. This is great for some variation in between trainings-sets. For example I really like to go Supping.

Trying out the ski-machine, on heels, courtesy of the  Dutch federation

I had a lot of fun trying out other water sports, but the best part for me was still water-skiing. There was a skimachine which could be used to introduce people to water-skiing. They had water-skis without the fins, so they could be used on a flat surface. Sadly to be more time efficient they used a skimboard instead. Here it is clear that water-skiing should be promoted more. On the other hand, there were wakeboarders giving awesome demonstrations in the harbour, by using a winch. I believe that we could maybe join them and give a trick-skiing demonstration, because not nearly enough people know about water-skiing in the Netherlands.

The Dutch water-ski and wakeboard federation did have a small stand in this massive event. There were two wakeboard boats, which caught the attention of a lot of people. Also the youngest skier at my home club was used for promotion. This shows that people of all ages can join our sports and there was a lot of enthusiasm for water-skiing. This is why I think that next year it shouldn't be a problem to have more space for water-skiing on this huge event. There was also a selfie competition with which you can win a pair of sunglasses, so I chose to take a picture with my little champion.