can you wakeboard with pontoon

[wakeboard199]

I'm wantin to get into wakeboarding, but all i have is a pontoon boat. Is it alright to wakeboard with a pontoon boat runnin about 21 mph.

[Wake Master]

The boat will pull you but I,m not sure I would call that wakeboarding!

[Buttafewcoe]

21 mph is about the right speed. A couple years ago, we were skiing behind an'86 Bayliner (doing inverts even). I can't say I remember exactly what kind of wake the pontoon throws. Hey!, if it's all you got, it's all you got!
.
Butta

[JoeTechie]

I would think it might be a bit harder to get up. If that is about the pontoons top speed (and it sounds like it is) then getting there may take a while. Most have very small outboards, like 65 hp range. Getting up on a wakeboard may be a grueling experience if the boat takes a long time getting to speed and now has to deal with the added drag.

Also since pontoons are a between a displacement hull and a planing hull, it is a strange and wide wake...

but like said above - if it is what ya got... go enjoy the hell out of it !!!

-Joe

[smokedog2]

I've done the WB thing behind a 40 HP v hull. Big guys could not get up. Kids and mid sized adults did fine.

SD2

[BoatmanCan]

I would compare that to doing downhill sking while pulled by a car on a flat surface - your moving and youve got the board tied to your feet, but, its not the same....

[EUSTACE]

You can pretty much board behind anything. I started behind my 16ft sport craft with an 88hp outboard. You’re not going to have much of a wake to work with behind a pontoon, but the upside is that it will force you to really learn to edge and work on surface tricks.

Good luck, E

[EUSTACE]

One other bit of advice, go and get your self a good non-stretch wakeboard rope. It makes a huge difference.

[Buttafewcoe]

LMAO @ Ed.....that reminds me of living in Detroit in the winter, 'cept we'd hide behind bushes at stop signs. The roads were covered in snow, cars would stop and we'd sneak out and grab hold of the rear bumper and the car would pull us down the street. Man, am I getting old....hard to believe that's been 30+ years ago.

[EUSTACE]

My bumper skiing story: The year is 1987 just out of high school me and two of my buddies take at trip to Austria to do some skiing.

After about a dozen German beers at the pub we decide to get a little bumper skiing in, so we head into the streets of this small town outside of Munich and start flagging down cars.

At first the Euros’ had no idea but once they figured out what we where doing they kept coming back to the main drag in town and giving us a pull. I was quite a spectacle I’m sure, at one point there were about 30 or so people cheering and taking in the antics of the 3 drunken Americans. Ahh! Distant memories….