In the mid eighties,
John spent five years studying cable water ski parks
where he and an old friend Banana George pursued trying
to build one in Southern California. Unfortunately,
this was during the California water shortage and it
was next to impossible to get water. The cable intrigued
John on the amount of air people were getting on the
corners of the cables by loading the cable with no wake.
In the late eighties, John spent
time pulling Tony Finn a few times. One day Tony offered
1,000.00 to anyone who could land a flip on a skurfer.
We had six great athletes and none of them could do
it. The sport has come a long way since then.
In early 1992, John was teaching
barefoot water skiing. Remembering how easy it was
to get up backward bare footing on a cable, he made
a 10 foot high bar that he attached the rope to. One
of his close friends had never made a tumble turn
or a backward deep water start. It was time to put
his idea to work. The very first time his friend tried
it, she made it and made almost every one she tried
that weekend, also making tumble turns behind the
boat for the first time. It had been such a big step
to go from learning a trick on the boom to behind
the boat in bare footing. What a difference the 10
foot pylon made. John thought about marketing it,
but he didn’t believe people would drive around
with a ten foot pole hanging out of their boat. He
was approached one day by a friend who asked if he
could make the extended pylons and John said go ahead.
At that time, he wasn’t thinking of it as a
jumping aid. Again, this was late 1992 or early 1993.
Probably what taught John the most
on his new idea came while doing a pole vault clinic
at UCLA. World renown pole vault coach Anthony Curran,
the uncle to Tom and Tim Curran, renown surfers, taught
John one of the most important drills he has ever
learned. Anthony was standing just off the runway
where his pole vaulters were jumping off the ground.
Anthony pushed on the back of their shoulder when
they were taking off. The idea was to increase speed
at take off, then let the pole vaulter load the pole
harder than they could by themselves. Using this technique,
the pole vaulter could jump higher in practice and
get on bigger poles than ever before. John took advantage
of this drill as one of the best high school pole
vault coaches in the nation and spending a lot of
time in the water jumping anything from barefoot jumping
to wakeboarding to hydrofoiling – always with
his mind trying to think of a way you could increase
controlled speed at take off.
Then one day while riding a dirt
bike it came to him. The harder you compress the shock,
the further you would jump. That’s when he decided
to add a shock to the tower.
After testing the very first prototype,
John knew he had something….and after a few
thousand more…the AirSling was invented.
