Though there appears to be a lot of similarity between the two water rides, wakeboarding and water skiing are two completely different sports.

The nature of both the rides is a key point of difference between the two. Water skiing is a simple sport whereas wake boarding seems to be a combination of different sports. In water skiing a person uses skis to ride the waters while being pulled along by a moving speed boat. Wake boarding, though it adopts the same principle also includes skills derived from other sports like surfing, snow boarding and skate boarding.

Water skiing traditionally is just a ride behind a speed boat. This is pursued for the simple pleasure of skiing over waters. In fact the smaller the waves, the better it is. Wakeboarding on the other hand is a sport based on the thrill and excitement of jumping the wakes created by the boat and thus the size of the waves play a huge factor here.

The different nature of the two sports is reflected in the individual sports gear as well. Wake boarders use a board much like a surf board but include foot straps and fins for better balance over waters while a water skier uses the traditional water skis for riding on water. Depending on the type of skiing, water skiers may use either one or two skis while wakeboarding is done with both feet strapped onto a single board.

The boats used to pull these sports riders are also of different makes. Water skiers use any simple motor boat for water skiing. The boats used for wakeboards have increased weight at the rear to create higher and steeper waves. The wake board boats have increased weight at the rear to create larger wakes. The lower the stern the higher the waves produced. Newer technologies like aftermarket ballast and lead are further used by manufacturers for creating larger wakes.

The ropes used to pull the skiers and the wake boarders also belong to opposite categories. A water skier’s rope has to have a good deal of stretch and flexibility while wake boarders need ropes that have minimum elasticity as the stretch factor proves a disadvantage when contemplating jumps over the waves.

OK, so much for the differences between water skiing and wakeboards.

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