There are a countless number of tricks in wakeboarding. If you think about it, it really is endless. A year ago everyone thought a backside 1080 and a frontside 1260 were impossible, and then they both happened, thanks to Danny Harf and Sir Aaron Rathy. There are all these amazing tricks that are pushing the sport to a whole new level. Most of us will never be able to do these things though. We may try, but we probably will never get there. There are, however, a countless number of tricks we can do that give us that same feeling. There’s one thing in particular that we can all do — no matter what your skill level. Everyone can get joy from this trick.
That trick is the slaysh. Or the carve or whatever else you want to call it. It’s not even a trick really, but it brings me so much joy when I really power through it that I can’t even describe it. It is nearly the most basic thing you can do on a wakeboard and is one of the first things you learn when you first get up. It is also the purest thing you can do on a wakeboard. You can just start out wide and carve in at any speed you want. You can carve as big or as little as you want. It’s all up to you.
More so than any other trick in wakeboarding, the slaysh connects us to other boardsports. It is the one thing that truly crosses over. Sure, we have off-axis or corked spins just like snowboarding and re-entries like surfing, but the slaysh connects us all. You can lay a deep carve in some powder or do a bottom turn on a wave. Carve a bowl and do a layback on a skateboard or bash the lip of a wake. In the grand scheme of things, across all the borders that separate each sport from each sport, this is our greatest thing in common. The link that connects us all.
Wakeboarding is becoming such an amazingly technical sport now. Things are progressing at such a fast rate we can barely keep up as spectators. The slaysh will never change though. Whether you’re young or old, new school or old school, it connects us all. People often forget that to have fun on a wakeboard sometimes you don’t have to do the craziest trick. Sometimes it is the simplest act that will really light up your smile. — Derek Grasman
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