Holeshot & Ride

Hole shot generally refers to how long it takes your boat to go from displacement to plaining speed.  For most plaining hulls the best hole shot is accomplished by trimming the motor/outdrive all the way down, and going full throttle as quickly as possible.  Push the throttle all the way to the stop very quickly and keep it there.  The boat will lift up and then start to settle back down.  That’s when you start to trim the out drive back up.  Then you adjust the throttle and the trim for the speed you want to run.

After you are on plain if the boat is “plowing” and feels like it wants to go to one side or the other you are trimmed down to far for the speed you are going.  Trim up.

If the boat is bouncing up and down and annoying the heck out of everybody in the boat except the bozo behind the wheel who is trying to pretend its normal either trim down a little or speed up a little.  ITS NOT FREAKING NORMAL.  You aren’t being cautious by going to slow for your trim.  You are causing internal organ damage to your passengers.

If the boat is running fast and loose, but you are going bouncing from side to side or the front end of the boat looks likes its doing a circle in the air you are chine walking.  That happens when the boat is so far out of the water the chines are loosing grip.  The boat can literally fall over on its chine like it was sitting on dry land.  When it falls over you correct, and and it causes it to fall over on the other chine and you correct again.  Generally this happens when the boat is going very fast, and most fast shallow V and Pad V boats will do this if they are fast enough.  Very fast hulls like most modern high end bass boats are notorious for it.  If it never happens to you your boat probably isn’t fast enough to see the affect.  How do you correct for it?  If you are a beginner out with friends having a good time, just slow down a little.  That’s not the time to learn what is a relatively advanced skill.  You do not need to run 65-80 miles per hour if you are just out having a good time.  I’ve owned a couple boats that were fast enough it could be an issue, and they tended to start chine walking in the mid to high 60s.  Just run slower than the speed it tends to chine walk.  As to how to ride out or control a chine walk.  I know what worked for me, but I am no expert.  I’ll share my limited knowledge and skills sometime in the future in a post specifically about Chine Walking.  Chine walk is out of control.  Being out of control at high speed is very dangerous.