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Another event postponement – How many more? Written by by Paul Mitchener

Paul Mitchener
http://www.skiracersworld.com/
The rains are taking their toll on our beloved sport of water ski racing, not to mention communities in flood affected areas.

Another event has been postponed due to the Victorian flooding. SRV Point Score 4 was postponed yesterday with no current re-scheduled date. The flooding in the area and isolation of areas such as Kerang and most routes throughout north central Victoria would have been the main contributing factor.The Murray River is still quite high from the Campaspe River floods and the Goulburn catchment is also quite high with a lot more water heading that way.

Just to make things interesting, once the water clears from the Echuca area, it is heading toward Swan Hill to follow up on the Loddon flood waters that will be heading down the Murray.

Next venue in line for the flood waters is Robinvale, followed by Mildura, then Murray Bridge.

Now let’s think about this in a bit more depth. Three weeks till the Southern 80, another 3 or 4 weeks to Robinvale, followed by Mildura 6 weeks later, then 6 weeks after that is the SA titles in Murray Bridge. Flood waters from the Campaspe, Goulburn, Loddon, Murrumbidgee, followed by Northern NSW and southern QLD coming down the Darling catchment to Wentworth. Think about the timeframes for the water to flow down these river systems; where will it all meet up and when?

We may see a lot of cancellations / postponements this season and a heap of teams that have paid a lot of money for insurances and entries that just don’t get used. Excluding the rivers there are still a lot of events to race. Events such as the Barry Carne in Wagga may see record entries of teams trying to get value for money from their yearly fees.

Let’s hope the waters subside quickly and don’t force the hands of event organisers to postpone or cancel more events. Yet organisers cannot be complacent and let events run when they should actually be cancelled due to excessive river currents and floating debris.

Last thing we want as competitors is to destroy boats and bodies for no apparent reason.
Paul Mitchener – www.skiracersworld.com
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