Some would wonder why Merv would travel from Shipshewana, IN to Hudsonville, MI just to cable wakeboard. That’s because it’s his passion. Merv learned to ride behind the boat, but once he found out about cable wakeboarding, it was love at first sight.

In 2009, a couple of my buddies asked me if I wanted to pick them up and pull their boat to the lake. I did and originally thought we were just going to ski, but they pulled out a wakeboard and I said,
“what the heck is that!?” I tried it and the rest is history.

It wasn’t until 2012 that I struck up a good friendship with Steve Pysh that I heard about cable wakeboarding. I was nervous about the idea, but he thought if I would try it, I’d actually like it. We made the trip down to Wake Nation in Cincy and it opened my eyes to a whole new side of wakeboarding!

Everything about the cable is different than riding behind the boat, I feel. If you’re a great boat rider, you’ll do really well at the cable for the most part. But, if you learned at the cable park and that is all you do, you’ll excel at the cable but could struggle riding behind the boat. I definitely preferred the boat over cable riding in the past, but this past summer at AWP has me questioning where my loyalties lie.

I loved every minute/lap of it.

Definitely the vibe there. There’s no clicks there and everyone is out to help everyone become better riders. It’s a positive yet slightly competitive vibe.So it always makes you push yourself out of your comfort zone and you become a better person all around, I think..

For sure the Billabong rail. However, the “tranzilla” setup at the end of the season was epic.

I can’t really say that I have a favorite memory. So I’ll switch gears and say that my favorite thing by far was the event called “Park Jam” such an incredibly fun and entertaining event.

Heck Yeah!