OK - 'dirt track' I'd guess too; none o' that IOM precision dicing. So: since the shape has to somehow accomplish that which human lore + feedback does on land, umm where shall the skill enter in? T'would seem that, overcooking a 'turn' would result in merely.. increasing the turn radius automagically / not elbow burns (splashes?)


Well, now, don't think even a Beowulf cluster (still current?) would be able to model the thing well enough to eliminate the skill. Too much lean? You get wet, with a strong flow up your nose (that is the direction it's going). Not enough, a-over-t -- call me skippy...

And despite the utmost efforts of able engineers, the surface of the water is not a plane. Related story: A friend in high school once had a boat made of two pieces of marine plywood and a few sticks of 1x10. Build a wedge, 10" thick at the back, then cut the front out in a semicircle. Power was an old "seven-horse" Evinrude, from the days when outboard racing was by manufacturer's advertised horsepower. Change the reed and the jets, and it was more like fifteen.

Directional "control" was the skeg of a broken slalom ski, screwed to the bottom in more or less the center... we were out on the lake one day, with plenty of fuel, and another friend was driving it. Probably thirty MPH across the water -- and a Chris-Craft passed across his bows at about ten knots. Have you ever seen the bow wave one of those puppies puts out?

Boat climbed the wave, went airborne, then (against all expectation) began nosing over instead of flipping bow-up. Thin end of wedge entered the other bow wave, more or less perpendicular to the water surface. plurg!

Hardly a splash. Tim had on a good life preserver, as evidenced by the fact that he did bob to the surface eventually, as did the boat (though quite a ways away from the, er, scene of the incident). Don't think the nabobs in the Love Boat ever noticed anything...

The boat was retired to pontoon duty on our fishing trips. Ah, youth.