Learning to waterski is complicated, even before you stand up: sit in water with skis pointed up, knees bent, rope between knees, knees between arms. Let the boat pull you up—playing tug of war with the machine never works out. Don’t lean back. Don’t lean forward. Don’t bend arms.
Staying up is complicated, too. Knees stay bent, shoulders go back, hips forward. Then straighten knees. Hips over feet. Loosen up your arms. Skis closer together. Stop clenching your jaw.
Linzy Yindra and Loren Scherschel do all of this on one leg, facing backwards, and holding onto the rope with one hand. And Linzy never even gets her hair wet.
The girls, two members of the Tampa Bay Waterski Show Team, make some of the highest-level water skiing tricks look incredibly easy.
On a Thursday evening at Lake Keystone, Linzy and Loren practice their ballet-line routines, a type of show skiing act that involves twirling on a swivel ski designed for performance.
With one foot each tucked into the binding of a ski and the other on the dock beside it, the girls take hold of their tow-ropes.
Linzy’s voice calls out from the dock. “Go Boat!”
The engine revs and the boat launches forward. The rope goes taut, and Linzypho and Loren follow, landing effortlessly in the water on their skis.
In the boat’s wake, Linzy and Loren twirl gracefully on the skis, which have special plates that turn 360 degrees. They combine ballet-style moves with technical tricks, performing 180, 360, and 720-degree spins, leg lifts, all while holding onto the tow rope.
At the helm, Dan Pitock maneuvers through the lake to give the skiers ideal conditions for tricks. Dan’s been driving for over 20 years with the team, and has been skiing since he was 17 years old.
“I saw all this,” Dan says, pointing to the girls, spinning on the water. “And I said, sign me up. That was 43 years ago. I haven’t missed the day since.”
He whips the boat around in a dog bone pattern, looping in a long oval-ish shape, then driving it through its own wake.
“It’s all about them having smooth water. It’s all about the skier. Nobody cares about the driver,” Dan says with a laugh. He circles back to the dock, leaving enough space for Linzy and Loren to skitter off the wake and cruise to dry land.
As they climb onto dry land, Dan’s daughter, Shannon Welch, her son, Linzy’s husband Zach Yindra, and the rest of the team suit up and figure out who will ski next.
Waterskiing, it turns out, is a family sport. Most members of The Tampa Bay Water Ski Show Team have at least one relative on the team. The majority have been waterskiing since they were children, and some have been on the team for over a decade.
“My parents have always been involved. I skied, my sister skied, and then I met my husband through skiing, our boys ski. So, we’ve actually got three generation families on the team,” Shannon Welch, a member of the team for over 35 years, said.
Shannon waterskied professionally for years at Sea World and Cypress Gardens—one of Florida’s most famous performance sites, with shows dating back to the 1940s.
Now, Shannon skis mainly with the Tampa show team. In some performances, Shannon climbs to the top of the pyramid standing on her two sons’ shoulders.
“Getting to compete with your child is just such a unique experience,” said Zach Yindra. “It’s unlike anything else. And I just find it so rewarding.”
Zach and Linzy got their daughter into skiing when she was young, and were able to ski with her in the team’s performances.
Zach married into the sport. He met his wife, Linzy, up in Wisconsin where she was already an avid water skier. She told him, ‘If you want to see me, you’re going to have to start water skiing, because that’s where I’ll be.’ So he did. He and Linzy moved to Tampa around 2014. They’ve been on the team ever since, forming a stronger bond every time they’re on the water.
While the team’s strength comes from the dedication of its members and the tight-knit community within, there is one piece of the puzzle missing: dedicated waters.
The Tampa Bay Water Ski Show Team lost its home lake, Tower Lake in Oldsmar, in 2018 when the owners of the lake decided not to renew the team’s lease due to liability concerns.
In Oldsmar, the team performed on weekends in the summer, bringing friends and family together for the afternoon. Audiences from the surrounding neighborhoods and beyond boosted local restaurants and businesses.
“We feel like we bring a lot to the community,” Linzy said. “So I really hope we can find some community partners to work with us, to find a home site where we can grow.”
Without a home lake, the team cannot practice regularly, host their own performances, or effectively encourage new members to join. Luckily, members and former teammates have allowed the skiers to practice off docks in their backyards.
Planning for a ski show requires planning similar to putting on a play, Shannon said.
“When we go to tournaments, it’s more obvious that our team doesn’t get to perform as much as some of these other teams who are practicing their tournament shows weekly,” Linzy said.
The team competes in the Southern Regionals, a waterskiing competition in Florida, in June. They won’t get to practice their full tournament show until competition day, but will use road shows as stage rehearsals for the competition.
One of those is Riverfest, an eclectic celebration of downtown Tampa’s riverwalk that also includes lantern making, a taco festival and wiener dog races.
“We love the road shows,” Linzy said. “They’re a ton of fun to perform in…they definitely give us a different experience and makes our team strong in a different way.”
As Riverfest nears, they’ll incorporate more difficulty into practices and choreograph their performance.
Performances must be catered to each occasion. For Riverfest, a multi-tiered pyramid isn’t feasible due to the narrowness of the Hillsborough River and its seawalls, which create more waves, making for a more difficult skiing environment.
“We kind of have to pare down what we do,” Shannon said. “It’s got to be simple, but we try to make it as clean as possible, which means you just have to be a strong skier.”
Those performing in Riverfest will begin practicing their routines specifically for the event in the next coming weeks.
But for many on the team, the water conditions and routines aren’t as important as just being together.
“I love skiing, but this is my social outlet as well. These are all of my friends. These are all the people that I can count on,” said Linzy.
This article appears in Apr. 23 – 29, 2026.