Mismatched doubles, one ski has severe drag. Why?

[No1uNo]

Over the winter we picked up a mismatched set of water skis, one my son found discarded in a snow bank at his work site and the other we purchased online to go with it so that we'd have a set of doubles. Both are O'brien slalom skis with concave bottoms and appear to be in very decent condition with no major scratches or anything. My son and I both tried deep water start on them we are experiencing a very strange issue that I've never encountered before...the ski my son found in the snow bank seems to have a very pronounced drag through the water (even just at slow speeds while trying to get up) making it impossible for either of us to even get out of the water. The one ski seems totally fine but the drag is so severe on the other that it actually sinks while trying to get up and pulls the leg of the skier backwards throwing off our balance. Looking at the ski shows no obvious flaws or anything that would be a clear source of parasitic drag source. I've skied on some very expensive skis but also some pretty ratched up crappy mismatched sets and never seen anything like this. Any ideas of what could cause this and how we might remedy it?

 

[Grub54891]

Let's see some pics of both skis, top and bottom.

 

[skibrain]

I would recommend buying an inexpensive actual pair of skis rather than spending too much time sorting out a match for a free ski that you found.

 

[Scott Danforth]

so you have unknown skis that you found and you are trying to match?

the reasons one has more drag than the other is because they are mis-matched

as stated, buy a complete set, or take off on one ski.

 

[sickwilly]

My theory is that the ski with the drag is a competition style slalom ski which have a lot more drag getting up. Boot placement on that ski could be a big factor too.