It's been 10 years since a small Tasmanian club set a new world record for the most water skiers to be towed behind a single boat.
The record took so much time, money and effort to achieve that the Horsehead Water Ski Club is confident it won't be beaten any time soon.
"I think I'll take it to my grave," said the club's Nic Wilson.
On January 27, 2012, a cruise boat pulled 145 skiers on Macquarie Harbour in Strahan for 1 nautical mile (just under 2 kilometres).
The same club broke the record of 100 skiers in 2010 with 114 skiers.
Behind the success were many failed attempts and years of planning and dreaming.
David Bennett came up with the idea decades ago when he skied past a large tourist cruise boat on the Gordon River in Strahan, on Tasmania's remote West Coast.
"We skied up alongside it and sort of waved at the crowd and thought we could have a crack at that world record," he said.
"I've done a lot of really weird stuff, skied on anything that even looks like you could ski on it … a couple of laptops, a couple of computer keyboards, we've got a set of skis that hold three people on it.
"Everybody likes to know how many skiers their boat will pull," he said.
The record of 100 skiers was set by a Queensland club in 1986.
Since then, six different groups from around the world had tried to break it but failed.
For its first attempt in 2008, the Horsehead Water Ski club had a boom built out of marine plywood to attach to the boat to separate the skiers — it snapped within seconds.
Undeterred, the team made a new boom in half a day using a length of gas pipeline.
It broke again and it was back to the drawing board.
A new aluminium boom was designed, wider skis were made and 12 kilometres of rope were used to connect the skiers to the boat.
The following year in 2009 another attempt was made but failed when the boom snapped again.
The club went to work trying to raise $60,000 to manufacture a new boom using aluminium pipe.
A naval architect, a rope specialist, a crane and a couple of helicopters were employed to attach the ski rig to the back of the cruise boat.
The fifth attempt saw 85 cross the finish line. In the sixth attempt, 99 skiers made it across, just one short of the record.
Two months later, the eighth attempt saw the determination pay off and the 23-year-old record broken, with 114 skiers making it across the line.
"The amount of emotion that was released by so many people on the back of the boat, plus the skiers in the water and people in support boats," Wilson said.
"The whole harbour was just a song of voices and cheering and yahooing, car horns beeping from the shore."
"Definitely worth it because everyone was just ecstatic," he said.
Lucinda Murfet was part of the record-breaking ski.
But the club wasn't prepared to leave it there and in 2012 the team reassembled to improve on their record.
"We knew we had a formula and we knew we could ramp it up," Wilson said.
They successfully broke their own record with 145 skiers, with the feat now listed on the Guinness World Records website.
Lucinda Murfet believes the record is "absolutely" safe.
"There was a lot of heart and soul and time and effort that went into this," she said.
Luis Wilson was 12 years old and the youngest skier in the group when the record was broken for the first time.
He agrees that beating the record would be difficult.
"Knowing from what I saw as a participant … the collaboration, the community that was required to make this a reality I think would be very hard to replicate," he said.
Organisers estimate it took 1,000 people and a total of a million man-hours to win their place in the Guinness Book of Records.
"The amount of volunteer time was just incredible," Nic Wilson said.
"We actually made all the waterskis we skied on," he said.
David Bennett said while the aim was to get skiers across the line, the effort involved a whole community.
"The people in Strahan, you know if we'd wanted to move the town hall they would have said, 'Yeah, no problems, just put it back when you're done'."
Nic Wilson estimates the attempts cost around $1 million with most of the money donated in the form of equipment and time.
"The logistics of just raising that sort of money … it doesn't come with ease," he said.
He said if anyone wanted to try and break their record finding a big enough boat would be a problem.
"Still, they have to find the boat and the venue. That's where we know that will bring them unstuck."
Celebrations for the 10th anniversary of the 2012 record will be held at the club's headquarters at Lake Barrington.
Club members will get together to share a meal and reflect on the "never say die" attitude which won them a place in the waterskiing history books.
"It is a nice little thing to have in your back pocket to say you're a world record holder," Luis Wilson said.
