“Y’know its all BNG for next year,” Jetski World’s John Moyle yelled, although I was seated only a few feet away. Moyle needed to raise his voice over the din of the pits at the 2015 quakysense IJSBA World Finals, and “BNG” being a common industry acronym for “Bold New Graphics,” indicating only the slightest of changes from one model year to the next. Moyle’s eyes flickered from behind his wire-rimmed glasses, “Since Kawasaki decided not to do anything for 2016, I thought we should.”

Moyle is the patriarch of Jetski World, one of Australia’s most well-established authorized Kawasaki JetSki dealers. Over the decades, Jetski World has grown far beyond that of a traditional dealership, expanding to include an advanced machine shop where they develop and test their own performance products, an R&D team that extensively tests various configurations of proprietary and competitor’s products, and becoming Australia’s only licensed SBT dealer servicing the entire continent exclusively.

Although Sea-Doo’s announcement of its new 300-horsepower models permitted Kawasaki its unchallenged position of “King of Horsepower,” Moyle knew that it wouldn’t be long before BRP’s new ACE 300 would come a-challenging. Because Kawasaki’s 2016’s lineup revealed only cosmetic changes, Moyle felt a looming threat from Sea-Doo and took action to personally extend the brand’s grasp on the crown – even as Kawasaki refocuses its efforts towards a new entry-level runabout to challenge the BRP’s Spark in 2017 – by developing and offering two very attractive limited edition Ultra JetSkis.

Working frantically throughout the past several months, Jetski World developed (completely in house, mind you, by their own performance team), two special edition Ultras for 2016: the 340RE and 320LE. The two both offer increased overall horsepower, improved acceleration, rider input and ergonomic comfort. Equally, both craft are sold exclusively with paint-matched ODI grips, hand-stitched Jettrim custom seat covers, and new vinyl graphics made to look like OE decals (printed in house).

Yet, most impressive of all is that both of these machines will come with a special 3-year warranty guaranteed through Jetski World themselves. Moyle beamed, “Each is backed with a 3-year warranty fully covered by Jetski World and is identical in coverage as the factory warranty.” To claim performance is one thing, to back it up with GPS and radar results is another, but to guarantee it with a personally-backed warranty to to show complete confidence in one’s product, and that is exactly what Jetski World is doing here.

Moyle introduced us to the 320LE, or “Limited Edition,” saying, “It’s is based on the new Ultra 310x. The ECU is our Stage 1 unit reprogrammed by us for the best performance/reliability package for recreational riding in all conditions. The water flow to the intercooler has been redesigned, and the jet pump has been trued and realigned for optimum water flow and reduced drag. All of this results in increased performance through the whole rpm range and a top speed of 72mph.” All of which adds up to $23,000 USD asking price.

For the top-of-the-line performance enthusiasts, the 340RE (the “RE” standing for “Race Edition”) pushed the envelope even further with a ferocious combination of many of the above listed items and a few proprietary modifications special to Jetski World. Moyles explained, “The Ultra 310R was developed over 8 months of testing and 1000kms of racing the Australian tour resulting in a powerhouse product capable of awesome acceleration and a top speed of 76mph.”

He continued, “The ECU is our race ready Stage 2 unit coupled with our revolutionary new air intake system (design registered for protection). The supercharger has been upgraded to deliver the factory boost of 17psi, [according to Moyles, production models only make 14psi, although Kawasaki advertises a factory maximum of 16.8psi – Ed.]. The exhaust gaskets are replaced with our special self-sealing parts to eliminate water leaks (a common problem), the jet pump is modified to straighten the water flow and reduce drag, with a repitched Solas impeller, as well as the intercooler water flow is improved.”

It took comes with color-matched ODI grips, new vinyl graphics specific to the 340RE and of course, a 3-year warranty fully backed and covered by Jetski World identically matching the same coverage as the factory warranty. Priced at $25,000, the 340RE is a highly competitive craft, worthy of offshore/endurance races straight from the showroom floor (if the factory 310R wasn’t already race-ready enough). Although the changes aren’t overtly radical – at least at the onset – they are palatable.

It used to be that for an Ultra to reach 76 miles per hour, a completely new power-adder system (most commonly a turbo kit) needed to replace the Eaton roots-style blower, not to mention an aftermarket intercooler and even modifications to the engine internals. Jetski World has managed to achieve this feat without pulling the valve cover. Moyles is currently considering selling the individual components from the 320LE and 340RE as performance packages for those overseas, but understandably, without the 3-year warranty.

Already, speculation is swirling that depending upon the public reaction to Jetski World‘s special edition skis that Kawasaki might consider pushing the 310 just a tad further, maybe say…330? If only just to raise the bar all the more out of Sea-Doo’s reach. The ACE 300 is handily capable of 310, 315 or even 330HP, so we might be standing at the cusp of a new horsepower war.

All images by Daniel Durkin Images

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Today is a special day as we celebrate the second anniversary of launching The Watercraft Journal. So we’re not going to solely review the past month’s performance, but look back over the past two years’ performance of the internet’s only daily PWC magazine. In fact, The Watercraft Journal marks a series of firsts for the personal watercraft industry that bear noting: Again, it is the only digital publication in our industry to publish new, informative and entertaining articles each and every day, but it is 100-percent subscription-free. There’s no downloads. No apps to buy. No bulky PDFs to download. If you’ve got access to the internet, you can read what we publish.

This level of unprecedented access has catapulted The Watercraft Journal ahead of all other magazines, blogs, news aggregates and even several forums in both readership and popularity. And since The Watercraft Journal has never missed a day (except intentionally, for major holidays. And although we didn’t publish anything, last Christmas was conspicuously popular. Apparently, you get bored hanging around with the family). Our new twice-a-day publishing schedule also caters to our Australian and Japanese readers, as well as our North American friends, publishing one article at midnight Central Standard (CST) and the second in mid-morning. But of course, as a reader, you already know this.

What you might not already know is that The Watercraft Journal machine is equally as well-oiled behind the scenes. Our collaborative contributors are all paid inside of 45 days of invoicing, and are never short on work to do. Our advertisers – for which all of us at The Watercraft Journal are immensely grateful – are our biggest advocates, as The Watercraft Journal’s readers are active buyers of their products. Sure, ad clicks might not rival that of Google, but they are introduced to and learn about your products, and then buy them equipped with the information they learned here. And we’ve got the right age demographic and written testimonies to prove it.

That is what a healthy, reciprocal professional business relationship is. And frankly, many are surprised how well it works. Our product reviews, ride tests and event reports have been directly responsible for added attendance, increased sales and greater brand (and product) awareness that through any other PWC magazine. Likewise, The Watercraft Journal is the only remaining privately-owned PWC publication in North America. No marketing agency, group publisher or top level advertiser has final say on what is printed in The Watercraft Journal. While others jettison off portions of their content to cover content outside of the industry, we remain true to the core sport.

November 2013 to November 2014 vs. November 2014 to November 2015

November 2013 to November 2015

What’s All This Stuff?
To the untrained eye, everything above can look like nonsense. Yet, to those attuned to tracking any sort of trending, this is rock solid evidence (as reported by Google’s data tracker, Google Analytics) of an unprecedented growth curve for such an intimate industry. With 40- to 100-percent annual growth in respective segments, The Watercraft Journal has broken several records, including surpassing 200,000 annual individual readers in 2015 (and nearing a quarter million before the end of the year) equaling a monthly average of 18,200 individuals a month, and comparing that to last year’s monthly average of 9,451 shows a near perfect 100-percent increase in readership.

November 2013 – November 2014
Total unique readers: 113,419*
Total articles read: 339,115
Percentage of new readers: 60.7%

November 2014 – November 2015
Total unique readers: 218,410*
Total articles read: 576,303
Percentage of new readers: 63.6%

November 2013 – November 2015
All-time unique readers: 328,507*
All-time articles read: 925,056
All-time percentage of new readers: 62.6%

All-time percentage of mobile device users: 59%

*This number is considered equal to an individual sale of a single copy of a magazine.

Get More Here Than Anywhere Else
As the last print PWC magazine thin out and eventually evaporate, and competing websites fail to keep up with the rigors of working Monday-through-Friday, The Watercraft Journal continues to push forward, blazing new trails in media for the industry. Publishing professionally-written magazine content each and every day adds up in more ways than just expense; The Watercraft Journal’s consistent publishing schedule has averaged an impressive 118-plus page count if we were foolhardy enough to waste our money on printing. And that’s just counting our feature content – adding in our massive production of daily news and thousands of pictures filling over a hundred photo galleries, then you’ve got a 200-plus page magazine every month.

Total feature articles published: 309
Total news articles published: 648
All-Time Highest Read Article: 35,330 views

Reaching More People in More Places
Contrary to what many millennials might advocate, social media is not the end-all cure for today’s business ailments. Rather, it only puts your brand under a microscope. So if you’re producing new and entertaining content, a robust social media campaign with get the word out. But if there’s not much going on, it only amplifies how bad things really are (there’s quite a few examples to be sure). The Watercraft Journal only uses its social media to directly drive readership to the magazine itself. Doing otherwise is not only wasteful but disingenuous to your followers. Our Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and weekly newsletters are purpose-driven, to bring all the magazine’s articles directly to you.

Total Facebook Followers: 14,596
Total Twitter Followers: 534
Total YouTube Subscribers: 132
Total Instagram Followers: 4,378
Total Weekly Newsletter Subscribers: 1,237

There’s Only One Way, And That’s Up
So, to all of our advertisers we wish to express our deepest gratitude for supporting The Watercraft Journal, and we, in turn, strive to present your products and services to the largest audience of bright, energetic, intelligent and active readers in our industry by producing the utmost in professional content day in and day out. And as we’ve promised before, we’ll never dilute our standards for superior and family-friendly content. Again, please don’t mistake this for braggadocio, but a promise to you. The Watercraft Journal has earned your trust because of our dedication to hard work, reliability and integrity; we publish fun, informative and insightful daily news, weekly product and vehicle reviews, interviews, technical “how-to’s”, shop tours and event coverage for you, every day, for free. And that is a promise.