“Whooo!” Florida Ski Riders’ founder and Sea-Doo ambassador Randy Cabrera howls like a waterborne Rick Flair. Donning his latest officially-branded FL Ski Riders’ jersey and embroidered hat, Cabrera pushes his silvery 2020 Sea-Doo GTX Limited 300 through a serpentine trail of grassy knolls and clusters of mangroves that litter the horizon and make navigating the labyrinthine waterways a dizzying affair. Only when we’re shown the occasional aerial shot via drone does one get a better scope of the maze he is traversing.
What Cabrera’s video demonstrates is what we at The Watercraft Journal and several more experienced riders have deduced for a while; the current Sea-Doo’s difficulty in negotiating tight, turbulent waters. Pay careful attention to how often Cabrera pins the handlebars to their stops while trying to make a hairpin. Even while feathering the throttle, the ST3 hull pushes Cabrera wide, almost into the grass despite being pinned to the side. Cabrera tilts hard, shifting his weight left to right, but the hull breaks its line and pushes outside of the apex again and again.
More importantly, Cabrera is a conservative rider. He’s not one for dangerous showboating or stunts. He knows when to get on the throttle and not; and his throttle control is more-or-less on point here. Nevertheless, the ST3 presents Cabrera a few too many close calls, to which he instinctively reacts with a “Whooo!” When leading the pack, Cabrera’s GTX sluices a trail rather naturally; yet, when navigating through wash, the hull is often prey to the whims of the leader’s wake. Thankfully, deep-set RIVA Pro-Series sponsons and some cleaver trimming has all but solved this issue for the big 3-seater, as we’ve proven HERE.
