MasterCraft Boats has been at the pinnacle of luxury sport boating for decades and has been an innovator in the wakeboarding boat segment since the sport began in the 1990s. Its flagship model, the XStar is back with a ground-up redesign ready to change the game again. The new 23 and 25-foot boats are powered by an impressive 630-horsepower and 665 lb-ft of torque from an Ilmor Marine 6.2-liter supercharged V8, ready to yank your whole family up on plane, while throwing the largest possible wake. You’re not going to hit the big tricks without big air, and this boat provides.
This monster boat is ready for a whole weekend on the water with more audio than your average basement punk show and more power than the truck you need to tow it. The standard MAAX Audio system features six subwoofers, ten cockpit speakers, four tower speakers, and six transom speakers, so even while you’re smashing backside 1080s, you can hear your favorite tunes.
“The new XStar is more than just a boat—it’s the ultimate embodiment of MasterCraft’s dedication to innovation, performance, and luxury,” said Greg Miller, Vice President of Global Sales at MasterCraft. “As the flagship of our fleet, it stands as both a testament to our rich legacy and a bold vision for the future.”
I was big into wakeboarding when I was in high school, and spent countless summer hours out on the lake with my folks in our old 1997 Malibu Sunsetter LX V-drive. We installed a tower and a wake wedge to make the boat better for boarding, and I got pretty decent at it for a filthy casual. The memories I made out on the water with my family are some of the best I have. But because I’m a gear nerd and didn’t understand how debt works, I always wanted a bigger and better boat. The XStar had just launched with a new twin-hull design at the time, and I was supremely jealous of the wake it could spit. I’m not going to lie, I still am. These things look cool as hell, and I want one. And not just because it has 630 horsepower.
If you know anything about wakeboarding, you know that the pros are riding around with tons of ballast to get their boat hulls to sink deeper into the water, even on plane. That kicks a taller and peakier wake behind the boat, so you can really get some height to sail your tricks across the sky. The MasterCraft XStar has a “Fast Fill” system that pulls about 500 pounds of water onboard per minute. A ton of weight added to an already 8,000 pound boat should shift a pretty gnarly curl for wake surfers, too.
Back when I was in the sport, it wasn’t quite this fancy. The gauge clusters on boats were still old-school needle-sweep deals, but now they’re packed with touch screens and micro-adjustments to determine the shape of the wake, the perfect speed for the perfect trick, and a four-camera surround visibility system for the skipper to keep an eye on everything. If I’m honest, this boat might have too much technology for my taste. You can even get a built-in beverage fridge! We had to use one of those old plastic coolers, ugh, so retro.
Of course, a wakeboarding boat is nothing without a tower. You need the extra height at the base of your tow rope in order to really get the ups, and this boat features a “Z100" tower from the factory. You can trick it out as needed with board racks, bimini sun covers, and even more audio options. And so everyone knows you have the biggest and best, the tower has illuminated badges on it, and projection lighting can put logos on the water around you as well. Nobody will look cooler than you anchored in the cove.
The newly revamped XStar models are available for order right now, and deliveries are set to start in time for Spring. MasterCraft has not released a price list, but you can request a quote for one built to your incredibly varied specifications. The previous-generation boats saw MSRPs touching half a million dollars depending on options, but it seems as though most typically trade hands for about half that. So is a new MasterCraft worth a quarter million dollars to you? Can you really put a price tag on the love of your family and the respect of your friends while spending time in the great outdoors?