This year’s Under 21 World championships were held in Meuzac, France and the UK took a strong team of five to compete which consisted of; James Earl, Danielle Shorten, Chris Wharton, Will Oliver and slalom specialist Freddie Winter. Team captain was Steve Glanfield who flew the team out to France a few days prior to the event to give the team the opportunity to familiarise with the site.
Myself (Rich Forrest), Dan Oliver and Michael Woodgate decided to drive out to the event to support the British team. This involved a twelve-hour car journey through the night in order to arrive at 9am next morning in time to support Britain’s first skier of the tournament; Danielle shorten. Over the next two days the preliminary rounds took place seeing some strong scores by all of the British skiers and some exceptional scores across the board from skiers from all over the world.
Slalom finals took place on Saturday starting with the women which saw Delfina Cuglievan from Peru, put out a strong score of 3@11m (38off) early on in the final which put the pressure on the higher seeded skiers and turned out to be enough to take the gold. This was a huge achievement for Delfi as it is Peru’s first ever gold medal in a World Championship tournament.
The men’s slalom finals then took place with Britain’s Freddie Winter seeded second from last before top seed Nate Smith. Both Benjamin Stadlbaur and Sacha Descens put out big scores of 3@10.75(39off) putting the pressure on the last two skiers. Unfortunately Freddie could only make it out around number 2. This left the young talent of Nate Smith who breezed through 10.75m (39off) and took the gold medal for the USA.
A Leduc man's lifelong love of water-skiing has landed him in Water Ski and Wakeboard Canada's Hall of Fame in Ottawa.
Ken Nelson, 66, is receiving the honour this November as a "pioneer" of the sport. He built a lake, called Shalom Park, just outside of Edmonton near Rabbit Hill, exclusively for water ski events and practice, which is the "most prolific host site in Canadian towed water sports history," Water Ski and Wakeboard Canada says. He invented a water ski jump that is now an international standard.
He has won more national waterskiing championships than he can remember and set six national records.
"I suppose, truthfully, it's a tremendous honour to be recognized for what I have contributed to the sport, whatever that might be," he said.
"I guess I've been hanging around the sport for awhile, so if you hang around long enough you're bound to be recognized."
Nelson grew up on a farm near Wetaskiwin and water-skied for the first time when he was 15.
"I thought it was just a blast," he said. He bought a boat right after he finished his university engineering degree and "just loved the sport and took it from there."
He got the idea to create a manmade lake exclusively for water-skiing after he saw one in the Mojave Desert in California in 1972.
"It was astounding. I couldn't believe someone could actually build a lake so they could go water-skiing," he said. "It planted the seed. I thought, hey, I could do that."
Syracuse, NY - County Judge Bill Walsh fancies himself a pretty good water-skier. But spending some time on Otisco Lake with three-time World Cup Tour Champion water-skier Jodi Fisher had Walsh rethinking his talent level.
Fisher brought his “Jodi’s Ski Skool” expertise from Orlando to Onondaga County at the request of Ron Peckham, the president and chief executive officer of C&S Companies who’d met Fisher during a lesson with the champion water-skier in Florida. Peckham and about a dozen friends – including Walsh – turned out to be schooled by the champion here.
Walsh said Otisco Lake is almost always calm but the water was unusually rough the day of Fisher’s visit. Any locals’ complaints about the water being too rough to ski were quickly put to rest when Fisher took to the water like a, well, like a pro, the judge noted.
“I had a couple of good crashes,” Walsh said, noting Fisher joked he’d never seen anyone as old as the 67-year-old Walsh ski so well, quickly adding he’d never actually seen anybody that old ski at all.
Walsh said he awoke the following morning feeling like he’d been physically beaten. He confessed to sending a text message to friend and a fellow skier Tony Basile that read, “I feel like I called Mike Tyson a sissy and he heard me.”
Basile, former commander of the Air National Guard’s 174th Fighter Wing, texted back, “I shouldn’t have helped you,” indicating he, too, was paying a physical price for the day with Fisher.
While Walsh picked up water-skiing tips, he took credit for helping Fisher hone his whistling skills. He quickly explained Fisher would whistle loudly from the boat to signal the student water-skier whenever he was doing something wrong.
Wharton, Will Oliver and slalom specialist Freddie Winter. Team captain was Steve Glanfield who flew the team out to France a few days prior to the event to give the team the opportunity to familiarise with the site..jpg)
Jodi Fisher had Walsh rethinking his talent level.