This is what you need

  The World Barefoot Council has established the following as the qualifying scores for the 2012 World Barefoot Championships in Waco, TX. 

You MUST have posted in an IWWF/WBC/ABC sanctioned homologated tournament (Standings List or Record Capable) between March 1, 2011 and July 30, 2012.

The Team Selection Committee is busy reviewing skiers scores and determining who should be considered as possible team candidates.  This list should be completed by February 15, 2012.  If you are not named to the list initially, it does NOT mean you may not be added to the list at a later time.  The committee will continue to monitor skier performances through early summer.  The final team recommendations are scheduled to go to the ABC Board of Directors for approval on July 10, 2012.

The current 2011 Worlds Standings List has not yet been posted, but if you want to confirm your scores for the qualification period, or if you wish to express your desire to ski as an Independent Skier (should you not be named to a team) please e-mail Doug Koch, US Teams Manager at  This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Thanks and good luck!

Doug Koch, US Teams Manager

Elaine Heller

ABC Female Athlete of the Year

The ABC has selected the 2011 Female Athlete of the Year: Elaine Heller.

          In the male-dominated world of barefoot waterskiing, Elaine Heller is continually driving herself and other women to perform beyond their ability. She is the first American woman and only the second woman in history to land an inverted barefoot jump, a feat very few male barefoot water skiers even attempt.  

 2011 was another record breaking year for Elaine, she set a new women’s world jumping record of 21.3 meters, breaking the record she set at the world championships in 2010. 

             Heller also had an incredible U.S. Nationals performance winning the gold in tricks, slalom, jump and the overall championships. She is ranked 1^st in the world in jumping, 2^nd in wake slalom and 4^th in tricks. 

 Elaine helps her family host several tournaments each year. You will find her doing everything from skiing and scoring to setting up equipment and hauling out the garbage.

 Elaine operates a Barefoot Waterski school called The Blue Moo Barefoot Academy. Elaine is currently in her junior year at the University of Wisconsin -Stout, majoring in hospitality management.  Her goal is to own and operate a business featuring Barefoot Waterskiing. Elaine believes her business and our sport needs to focus on attracting new participants to survive. Since half of all new skiers are female, Elaine hopes her success can help inspire other girls to give our sport a try.

 Elaine was nominated for the 2011 Woman’s Sports Foundation’s “Sports Woman of the Year” award.

Heller has broken the “fiberglass ceiling” in barefoot waterskiing and continues to set the bar high for women and men across the world. Heller hopes her success will help send the message barefoot waterskiing like a world champion is as attainable for girls as it is for boys. Just watch Elaine fly 

Brody Meskers

ABC Male Athlete of the Year

The ABC has selected the 2011 Male Athlete of the Year: Brody Meskers.

          Eleven-year-old Brody Meskers says he doesn’t want to be like World Champion Keith St. Onge when he grows up. He wants to be better.  It has been many years since our sport has seen such a self-motivated young skier move up so quickly in the sport.

When Brody Meskers was three years old, he watched some barefooters in a ski show in Wisconsin and told his dad he wanted to learn. By the time he was five, he was barefooting on a 20-foot line and at six, he entered his first competition.  Because of his tumble up starts, the tumble turn became his first trick–even before he learned to wave.

Six-year-old Brody competed in the Midwest Regional’s and U.S. Nationals– and he won both tournaments, edging out boys who were 7, 8 and 9 years old.  The following year, Brody learned to barefoot backwards and that opened the door to harder tricks and even more barefooting.

Brody is now a sponsored skier at the World Barefoot Center. “I like barefooting so much because there is so much to learn,” says Brody. “You can always get better and better.  Sometimes I don’t want to ski, but if I want to become the best, I have to go hard at it.”

This year, Brody focused on jumping and surface turns.   And at the tender age of 11, Brody has become a force to be reckoned with in national competition.  At the 2011 U.S. Nationals he swept all titles in Boys 2. He won slalom with 8.9 points, tricks with 2,900 points, jumping with a 22 foot jump and of course, the overall.

The sky seems to be the limit for the young gun from Chetek, Wisconsin.  Brody represents the future of our sport… and thankfully, the future could not be brighter. 

WBC Invitational

The first WBC Invitational was held on the 7^th and 8^th of October 2011 on Lake David located in Groveland, Florida. There were 10 competitors, including some of the world's best, as well as the up-and-coming "young guns" that were competing for the largest cash prize this sport has seen-with up to $20,500 being paid out. Countries included America, New Zealand, Australia, Great Britain, South Africa and Holland.

This wasn't just a traditional barefoot competition. This tournament used a new format of head-to-head competition. Also being trialed was the instant scoring system, where there was only one judge and one scorer in the boat, meaning the skiers knew their scores straight away. There was a lot of very positive feedback and both the viewers and the skiers loved it. We also had the live broadcast on the website for everyone to view. There were around 1000 viewers from all over the world, on both the 7th and 8th.

The competition kicked off around 8.30am on the Friday after interviews with both the skiers and officials were broadcast live to the world, and the American Anthem was played. The weather was looking a little average, however it held out for most of the day and the skiers were able to get some good results. The first day consisted of 2 rounds of each event - tricks, slalom and jump. After the 2 elimination rounds the group was cut down to just 8 skiers.

Saturday was the beginning of the head-to-head competition; this is where it was going to get interesting. Conditions were not looking too good and they weren't expected to get any better as the day went on, so the competition had to go on. The wind was howling and the rain had set in. The trick event kicked off, first on the water was Ashleigh Stebbeings (AUS), up against 2 Time World Champion Keith St. Onge (USA). Lucky Ashleigh. The big upset came later on in the bracket when Brendan Paige (AUS), faced St. Onge in the Semi Finals of tricks. Paige stood up two solid passes and put the pressure on St. Onge. Keith went down early, and was nudged out of the Tricks Finals by 2050 points. The Tricks Finals were held later that day, and resulted in Paige taking 2^nd place to Current World Champion, David Small (GBR), with Ben Groen (NZL) picking up 3rd place.

With the Slalom event underway, the wind was really going hard now. Athletes were pushed to their limit to fight the conditions, with a couple of skiers going down as they entered the course due to the chop down one end of the lake. Ben Groen (NZL), gave the crowd a show as he went down entering the course on his second pass, and simply refused to let go. After falling out the front and bouncing on his stomach and back, he tumbled back up and completed his second pass, knocking out Brendan Paige (AUS), and ending up with 4th place, after a loss to David Small (GBR) in the Semi Finals. Florida Southern Student, A.J Porreca (USA), grabbed the 3rd position, and

Small went on to battle it out against, Keith St. Onge (USA), later that day and managed a close 2nd, with the Slalom Titan (St. Onge) living up to his name and taking 1st.

With only one event left before the tournament was all wrapped up, the weather decided to let up a little, and the skiers were graced with some nice conditions for jumping.

David Small (GBR) was up first on the water and his natural, cool, calm self, going up against "young gun", Cody Ebbert (USA). After flying over Ebbert, Small had a slight challenge with A.J Porreca (USA), who kept the "Jumping Guru" and 5-time, undefeated, World Jump Champion on his toes, right to the last jump. With Small now in the Finals, it would come down to Ben Groen (NZL), who had jumped a New Zealand record of 25.1m the day before, against Keith St. Onge (USA) who had jumped 25.3m the previous day. St. Onge stepped up and planted a sweet 24.9m jump on the board, which was enough to knock out Groen by a meter, giving his 3rd place. With yet another clash of the titans in the Finals, Small proved his worth and pulled one back over St. Onge, picking up 1st Place, and 2nd Overall for the tournament, with Ben Groen coming in behind him at 3rd, and Keith St. Onge, taking out 1st place Overall.

Tricks

David (1^st)

Brendan (2^nd)

Ben (3^rd)

Slalom

Keith (1^st)

David (2^nd)

AJ (3^rd)

Jump

Keith (2^nd)

David (1^st)

Ben (3^rd)

Overall

Keith (1^st)

David (2^nd)

Ben (3^rd)

We would like to give a huge thank you to all the skiers, officials and organizing committee for this event. Without the help and support of everyone involved, this competition just wouldn’t have been possible. We hope that this tournament is just the first of many to come.

 The World Barefoot Center  teaches first timer's to advanced Barefooters and can be reached at (863) 877-0039 or email   This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

Elaine Heller's Jump at Nationals has been approved by the WBC  as a New World Record.

Elaine held the previous record with a jump of 21.0 meters which was set at the 2010 World Championships in Germany.  Elaine bettered her old record by .3 meters at this years 2011 National Championships at the  Barefoot Ski Ranch  in Waco Texas.

2011 Jump Jam

The Jump Jam lived up to the hype.

Mens 1 competitor Landen Ehlers won $5000 dollars for the largest increase to his PB.

David Small took home $5000 dollars for the longest jump.

Click here for Largest increase to PB here

Click here for the Longest Jump results  

Click below for 2011 Barefoot Nationals pics

Day 1 and 2

Day 3 and 4