| Every
year in early March, the Wisconsin Waterski Federation hosts a waterski
convention called ThinkTank. It's a convention that is set up to
mainly attract show skiers from around the midwest. Holding it in early
March while all the lakes are still frozen all but guarantees the skiers will show up. It's the show that gets everyone pumped
and ready for the upcoming season.
2008 marks our fourth year of
attending ThinkTank events. This year the event was held at the
Chula Vista Resort located in The Dells, Wisconsin. The Dells is
the #1 vacation spot in Wisconsin and contains mainly attractions
ranging from scenic boat rides, several amusement parks and countless
water parks. Seeing as though Wisconsin has very cold winters, it's
commonplace to see indoor waterparks attached to nearly every hotel
around the Dells. The Chula Vista is an extremely large resort
that offers guest a wide variety of amenities including plush rooms,
watersports, golf in the summer, fine dining and a full service spa.
2008 is the 2nd year ThinkTank has been held at the Chula Vista and the
skiers seem to really enjoy the resort.
Since our purchase of Eagle Sports
in 2006, we have made it a point to attend ThinkTank in order to
participate in the Friday night Fashion Show that is organized by Abby
Lorenz. Abby organizes the models, works with all the companies
that plan to participate, and makes sure all the models get pampered
before and after the event with facials and goody bags.
No one ever really knows how big
ThinkTank is going to be. That's mainly because the skiers (being
mostly college students) never commit to going until the last minute.
During the weeks before ThinkTank, you can start seeing discussions on
the Forums as everyone tries to gage who's going, who's teaching the
classes, and what fun things are going to happen. Most of the
skiers come to ThinkTank for the social interaction and chance to let
loose for a weekend. Basically, it's a huge weekend party with
some learning thrown in for everyone's good. It's has proven to be
a great way to jump start the ski season in Wisconsin. Just
imagine yourself and thousands of your ski buddies from all over the
country held up in a plush resort for 3 days with nothing to do but talk
skiing and socialize. Enough said.
This year was the first year we
would bring Eagle's entire product line to showcase in the Fashion Show.
Traditionally, we had only showcased the barefoot and showski suit line,
but with Eagle's decision to branch out into slalom, wake, and
hydrofoil, we were bringing many more new products to showcase.
Dave Mueller was on had for the show and as always to a great job
announcing the Eagle products. Many thanks to the Ski Sprites Ski
Team for helping out as models during the show.
As a highlight to the Eagle Fashion
Show, we end the show with the awards presentation of the BFC Footer of
the Year. This year, we were awarding 8 year old Nicholas Ruchti
with a custom made Eagle suit, jacket, t-shirts, and award plaque.
Jenny Malony, the 2006 Footer of the Year was on hand to present
Nicholas with his suit as she sported her brand new 2008 pink on pink
Checkmate by Eagle. Nicholas' family was on hand and was amazed by
the size of the crowd and event in general. They said they had
just gotten into the sport a year earlier and have been blown away by
the support Nicholas has received. So keep your eyes out for the
Nickster at Figure-8 tournaments this season. He's sure to be a
big hit at Footstock.
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Click Here
to watch video of
Nicholas receiving his awards |
Another reason for us attending
ThinkTank is to help promote FOOTSTOCK. Footstock is the largest,
and most popular of all Figure-8 tournaments. We've been
sponsoring the event since 2004 and come to ThinkTank each year to show
videos from the event and answer any questions skiers may have.
This year, we released a DVD containing all the footage shot at
Footstock 2007. You can purchase a copy of the DVD for $9.95 on
BarefootCentral.com. The video takes you through the entire
Footstock experience, starting with the annual pre-Footstock golf
tournament, through Day 1 and Day 2 competition and finishes with the
Awards Ceremony. It's a great keepsake. We played the DVD at
ThinkTank and watched as many footers sat through the entire video
before leaving.
Along with
the Footstock videos, we also showcased the new BFC "Entire Video
Collection" DVD, 17 of our best vidoes back to back. Skiers
watched in amazement as Keith St. Onge showcased his talents and Andre
De Villiers performed mind boggling stunts such as the scissor slide,
dolphin start, front flip and front to back off the side of the boat.
 Mike Seipel was on hand showcasing
Barefoot International products. Barefoot International is one of
BarefootCentral.com's most popular suppliers and they continue to be one
of our easiest manufacturers to work with. It's always nice
visiting with Mike Seipel and getting his take on the industry and what
he thinks of the new generation of footers such as Heinrich Sam and
Andre. Mike is also very good at predicting the next Footstock
winner. His choice for 2008 is CVZ again.
This year it seemed like everyone
turned out for ThinkTank. We seemed to be running into someone we had not seen in several
years, or we hadn't met at all. Many Cypress Gardens skiers were
on hand, Geno Yauchler was on hand teaching at the Tanks, socializing,
and judging the Mastercraft indoor wakeboard competition. Keith St
Onge was at ThinkTank running the barefoot tanks. He brought his
dad (Claude) with him to help out and review his diet and exercise
routine. There was a lot of talk around the bar and convention
area about Keith's decision to leave Eagle and BFC. I did meet
Keith and his dad in the hall as they arrived at Chula Vista late Friday
evening. We spoke briefly and wished each other good luck during
the weekend. We didn't see much of Keith after that. We
heard the barefoot tanks were very busy and Keith must have used his
downtime for more relaxing ventures.
We did however, bump into Bill
Scharpf, the Director/Producer of the new movie that's due
to come out in theaters this summer called H2O Extreme. He had
come to ThinkTank from Orlando to promote the movie. He had plenty
of posters to hand out and played the trailer to the movie at the Friday
evening show. Many skiers missed it due to all the chaos that goes
along with the show, so we asked Bill to give us a copy to show here on
the site:
We had a great time talking to
everyone that stopped by the Footstock/BFC/Eagle booth in the convention
area Saturday afternoon. The new Eagle slalom/wake vests were a
huge hit (especially the new lady's vests), as were the new Eagle knit
caps, sweatshirts, heater shirts, and barefoot suits. And now that
the word has spread about Eagle's new Show Ski Support Team and their
willingness to accommodate a wider variety of graphics, suits designs,
etc..., the booth was packed with more Show Directors inquiring about
what is now available to them.
Team BFC and Team Eagle made some
key announcements during the ThinkTank. Here's a quick summary:
- BarefootCentral.com announced
the 2008 ShowSki Challenge. With the popularity of the videos
submitted so far to the ShowSki Challenge, BFC has decided to up the
ante. We'll be accepting video entries for the 2008 ShowSki
Challenge between April 1, 2008 thru Dec 31, 2008. We'll be
selecting the top 5 videos and then putting it out to vote to
everyone to select the ultimate winner of the 2008 Show Ski
Challenge. The 1st thru 3rd winners will be announced at
ThinkTank 2009. 1st Place wins $1000 for the team, 2nd Place
$500, and 3rd $250 to go towards the teams next equipment purchase.
More details to come in the coming weeks.
Click Here for more information
- Eagle announced that Scott
Reed will be the local Eagle Representative for the Midwest.
Scott will be attending events and giving skiers an up close look at
Eagle products. He will also be working with local dealers who
wish to add Eagle products to their shops.
- Eagle introduced Ellie McClean
at ThinkTank. Ellie has been with Eagle Sports for 8 months
and is the factory Customer Service & Production Manager.
Ellie works directly with Eagle Retailers to receive, process, ship,
and invoice orders.
- Eagle introduced the NEW
SICKNESS Series Barefoot Suit designed specifically for Chris Van
Zeeland, the current Footstock Champion. Chris was on hand at ThinkTank to
model the new suit. It was his first time seeing
the new suit and was very pleased with both the design and fit.
Expect to see the Sickness available on
BarefootCentral.com by May.
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Dave Mueller interviewed
Chris Van Zeeland about his new suit and the upcoming season
Click Here
|
-
 We sat down with Aaron
Schoelzel (4 time Footstock Champion) over the weekend to review his
status for the
coming year. Aaron had asked to be released from his
obligations 2 years ago in order to address some personal issues.
Now that he has things sorted,
he's back on Team BFC and has asked to once again wear Eagle
wetsuits. So expect him to be a force to be reckoned with this
coming Figure-8 season and at Footstock.
The evenings at ThinkTank are very
interesting. Everyone meets in the bar to socialize, talk about
the past and present, and drink a lot of alcohol of course. The
Chula Vista Resort has the bar adjacent to one of the restaurants, so
that was the hot spot for the weekend. The bar closed at 2 am and
it was packed every night up to that time. Anything that happened
after that we can't report on. ThinkTank is kinda like Vegas.
What happens at ThinkTank stays at ThinkTank.
We had spent all day Saturday in
the convention, so Michele scheduled us for a massage at 4pm. That
was very relaxing. We then met the team at ?? Steak Restaurant.
It's a 5 star restaurant on the 2nd Floor there at Chula Vista.
You won't leave hunger. It's a bit on the expensive side, but the
portions are Texas Size and food is top notch. We had a great
dinner and talked about the upcoming season and how we plan to support
the growth of Eagle across our multiple product lines. Scoot Reed
is excited to be our Factory Rep in the Midwest. Scott can be
reached at 414-840-1572 or by email at
footinforlife@aol.com. We
ended dinner with the desert of all deserts. A $20 banana split.
It took 10 of us to finish it.
After stuffing ourselves, the team
decided to take advantage of the hotels oversize HOT TUB. The hot
tub a Chula Vista can accommodate about 100 people, and was a popular
hit for all the skiers. It was open til 10pm each night and was a
must do for all. So we made the mad dash outside in the 25
degree weather with snow all around us to jump in the 101 degree water.
The hotel even served us drinks while we were in the hot tub. And
of course, after a few drinks, we began daring each other to run out
into the snow and roll around. For a thin blooded Texas,
that was a tough bet to follow up on.
After the hotel kicked everyone out
of the hot tub at 10pm, we all decided to make our way back to the bar
where things were just getting started. We met up again with Geno
and his wife, Bill Scharpf, and some skiers from Minnesota's Shakopee
Prior Lake Ski Team. Two of the girls on their team (Katie and
Heidi) had been stalking me in pursuit of my BarefootCentral.com visor
that had Sanger Boats on it. Heidi and her husband had recently
bought a Sanger and loved the visor. It was my last one, so I
wasn't letting it go without first buying me a few drinks. We had
a blast talking to them til about midnight when we finally decided to
call it a day, and thus ended out 2008 ThinkTank experience.
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