These are
some views from the competitors about the tournament as a whole.
Mamo
Colosio Italy "The tournament is going to be very spectacular and
hopefully full of hot women!"
Evert Aartsen Netherlands "I think it’s going to be cool and
fun!"
Even Berger? South Africa
Keith St.Onge? USA "This X-games event is the future of our sport
and will help barefooting grow in the years to come.
Jan Ballien? Belgium Quote from Keith, "Congrats to Jan and on his
three week old little baby boy!" (Paul, don’t have to put that in
if you don’t want to)
Oene – Netherland Team Captain. "This new format is the future
of our sport with the thrill and excitement all in one! And the most
important thing is the good fun afterwards!"
Devin – Team Netherland Skier "The comp. was great and every
body loved it!"
Blake Summers – Team Great Britain. "I thought it was wicked and
the best barefoot competition ever!"
David Beckett, 1996 Great Britain Champion. "This new format
definitely works and it’s the best comp. that I’ve been to since the
1996 worlds!"
Rob Molenkamp - Tournament official, "It was very exciting for the
people, spectacular and lots of action with no down time!" "This
will help us for the future competitions and the skier has the chance to
use his own line and handle." The tower was too high from a judges
stand point and we need to have different starts off the tower."
Andy Harris – Tournament official, "Extremely exciting and next
year will be a larger event with jumbo trawns across from the site for
spectators to watch."
Clive Wilsdon, Tournament Organizer. "Everybody enjoyed the Splash
and I aim to make it bigger, better and more money for the skiers."
"I feel that the sport of barefoot waterskiing deserves more
recognition."
A note from Patrick to Paul Stokes about the Splash:
Hello Paul,
Back from the splash, recovered from the party, I had to give you some
news. But first I hope your neck is getting better. I tried to make the
best out of the chance you gave me to ski the splash... and it was not bad
as I came second.
On Saturday morning at 7am I left from Strasbourg(FR) to Frankfurt
which is about 2 hours drive. From there I took the plane to Heathrow
where I arrived about 1 hour before tournament start. There I met Ron,
Evert, Evan, David, Mamo, Keith and Jan who had about as much clue as me
about how the tournament was going to run (=nothing). All we knew was that
we were there to have a lot of fun and give a good show of our sport.
After we got all the information needed, we all went to start the
splash... and by looking down the start tower, we realized why it was
called the splash. That tower appeared very high to us, probably because
we were just not used to jump start from 7 meters. But finally no-one
missed the start and jumping off the tower was a good show and a lot of
fun. The course had 2 ramps in opposite directions for the skiers to do 2
rounds in a row. First round everybody didn't quite know what to do so the
tricks were more or less basics. But the next rounds spectators could see
steps, flips, multiple turns, feet to feet toe turns.
I
had the chance to ski 2nd round where I had to ski against David and Ron
was skiing against Keith. I eliminated David thanks to a line F-B and B-F
and a Feet2feet toe turn, and Ron beat Keith. Unfortunately I hurt my knee
