Back in Old Melbourne Town

It was really great to get back to Australia after a 26 hour journey from Chicago to San Francisco to Sydney to Melbourne.  Flying in to Sydney on a clear morning is always a great site and I knew I was home.  Landing in Melbourne was awesome and I get to check out Mum & Dad's amazing new diggs.  I'm almost tempted to stay.

It was great to see my family and finally get to meet my brothers new born, Oliver, along with his other two kids, Charlotte and Sophia. 

I am planning on running a wakeboarding school on the Gold Coast along with having the privilege to ride for the summer in my hometown behind my Nautique 230. 

It was a pretty mixed US Summer.  A couple of steps forward, a couple of steps backwards here and there but overall, a lot of new experiences and good times along the way.

Roll on the Aussie Summer

WWA World Titles - Pleasant Prairie Wisconsin

After packing up all my stuff and saying goodbye to Orlando for the last time until next summer, Twiggy and I got on a plane and headed to the World Titles in Wisconsin. 

After two cancelled flights I was getting nervous that I was going to pull a Phil Soven at Nationals, (missed his ride due to cancelled flights) after finally landing in Chicago, Michigan, I got straight on my coach and mobbed it to Kenosha as fast as the bus driver said he could go. When I got to ‘Brat Stop Kenosha’, 2 miles from the site, I had to patiently wait for the cab that was supposed to be there waiting for me.

All just to be told i got there too late by 10 minutes, I was shattered and heartbroken. I was there a good 2 hours before my ride, but they said rules are rules.  I hope they treat all riders that way in the future because it sucked big time.  All i could do at the time was swallow my pride, and support the other riders who were lucky enough to ride in the contest.  It looked like a really fun contest, the lake was buttery all weekend, the wake didn't look bad and the boys were all shredding! 

At least I had something to look forward to, yes I was finally heading home after a long and fun summer with the people I love, I was looking forward to getting home, seeing my family and organising my house on the Gold Coast.

Westchester Ohio - US Nationals

After having a great weekend in  San Jose Costa Rica with my girlfriend Jillian, we headed back north from Orlando to Nautique Nationals.  We were still without my Aussie Photographer Mate Tim Mossup (Twiggy) who was still in California living it up on the beach getting snaps of skaters. 

When I arrived at the comp site, I saw the heats and was surprised to see how hard the heat was that I was up against the King of Wakeboarding Danny Harf.  I wasn’t overwhelmed with how hard my heat was but was stoked to be riding in the same heat as Danny himself.

After watching Danny ride I was pretty intimidated when he fell three times in his run behind his own boat the Nautique G23, but I put my boots on and went for it, unfortunately trying to open with a toe 9 is hard enough, but i was NOT expecting the wake to buck me that hard or to get that much airtime, the wake was so big it was unbelievable.

But never the less, got back up and kept going for gold, after a rare and unfortunate fall on the transfer rail, I was seeing myself to not make it through to the next round. At least I got to hang out with Shawn Watson and Danny and a few of the other Nautique riders who I haven’t seen at the last few events.