Barefoot Central Show Ski Challenge Videos

Finally had a chance to watch what I think are the two new videos out there. They were filmed up on Lake Sinisippi in late April and features skiers mainly from the Beaverland Must-Skis and Sinissippi Ski Club. The first one shows the crashes and the second one shows the trash talking. It’s nice to see some people that are as foolish as I am when it comes to skiing early in the season.

You can check out all of their “show ski” videos by going here. The crash video is here and the trash talking video is here.

They also have video of a flier from a bridge, but I won’t link to it to promote it since the way it was done it is basically a deep water. Boat didn’t move until he hit the water. A flier involves jumping off the dock (or whatever your jumping off of) and while still in the air the boat needs to accelerate. Takes a good driver as well as a good footer.

Links:
Barefoot Central
Beaverland Must-Skis
Sinissippi Ski Club

Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.

A Good Night of Practice

Actually had warm weather, calm winds and calm water. Yes, you read that correctly. Calm water. It was almost weird.

After completely messing up my first flier by mistiming my jump badly, I nailed the second attempt and made a nice long loop (dock to the bridges and then looped back). Too bad they were only pulling me at 38 MPH. I’m six foot and 230 pounds. I need more than 38 MPH to be comfortable on my barefeet. While holding my position in the curl while going around the corner, I couldn’t see a thing. I was trapped in a ball of spray. Later, I did a couple of 3 highs to get my pyramid legs back underneath me. Both of those starts were much better than last weeks.

The team also managed to get the docks straightened out again by moving the anchors and did some work on the jump to get it straightened as well. Plus, our triple rig made an appearance as well.

This made for a good night of practice.

Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.

Long Weekend Update

I guess the weekend really started on Thursday night when I caught POTC3. For the uninitiated that’s Pirates of the Caribbean 3. See my quick review in the previous post.

In reality, the weekend started with some frantic calls on Friday afternoon to arrange some water skiing for after work. As I sat in the dentist chair getting my teeth cleaned (literally) I managed to finalized the arrangements. About and hour latter I was launching the boat at Olin Park waiting for Sandy and Teri to join me. I figured since I plan on competing in the Mad-City Dual next weekend I should do at least one step off. Since it was a calm late afternoon we started in the main lake. I (surprisingly) made my slalom start and tried to do a step off but the constant wally rollers made it impossible for me to get comfortable. Finally, seeing no end in sight, I punted. I then decided to give it one more go in the main lake. Once again, I surprised myself by making my slalom start again and then managed to make my step which felt clean and according to Teri, looked clean. After going through some rollers and seeing more, bigger rollers coming up, I decided to make it a very brief run. Also wanted to go back and pick up the drop ski. After Teri & Sandy had skied, we headed into the bay so I could do a couple long runs. First run started with another step-off (once again after making my third deep water slalom start of the night and in a row) and ended back at my ski after making the loop in the bay. After handing the ski into the boat, I took one more run and made another loop around the bay.


Finally warm enough to go sleeveless.
You can also see the weeds we are constantly footing through.


Me after my footing sets.


Dr Sandy driving the boat.


T-Bell posing for the camera.

After putting the boat away, I headed to the Stadium Bar to watch some friends play vball and then ended up staying there till about 11 before heading to the Dane for some more drinks. Finally made it home as the hour approached 1am.

Saturday morning I woke up to a cool, overcast day and headed down to practice planning on helping repair the dock with John. In all honesty, I didn’t do much other than move the docks or hold them in place as John worked on anchoring them. After spending an hour or so in the cool water, we had the docks back in place as best they could be.

The rest of the day was relatively low key. A little TV, a nap, inspected the trailer brakes, making calls about skiing the next day.

Sunday morning arrives and I finalize plans at 8am for skiing at 9am. I hit the lake with 7 & Lori. I do some more loops around the bay which is now nearly weed filled and 7 does some footing too. He’s been working on his deep water sense last summer and finally has it figured out. He’s had a lot issues with “cheeking out” and after getting a tip a few weeks ago from a UW skier he now makes more than he misses. Still took him 3 runs to get 2/3 of the way around the bay, but he’s making his starts now. In his defense, on his 3rd run, moments after standing up he hit some fishing boat rollers which ended his run.


That’s me in the ball of spray and those are the weeds in the background.


7 on his “Police Evidence”

After lunch and a nap, I headed down to the ski show. The show was a little rough, but a good start.

Sandy and Teri doing fliers in the show.
Photo from Jim’s Photos.

Afterwards, grabbed some pizza with Bugs & Scott and then headed to a bonfire for some drinks. Stayed out way to late even though some people thought I was leaving early. But getting home at nearly 2am, I stand by that it was way too late.

Monday was relaxing. Did some work around the house, mowed the lawn and visited with the neighbors. The evening turned really nice and would have been good to the hit the lake, but it was nice to relax too.

For full size versions of these pictures, you can view them in my Picasa Web Album here.

Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.

POTC3

The quick review (and that’s what this review will be) is the movie starts off slow, lots of different stories going on. Almost confusing. Towards the middle, the stories start to come together. The first half drags on just a bit as they put all these stories together and then they get to the ending and the ending is worth the wait. I’d recommend watching at least the 2nd one again to refresh your memory about the story since it basically ended with a cliff hanger. Well worth watching, although I liked the 1st one the bes of the 3.

Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.

Show Ski Season Starts this Weekend

For those of you who may not know, the Mad-City Ski Team kicks off their season with their first show of the year this Sunday at 6pm at Law Park. They are the defending State and National Champions. We’ve been on the water just a couple times so far this year and our first show is always interesting.

Our neighbors to the north in Beaver Dam kick off their season this weekend as well. Their show is on Monday. For more details about the Beaverland Must-Skis you can check out this news story or visit their website.

Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.

Old School Mad-City Ski Team Video

One of my Google searches found the following video out on YouTube. Some people did a promo video for the Mad-City Ski Team in 2003 which is the year our theme was The Resurrection and finished 2nd at Nationals. OK, it really isnt’ that old, but it’s amazing how much the ski team has changed in 4 years. Enjoy!


Funny part is as I write this post the song Superstition came on the radio… spooky.
Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.

Another Sign of Summer

Tonight I encountered another first while skiing this year… I actually ended up getting hot wearing my wetsuit and heater shirt in between pyramid runs. This is always a good sign that the weather and water are finally warming up. I’m pretty sure others on the team would probably disagree with my statement, but I’ve always been a pretty warm person to begin with.

Not my best night skiing though.

Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.

Cross Training

Tonight, before ski team practice, I decided to do something a little different… I took a short run on my Rollerblades, something I haven’t done in years. I grew up playing hockey, so skating isn’t an unfamiliar thing, just haven’t done it in a while. Tonight I dusted off the blades and took a short run from Olin to Law Park and back. Took me just a bit to get my wheeled feet back underneath me, and now I’m reminded about some muscles in legs that only really get used for the skating motion. I needed the cardio workout though.

During practice, I manged to time taking my barefoot run pretty well. Wind seemed to be dying down and just after finishing the runs, it started right back up stronger than ever. I had opted to leave the barefoot shorts in the car when heading down to the site and now I remember all to well why I purchased them. Also, the one fall I had where I landed square on my back wouldn’t have been bad, except for the tumble turns I had tried on Saturday. Still feels a bit bruised from then.

Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.

Let’s Talk About What Can Loosely Be Called Tumble Turns

So last August I had tried some tumble turns with very little luck. I decided to give them another attempt yesterday. I hit the water yesterday morning with the Bells, Sandy and Teri. We had all been out late the night before, so morning came early, even if it wasn’t that early. I arrived at 830, they arrived about ten minutes later ready to ski.

I took the first set, just doing some long runs around the bay. Most of the way around one way, then turned around and went most of the way back around. It just felt good to have a few nice calm runs again after my random roller run from Thursday night (it would have been good water, but just roller after roller after roller until I finally hit one that felt like a double up… I caught air and landed on my side, hard; then I took another run).

We then setup the boom and Sandy took the first run. She really wants to work on her one foots. She does a little work on them, mainly cleaning up her form because her natural stance has her knees together and she’s back on her heels. She knows she has to have a more natural stance with her knees in a bit more natural position, not so close together, and also not so far back on her heals. After her foot runs she took a set on her barefoot trainers and managed to clean her form a little and do some one foots on the trainers.

Sandy about to throw a tumble. You can see how she keeps her knees close together.
She’s even catching a little air with left foot.

Next on the water was Teri. She also threw some tumbles and then did a little work on her one foots as well.

Teri on the water. She’s not a fan of the weeds that we’re going through.

Then I took another set, almost anxious to try some tumble turns again. I’d been thinking about them since the night before when we talked about putting on the boom. Like last August, I never quite got them right, but Sandy and Teri did say I managed to get about 3/4 of the way around once. While the other attempts weren’t nearly as good, they did provide some funny photos.

First tumble attempt… something tells me this isn’t the right way to finish a tumble.
It looks like I’m leading with my legs to finish the spin, instead of the hips.

Another tumble attempt. Same problem.

My best attempt, but didn’t make this one either. Need to keep the rope in by my hips.

Now I’m just getting tired.

After heading home to drop off the boat and grab some lunch and an unexpected nap, I turned around and went back to the lake to meet up with Beau (aka Peaches), Bugs and 7. Beau was taking his old school jet ski to the lake to play with. Still a little sore from the morning, I just played the role of spectator. At one point Beau wondered how long it would take to go across the lake and back on the jet ski and decided to find out. Well, the wind was blowing strong out of the southwest, so he didn’t have calm water. I actually wondered if he’d have enough gas to make it there and back. About 30 minutes later, he finally did make it back. Then just about everyone cracked open some of the new Lienie’s Summer Shandy that the Bug man had brought along. I had a feeling it was going to be a fruity beer and was right. A lot of lemonade flavor to it, but I didn’t care for it. I’m not one for fruity beers.

Then after heading home to catch another nap after eating some supper, I headed back to the lake a 3rd time. This time to Russ’s to sit around a fire and drink some beer. We had a few isolated showers (which Jaws felt sorry for since they were lonely) while drinking beer, but they didn’t stop us.

Finally roll back into the garage about midnight, exhausted, ready for some sleep. It was long day, most of it at the lake, spent with good friends. Every day should be like this.

You can find all of the pictures from the morning ski run here.

Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.

Practices Have Started

After months of land practices and weeks of working on equipment, the Mad-City Ski Team has finally taken to the water this week. Unfortunately mother nature hasn’t been kind.

Monday’s practice featured nearly 90 degree temperatures to keep us warm and 30 MPH winds with gusts going to 40 to try and keep us cool. The wind didn’t help with keeping us cool and they were southwest winds which really aren’t good to begin with for our ski site, let alone at 30+ MPH. This means rough water. White caps.

Today, the wind was good, just a breeze out of the northwest, which is a great direction for our ski site, but the air temperature was probably about 50 degrees, maybe 52. And overcast. Just not a very warm practice.

I did take advantage of the calm water that apparently nobody (besides us and a few fisherman wanted to be on) and had a very good barefoot run. Started at the main dock, down to the bridges and back past the dock to the Betty Lou launch. Looking at maps it looks to be about a 2 mile run.

Comparing this run to pretty much all of my runs on Saturday, including the “good” runs, it is amazing what a difference decent water makes. With water like this, it would have been a run a piece on the way down the lake and then one each on the way back. Instead it was face plant after face plant after face plant.

Visit bfooter.com… More pictures, more videos, more water skiing stuff.