Tag: cold

Project Snowflake 2010

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The Mad-City Ski Team just held their 2nd annual Project Snowflake this past Saturday. They performed a water ski show to raise money for the UW Children’s Hospital. Now, you ask, what’s so special about doing a water ski show? Well, the Mad-City Ski Team is from Madison, WI and in December, there is typically snow on the ground and this year was no exception. From 6pm the day before till 6pm the day of, the entire area was under a winter weather advisory, but they still did their show, amongst the freshly fallen snow. And they even did a little footing…

For more details about the event, be sure to check out the team’s website for more pictures and videos from the show.

Ice Footing

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The boys (and girl) from Beaver Dam suited up early this year, hitting the water on March 21st this year. The lake had thawed just enough so that there was open water on one side while ice covered the rest. With the exception of Sarah who just wore  a shorty, the rest suited up in their drysuits doing their best impressions of the Stay Puft Marshallmellow Man to enjoy a bright sunny day on the still very cold water.


Cold Feet

The air on this day was in the 40s while the water was dangerously close to freezing. Be sure to watch all the way to the end where you see why you don’t go out on thin ice.

Thanks for the video Tommy!

First Person Perspective

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AreaMike of Barefoot Ski Dot Com posted another video using his GoPro video camera. I have to give some props to provide a new perspective on video to me. I don’t think I’ve seen first person LONG LINE deep water videos before. Thinking about it, I haven’t seen about half of this perspective before and I’ve done hundreds, if not thousands of deep water starts… I’ve realized that I close my eyes until I’m on top of the water sitting up. Here’s one of his latest videos showing this unique perspective.


More Cold Water Footing

What I think would be interesting to see is someone that can do the sick freestyle tricks strap one of these cameras to their chest and give us a first person perspective of jumping out boats, side slides, dolphin starts (that could be really challenging with a camera on your chest, overhead 360’s, etc. I’ve got a feeling that those videos would like induce motion sickness in a lot of people… still be fun to watch though. Someone out there needs to make that happen.

Through the Eyes of a Footer

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Courtesy of the Freeman Funk Footers and via Barefoot Ski Dot Com comes a video of some barefooters that decided to break the ice… literally. What’s unique about this video is that it is shot from what I must assume to be a helmet-cam. It takes a little while for the footing to start because they need to push the jet ski out into the water over the ice, but for those of you haven’t seen what a barefoot deepwater start looks like first hand, here’s your chance. You’ll also get to here the comments that come up while barefooting in bone chilling water.


Cold Water Footing 1st Person Perspective

I couldn’t find a website for the Freeman Funk Footers, but did find this t-shirt that gives their top 5 excuses for why they didn’t make it…

  1. Forgot to cinch my straps
  2. Had to poop
  3. Bolt in the Clinchers
  4. Boat Driver
  5. Train Wreck

Varying Degrees of Winter Water Skiing

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First off, some props go out to the Mad-City Ski Team, Skipper Buds and Malibu Boats. Based in Madison, WI, the ski team performed a benefit show on December 19th called Project Snowflake to raise some dollars for he local children’s hospital. They braved 30 degree weather and 36 degree water to raise about $3k for the American Family Children’s Hospital. They had fun for a very good reason. Check out the story on their website for more details. You can also donate to the cause. Details are in the Mad-City story. You ask why this made a barefooting website? Well, they had some barefooting in their show. Picture below.

Next, 30 years ago a town in California decided they needed a way to boost business on New Years. They settled on the Bun Run. It’s naked water skiing on New Year’s Day. Read the story here for more details.

Finally, there are a group of wild and crazy guys up near Montreal, Canada that like to do some water skiing in the winter. It sounds like it’s an annual tradition and they have a lot of fun in the process. Watch the video below…


Winter Water Skiing in Canada

Another Chetek Video

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I’d start off by saying the Chetek Boys (link to their first video) have gone to far with their latest video that shows them watching Chetek Girls video that was done, but I don’t think I can in good concious say that.  I can’t say it because they make good videos.

First, the video quality is great.  The production quality is great too.  They take time editting their videos together and put a good soundtrack on them.  Finally, the footing video is outstanding.  Now, they aren’t doing tricks like the DV boys, but good solid footing, a couple good comments here and there and they usually have a nice little crash sequence.  All elements of a good footing video, at least in my opinion.

In their latest video, 2 of the Chetek Boys take “Keith” out for some barefooting on November 1st.  For those that don’t know, Chetek is is northern Wisconsin.  On November 1st, it’s cold, and the water is cold even in southern Wisconsin.  Toss in the fact that it didn’t look like a bright and sunny day and you have a very brisk footing set.  And they have fun doing it.

Enough commentary, here’s the video that they submitted to BFC for the Show Ski Challenge.  That makes 3 entries for Chetek by my count.

You can find their video on BFC Show Ski Challenge Page here.  It’s titled “Fake It”.

One last thing, stick around to the very end.  One of them makes a funny comment after a  bad fall.

New Years Day Barefooting 2009

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The Carolina Show Ski Team organized a little barefooting challenge this past January 1st.  The challenge? 46 degrees out of the water and 44 degrees in the water.  Believe me, both of those add up to it is very, very cold.  It’s no Winter Waterland with snow in the air and ice in the water, but yeah, it’s cold.

After looking at their website, it looks like they actually did try to keep scores with the time they stayed up on the water and how many tricks they did to come up with winners, but I contend the real challenge is just getting in the water.  Yes, it’s mind over matter, and you can convince yourself to get in, but matter is something you study in physics, and the physics of a person at 98.6 degrees getting into the 44 degree water means the heat is going to get sucked right out.  Then you need to add in the wind chill factor.  Your face is wet with very cold water and then you start going at speeds in excess of 40 MPH, which means a 40 MPH windchill.  It all adds up to being very cold.

Anyways, they put together a nice little video to commorate the event.  So without further ado, here it is…


2009 New Years Day Barefoot Challenge

I’m not sure if this was a team only event, or if they opened it up to all skiers, but hopefully, they’ll spread the word a bit more next year.  

Anytime anyone has a barefoot event, please send me the details at wedge [at] talesfromthefoot.com.  I’m more than happy to spread the word to my many readers.  Just about all of them love to barefoot.

Winter Waterland 2001

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Yes, this video almost gets disqualified from this site based on all of the wakeboarding in it (I’m not anti wakeboarding, but this is a barefooting site) but there is enough footing in to warrant it’s inclusion.  Plus, there’s some pretty funny stuff in it. The weather was about 1 degrees and everyone’s having fun.  Enjoy the video…


Winter Waterland 2001

We may not have the weather to ski year round up north, but that won’t stop us.

Winter Water Skiing Just Looks Cold

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Adrienne sent in that there was some winter water skiing and barefooting taking place just yesterday, February 1st and sent a long a link to the pictures, which I’ll share.  Why are they doing this you wonder?  Well the local news crew was interested…

The backstory is Kare11 did a segment on winter activities- Eric Perkins “perk at play” took a stab at waterskiing in the winter. I’m not sure anything I took part in will make the air 😦 since we tried to build a pyramid and I fell twice (brrr), but it should be a fun segment. I think it airs Tuesday at 10- might be able to find it online. The video should have some good footage. There is a hard core group in MN that regularly foots year round, including a New Years day outing.
  – Adrienne 

Anyways, here the pictures…

Most people that pull up to the lake and see this, don’t think about going in the water.  But as you can see, they are already splashing around in the water while the rest picnic on the shore ice.

The Scene

Next, before they went skiing, the needed to clear the dock.  Usually this involves sweeping off whatever that stuff is that the sea gulls, docks or geese leave behind.  But they didn’t need to worry about that nasty stuff. They just had to get rid of some snow, so they bust out the snow blower…

clearing-the-dock

Next, they launched the boat and pulled up to the dock to load the barefooters spotters suckers into the boat. The driver’s face is just going to freeze when the start moving.  40 MPH wind chill is cold.  Don’t believe me? Next time it dips down below freezing, just roll down your window while you’re cruising down the highway.  It gets pretty cold pretty quick.  Next, stick your hand out the window without a glove on as you move.  Now it’s really cold.  If you’re really brave, dunk your hand in water so it’s soaking yet and then stick it out the window and you’ll get a tiny little taste of what it’s like behind the boat when your cold, wet and moving very fast.  On days like this, the drivers just don’t get enough credit.

 
pulling-up-to-the-dock

They finally did do something in the water though.  Here’s a good shot of some barefooting.

 

winter-footing

 

This is really cold.  But its really fun too!  Plus you get to brag to all your friends.
Thanks to Adrienne for sending in the picturs.  If you want to see the rest of them, here’s the link to the album.

Hell of a Way to Ring in the New Year

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Found this gem of a video over at the CRB and since it has some barefooting happening in winter, it’s just too good to pass up and not share here.  A local news crew did a short feature on a group of skiers from Witchita, Kansas that likes to go skiing on New Years Day… no mater what the weather is like.

It looks like this year the weather cooperated… well it cooperated as much weather can on January 1st.  And did I mention there’s  a Speedo?

71 Year Old Barefoots in a Speedo on a Frozen Lake

And for those that haven’t visited the Creaky Rowboat before, you should really stop by.  Even USA Water Ski’s executive director Steve Locke has taken notice.