Hey World!

Another day of competition is complete. Today was jump and trick prelims. Team USA started off strong with Alex jumping 47.4m and Lauren jumping 48.9m. They finished 1st and 2nd with Kate Adriaensen of Belgium in 3rd. Men’s just went alright from our team. There were some huge jumps by Pipe Miranda, Alex Paradis,Emile Ritter and Kevin Melnuk. At the start of men’s jump, they were going to take 10 since there were 16 jumpers. Unfortunately, an Italian jumper didn’t jump which meant they were only taking 8 skiers according to the rules. That bumped Tyler Lorenz and an Italian skier Davide Napolitano out of the finals. We were all pretty bummed not to have Tyler make the finals but he made up for it by making the finals in tricks! After slalom and jump, it was estimated that USA was 1st, Chile 2nd, and Czech Republic 3rd.

Tricks prelims were next and we thought this event could be our strongest. We were hoping to extend our lead. For the most part, all of our trickers did well. Unfortunately, Adam had an early fall on his 2nd pass. Alex (USA) and Iris from France both put on a show to end the women’s event. All 5 of our trickers still managed to make it to the finals. The 4 out of the top 5 male trickers all stood up their runs. They definitely put on a show and it was a great way to end the second day of competition.

This evening, my parent’s and I walked a few blocks from the hotel to go to dinner. We heard there was a place called, The Patio, that had a handful of restaurants. Every restaurant had patio seating and they were all packed. There had to have been at least 10 restaurants. The Patio definitely seemed like the place to be; especially on a Friday night. As we walked backed to the hotel, the streets were packed with people, entertainers and live music. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera so I was unable to take pictures. We may go back one more time before we leave and if we do, I will definitely take some pictures.

Tomorrow is the finals for slalom and tricks. I am looking forward to getting back on the water. I feel that I am in a great position to set the bar high for the remaining skiers. Watch the live webcast at www.waterskibroadcasting.com I am predicting I will ski between 7am-8am west coast time.

Below are pictures from the opening ceremony last night. It includes all of the countries and athlete who are participating.