I’m back to riding, and really kicked it off this weekend. On friday, my good friend from Nebraska, Ben Bazis, came into town to ride for abit. Ben was featured in Ronnie Ramaro’s video SNAFU, and definitely kills it….especially on rails. I’d recently received a new vide (CWB’s new press board) and was wanting to try it out, so we headed out to Tampa cable in the morning. After spending all day on it, we were beat, and started heading back to orlando. Once there, and after an amazing meal at Chic fila, we decided to head to OWC. It was awesome, completely empty. By the end of the day i think my rail riding skills doubled, and had to be one of the most fun days i’ve had riding. Pretty crazy considering i didn’t ride boat or do any airtricks. I guess its all about the friends your with, and the flex board probably helped.

On Monday, the 14th, the iwake team flew to Texas to begin shooting our team video. We were all stoked to get out there, and to find out what the plan for the vid was. Meeting us out there was Spencer Norris and Adam Burwell, the guys picked to film and edit the video. I’ve worked with Spencer Norris before, so was stoked to have the chance to work with him again on this project. He definitely has the creative eye it takes to make a wake vid different than the norm. Meeting us also was Spencer Smith, with the job of documenting the trip and future trips for WBM. Unfortunately for everyone, the weather was anything but perfect all week, ruining any chances of getting some shooting done. It did give everyone a chance to coordinate the upcoming filming trips and get stoked on the chance to travel the world. Some of the locations will be New Zealand, Mexico, and others with amazing backdrops and perfect lakes. After the week in Dallas, I took off to TSR for the weekend for some cable riding. TSR is one of my favorite cable parks, and did not disappoint this trip. Finally I conquered my fear of a switch s-bend to blind, so that pretty much made the trip for me. But then the unthinkable happened, I took a gnarly fall, and all I could feel was the pain in my knee! That was last weekend, and still I’m having trouble walking. Went to a doctor, and luckily no ligament damage, but not sure about the meniscus. He put me on some anti-inflammatory pills and wished me luck. I’ll keep you updated on any occurrences, hopefully it’ll go smoothly and I can find myself back at TSR in no time.

So last weekend was Surf Expo, and like every year, was absolutely crazy! The King of Woly himself was staying with me for the event, and incase anyone had any doubts, he doesn’t do medium! I mean this by, every morning we had to be at Expo at 9 am, when it opened. . . .but yet were the last ones at the parties every night! Me on the other hand, am definitely a “medium” kinda guy, so keeping up was made possible by lots of coffee. This year it got moved to the old building at the Orlando expo center so wasn’t to sure what to expect.  As a result of the economy, there were a lot fewer and smaller booths in the wakeboard industry section, but every company still managed to get out most of their 2010 products.  After looking at all the board companies 2010 stuff, all i can say is wow!! Pretty much every board company stepped it up this year and every one impressed me like crazy.  And if Expo wasn’t enough, the expo parties were better than ever this year!  The hilights had to be Park’s documentary and the Nike 6.0 premier.  Parks doc was the craziest wake movie i’d seen in a long time, and its unbelievable what he has done in his 27 years.  The gnarliest part is that the footage of tricks he was doing in 03/04 is still good enough to get into the best trick award at wake awards.  He did a double whirly (which noone else has ever done) and a toeside backroll whirly (which i’ve never even heard of) along with a double back mobe (!!!!!). It really showed why parks is the face of wakeboarding.  Before i forget, in the WBM wake awards, Rathy won with a wrapped, grabbed, backside 10!! what? yeah, crazy. progression is a daily thing now.  Moving on, saturday night was the Nike 6.0 premier and party.  THe party was in dt orlando, and was 80’s prom themed.  It was a pretty good party, but then word of the surprise band got around.  If you could have any band at an 80’s prom, who would it be?? I got it on my first guess.. . . . .The DAN Band! Yup, the guys from Oldschool, and from I Love You Man. That instantly stepped the party up to legendary status and everyone proceeded to get hammered off of the free alcohol.  Attached is a picture of Dan himself, but it was taken after intoxication so is a little blury.  Now, on Wednesday, life is back to normal.  It took 2 days to recover, and Surf Expo was definitely one to remember this year.

Its January now, which means all the winter festivities and vaca’s are over and its time to get back onto the board. I just moved out to WInterhaven, and am now neighbors with a couple of my teammates. Needless to say, i was stoked to ride on my new lake for the first time. That was Saturday, and now i’m just starting to remember it. Unfortunately my first ride back didn’t go so well, and i proceeded to knock my head pretty hard and forget about everything for a couple hours. The headaches are starting to go away, and i’m starting to get stoked to go out and ride again. I guess i cleared all the cobwebs out of my head real quick with that fall. Now, if i could just remember what i fell on. . . .

Recently I ran across an interesting fact that I would like to share with everyone. Recently, Orlando Fl has bypassed Vegas to be the #1 tourist destination in the country!! And we all know the reason for that. . . .wakeboarding! I never thought wakeboarding was that popular of a sport, but that statistic just proves it. So many people are flying down to orlando to go to various wake camps and cable parks that it pushed past sin city as the most popular destination in the US. This is definitely good news to the wake industry, especially with the economic turmoil thats been going on lately. Even if Citi Bank and most of the US car manufacturers go out of business, at least we know the wake industry will be holding strong. Ohh, and I guess a small percentage of those tourists might be visiting Disney, Universal, Sea World, Kennedy Space Center, and other local attractions, but my money’s betting that most of them just wanna come down and ride butter!

Just learned how to Scuba dive. Sooo sick. Was way cooler than I ever thought it’d be. Going to go spear-fishing in a couple weeks and can’t wait. Attached two pics of us diving out at West Palm beach. The day we picked was gnarly. . . 6 foot swells, thunder and lighting, and pouring rain. I felt like i was in a movie, maybe the Perfect Storm. But, that made it way cooler. Anyone thinking bout learning, definitely should.. .and if you do let me know because i’d always be down to go.

Its that time of year again when the mornings get brisk, the leaves change colors and wetsuits are brought out of storage, yup its fall. For most that means the end of their wake season, but for Floridians it means the time of year to try new tricks and progress. For me, it means I have to start seriously planing my Halloween costume, and I feel like this year could be the toughest yet. While the vast over population of the United States may mean many different things, to me it means more people are taking more halloween costumes away from me. Add that stress onto the fact that schools started up, and fall gets intense. School’s been crazy, and if i plan on keeping in line with my 9 year plan, i gotta buckle down and make sure i pass my one class per semester. On top of that, we’ve been wakeboarding like mad men. Now that the season’s over, its time to cram photo shoots and video shoots in before it gets to cold. Last week Spencer Norris stayed at my house to film for his new vid, and I must say we did work! I landed the first new tricks i’ve had in a long time, a switch heel 7, back 7, and Indy Front Flip to blind. It was definitely a fun week. But the fun didn’t stop there. Friday night was Chad Sharpe’s b day party downtown, so a couple friends and i meet up with them, and had more than our fair share of adult beverages. Needless to say, i decided to stay in on saturday night to get ready for my trip to Texas on Monday. I”m going there for a week to ride, and go to the Angels and Airwaves concert. Also, while down there, going to plan our trip to Mexico in January. Will fill everyone in more when it comes about. As for now, i have a fridge full of food thats going to go bad, so i’ve put aside this whole day to eat. It may sound like fun to some, but after the 6th meal in a row and the 5th scrambled egg, it definitely becomes a challenge. I do respect professional hot dog eaters.
.

Big News! Earlier this year I put together a trip to Shasta with abunch of Westcoast riders, including fellow CWB riders the Hoffman sisters and Rob Carter. The trip was definitely an adventure, and everyone had a good time. Since then, Spencer Norris put together a video on the trip, I wrote a masterpiece of an article, and Sean Watson (the photographer from the NW, not the rider) put together a photo gallery. The news will be up on wakeworld soon, but as a special to the CWB bloggers, it is on wakeboardingmag.com. The direct link is;
http://www.wakeboardingmag.com/article/Events/Video-and-Gallery-An-Epic-Week-of-Shasta-Shredding
So be the first to check it out!

Its Blog time again! Since my last update life has been alittle crazy. As you may have seen in Derek Grasman’s previous post, myself, Derek, and Cory went to Smith Mountain lake in Virginia to experience BroStock first hand. Wow. It was one of the craziest weekends of my life. Never have I seen so many man-soda’s shot-gunned, pounded, guzzled, sipped, drank, and funneled in my life. It was a good time, but I was definitely glad when it was over. That lake was one of the coolest I’ve been on, and recommend it to anyone that has the opportunity to check it out. The water was always glass, and super warm. Plus, the crew at Wake-N-Skate was awesome and stoked on riding.