Uni Wakeboarding

The University Wakeboarding Team has placed second in the Student National Championships this summer.

Monday

Only Portsmouth had arrived by midday so could get an extra day on the cable practicing and getting used to the obstacles.

The massive Hyperlite pier was still tethered to the bar balcony and drew a fair crowd to watch the final pieces being put in place.

It may have taken over 12 months but by midnight it was in the lake, anchored and glistening in the moonlight, dwarfing the ski jump like an oversized nessie! Just the one injury from today, a semi dislocated shoulder from Portsmouths JLo that put him out for the week... So that would be his cable pass fee of £45 going straight behind the bar then!

Tuesday

Everyone was in anticipation of another great day and for two very different reasons. The first was obvious... It was the first ever hits of the Hyperlite pier, easily the largest obstacle in the UK and the only one with a wall ride.

Local Simon Chappel was the first to hit it with the students following close behind after the cable was opened once again. The day did include the arrival of a brand new Mastercraft X2 with only 1 hour on the clock and a steering fault, which meant that the one handed Kenny struggled with the boat all day.

Mastercraft sent out 2 engineers and the boat was fixed within 2 hours: massive thanks to them! The Kneeboard competition saw the first comp for 3 years without a landed backflip though there were some good stacks... Josh Clarke (Portsmouth) also walked away with an impact vest for his epic wall ride!

The second reason for all the talk and hype was the now infamous Themed "fancy dress" night to kick off SN08. Each Uni had its own theme, and with the locals being told their theme was Students, they decided on schoolgirl sluts.

Small problem being that Portsmouth went for a cross dressing theme and all of a sudden there was a whole host of male flesh masquerading as females.

Was a very surreal night with more than one person admitting to taking a double look at a few of the costumes, confused about the gender of the wearer!!!! Dan Jordan (Notts Trent) got on the decks and the dancing went well into the night, and even out into the car park!

Fancy Dress Prize went to Ben 'Mme Doubtfire' Kelliher (Portsmouth)  Everyones favorite Scottish Aunt.

Wednesday

The overcast nature of the weather only helped the hungover lie-in excuses and as such the day started a little later than normal.

Practice boat sets from the day before were started on the less than flat water, but Dave and Pat in the Caf served up some incredible breakfasts for all 80 of the attending campers!

You need to try potato dogs! Hash Browns wrapped around a hot dog... Amazing! We decided not to hold the wakskate comp in the evening but went ahead with all 4 of the Mens B Cable heats and the Mens A Boat comp.

The heats are always a highlight of the week, with a huge amount of waving to the judges, butter slides, ollie 180s and straight airs on the kickers, but what seemed to give certain people the edge was a student National favorite, the toeside 90.

Basically a whiplash face-slap onto the water this was enjoyed by all with the paramedic watching on through a chink in his hands. The best thing about the heats is that it shows we are all there to have fun.

The mens A boat comp was a definite highlight of the week and the order seemed to suit everyone apart from David Coates (essex), who had to ride in almost Seastate conditions.

His set went well but every hit of the wake needed to be timed like a doubleup, and he must have been cursing when the wind dropped and the lake flattened a bit for Dan Jordan (Notts Trent), who took the riding up a notch though his major tech trick Tantrum to blind, was just out of reach.

The next to up the level of riding was Johnny Carne (Ox Brookes), fresh from EAME Bronze he went out and got a huge reception from the crowd.

Always smiling he even managed a fashion air and some tindy grabs to really annoy Matt Crowhurst but always with style. The distance on his raley was unreal.

We thought there was only one rider left in Mat Price (Loughborough), who with his traditional understated and quiet way, dropped off the dock and went into a run that had the audience cheering every trick.

Tech levels went through the roof and a heel 7 for his double up was just out of reach, but had enough height to go to 9. Incredible.

The chat in the boat had been if Sam Mitson (Portsmouth) would compete, given that his captain had entered him for the wrong competition, yet we saw him on the dock, ready to go out and have some fun!

The underdog came out and gave it everything he had, and became a Nationals Legend when at the end of his set, was given a pro level double up, that he hit perfectly and was launched into the stratosphere for a Straight Air that he stuck perfectly to a massive roar from the crowd.

It was his first ever double up and Matt Crowhurst had told him to hit the third roller... Which he did. The evening was sponsored by Alliance Magazine and Wakestock. Oakleys Movie, Push Process was driven up from Grendon especially for the event and went down a storm.

Everyone missed the 1080 from Rusty but could not miss the crash section and the epic finale with wake to rail transfer... has to be seen to be believed.

Thursday

Finals Day showed us some great weather and we kicked off at 9am with the Girls boat comp which was dominated by Sam Filsell (Edinburgh).

She has a bag of tricks that would have got her onto the men's B podium and it set the pace for a double in the cable comp later in the day as well.

Cable Semi Finals followed the boat comp and there was an upset with Dan Jordan not making it out of his semi, despite the rules changing just before the semis to allow 4, not the initial 3, riders through to the finals.

The Mens B Boat comp provided a controversial result when Steve Hewatt (Southampton Solent) took the top honours with a wake to wake 3 and a 5.

The rules stated 1 invert and 1 spin were enough to put you into the A category so this was all above board! Sam Mitson reran after some leniency from me and managed to podium, coming 2nd.

Coming up to 4pm and the start of the finals Relentless had still not provided any product for our athletes so we took the step of hitting up the local shop to get energy into our riders!

The Mens B Final was a seriously high caliber, with the occasional invert and spin being thrown but nearly everyone trying to hit the Hyperlite pier.

The womens comp followed and again, Sam Filsell walked away with 1st place with a combination of Air tricks and tech riding. It was a shame there was no Liu Bachelor (Loughborough) to compete against her. Wakeskate jam followed and it was expected that local boy Tim Johnson (Sheffield Hallam) would walk away with it but he had a poor first 5 mins and Rory Cambell (Ox Brookes) stepped up the pressure.

In the end though Tim was able to take the win with some great moves and even landing both the Kicker and the Box Section of the New slider.

Mens A Section was again an awesome competition and saw some of the big names in UK wakeboarding competitng for the top university prize.

To be fair though, there wasnt much more going to pressure Mat Price when in one run he threw a heel 7 and a toes 7 along with a boardslide to backside 3 off the A frame, tootsie roll Blind Judge, Raley and a roll to Revert.

Johnny Carne came 2nd with Rich Underwood (Bedford) getting some serious height off the inside kicker on his Raleys. The only thing left to do was have a big air contest won by David Coates who threw a massive switch Big worm from the outside kicker.

Final Night BBQ was awash with gossip as to the winning combination and which uni was going to take over all prize, and when prizegiving came around the biggest cheers of the evening were for an absent hero, who had taken his horsebox and gone back to his Mitson Clan.

After crowning the winners and a lengthy thank you speech from both myself and Andy Granger, the party could finally start with a keg of free beer, only accessible after the fancy dress winner Ben Kelliher and myself had finished a 4 pint pitcher of Beer.

Thankfully we did and the party continued to 7am with blurry memories of tower jumps... though that could have been a dream! ;)

Friday

Pack up and go home was the motto of the day, but more Uniwake t-shirts were sold and a few hardy boarders hung around to compete at the 10 ft high comp on the Saturday.

For those that did stay, the best sunset of the week told us it was time to start planning for next year when the BWSF and BUSA will be taking the results and making them more official than they ever have been in the past.
Thanks...

Thank you everyone who was involved! It is impossible to complete this week without the help and support of the locals, and it couldnt have gone ahead anywhere else. I love all of you who competed and equally those who supported. Lets see the comp on our screens soon!

Article taken from www.uniwake.com