Date:
08/28/2011
Place:
1st
Number of Teams:
1
Before the end of first semester, the Illini Water Ski Team elected new officers! We met at Firehaus for dinner and elections before the start of the semester's barcrawl. We decided to combine some of the positions that we have had in the past, so the positions up for election were: president, vice-president, secretary, treasurer, social chair, webmaster, and homecoming chair. Kathleen Nolan is now president and Devin Cassidy is vice-president. KK Feid is secretary. Stu Herndon remains treasurer for the next year, and Sarah Trevor remains social chair. Carly Wylde is webmaster, and Kara Builta is homecoming chair. We are all very excited for the new executive board, and we have many ideas to continue improving the team!
March 19th-March 26th eleven members of the Illini Water Ski team drove to Florida for a few days in Panama City Beach, followed by five days of skiing at Pickos Ski School! We began our trip on Friday night. The team met at the trailer and drove through the night to Panama City Beach. We spent Saturday on the beach laying in the sun and meeting up with other friends that were also on the beach. On Sunday we drove the twenty miles to ski school in the early afternoon, and we relaxed by the lake for the remainder of the day. Monday morning began our five days of water skiing! Most of the team skied three or four sets each day during the week; we were tired, but very happy to be on the lake! We enjoyed sitting in the hot tub after ski sets each day.
The whole team skied really well for the first time out since October! Stu ran his first pass ever, Devin got a new trick ski and learned some new tricks, and Kara also learned some new tricks! We also had two birthdays during the week, Kara turned 19 and Sarah turned 20. We celebrated with the Illini Water Ski tradition of doing cakestands, where we shove our faces into a cake! Overall, we had an awesome week! We love the environment and the hospitality provided by the Pickos family, and we plan to return next year!
This past weekend, February 19th-20th, the Illini Water Ski Team traveled to Columbus, Ohio for Winter Conference, which was hosted by Ohio State University. On Friday night, we arrived in Ohio and reunited with the other Team Midwest skiers. Saturday afternoon, the actual conference took place. Four professional skiers, Billy Susi, Scot Ellis, Ryan Dodd, and Thomas Moore, traveled all the way to Ohio to speak with us and give us tips. We had four breakout sessions that afternoon, each geared towards a specific topic. We received tips on slalom, trick, and jump, as well as off-season training tips and fundraising ideas.
Once the four breakout sessions were complete, Team Midwest gathered in an auditorium to hear the results of the Skiammy nominations. We are proud to have a few winners from our team! Devin Cassidy won Female Rookie of the Year, and Mark Cassidy won Most Outstanding Senior Male. These two also both made the All-Star Team, of which Mark is captain, and they have the opportunity to compete in the All-Star Tournament in California this summer. The theme for Saturday night was “Fallen Favorites,” and we all had a blast dressing up as our favorite fallen celebrities.
January 4th-9th the Illini Water Ski Team drove out to Winter Park, Colorado to get some quality time on the slopes. We went on a trip with the entire campus, organized by Lifestylez. We spent four days on the slopes skiing Winter Park and Mary Jane. Most of the team snowboarded, but a few of us snow skied. At night we got to hang out as team, and we also got to be around a few hundred people from our campus. Entertainment was included in the trip. We got to see a few bands play, along with getting to see the Coolio concert with Black Pegasus and MIMs. Our team even started a trend by wearing our goggles out one night! We all had fun, and can’t wait to hit the water again once it is warm enough to water ski!
Team Illinois ended the fall season with a great weekend of skiing in Arvin, California for the NCWSA D1 Nationals. 14 members of our team flew out last Wednesday to compete against some of the best skiers in the world. Both women and men slalomed on Thursday: Kathleen Nolan and Kara Builta skied their personal bests...while the men probably earned their personal worsts. Men's trick and women's jump kept the team in 11th place for the remainder of Friday, but the men redeemed themselves by jumping exceptionally well during the last event of the tournament with the help of some spirit from a very enthusiastic Team Midwest. Jason Stelzer jumped his personal best and Mark Cassidy jumped near his personal best and broke the Men's team Jump record after being given what may have been the record for the most cheeks involved in one mooning (To view team records, please visit the records page). At the awards banquet on Saturday night, the University of Illinois was awarded with a trophy for 10th place out of all the collegiate teams in the country. We partied even better than we skied and even enjoyed our time in the airport before our flight the following morning. We look forward to a winter full of team bonding with upcoming social events such as the apartment scramble and team barcrawl!
For a full listing of results from the 2009 NCWSA Nationals visit www.ncwsa.com
If you have pictures from this tournament that could be put on the website, please send an email to illiniexec@gmail.com with a subject of "Tournament Pictures"