by Aaron Schoelzel

The first barefoot race of the year took place May 10th in Beaver Dam Wisconsin. It was a great race and even more fun afterwards.

A quick recap of the events. Friday night a good portion of team Ace in the Hole went to an adult entertainment establishment.  I wasn't there to take part in these activities so if you wanna know any details you will have to ask them.  Chuck informed me that it consisted of him, Tony, Jason, John, Scott and Dave Mueller.  Dave supposedly fell asleep while getting a dance and Jason was hitting on the bouncer.  All the boys were in bed by midnight after watching Jason throw up in Scott's back yard.

Skiers such as Tony B. from Connecticut, Jason Lee from Indianapolis, two of the St. Louis teams,  Brent Schroeder from Austin, even Chuck Gleason came from Texas came up to play in the chilly waters of Beaver Dam lake. Saturday morning all the teams met at the boat launch to talk trash, MVS even skied the course. The water conditions were awesome this year. The course is twenty two miles long and in years past after skiing it you felt like it was 222 miles long.

Once everyone had their boats in it was time for the skier meeting and lane selections. Team Ace in the Hole (our team) drew lane 3, Team Pavestone Lane 4 and Team MVS had lane 5. This set up for a great showdown between Tony and the lead off skiers for MVS and Pavestone.  Brent Schroeder (aka Viper from Austin), Tony B, Team Pavestone, and Gary Slawny from the Beaver Dam team skied fast and long for about three quarters of the first half of the race before Gary finally went down.  Team Pavestone lasted until about mile 9, and that left a two boat show down (Tony B vs Kaedle) both behind Ski Pros. The two Ski Pros raced nearly side by side all the way to the turn point. Ace in the hole was on the inside of the turn with MVS to their right on the outside of the turn.  Can you imagine footing 50mph for 11 minutes then having to make a turn around?  It was amazing to watch. I as well as Scott Reed and CVZ were in absolute awe of both Tony and Mr. Schroeder having never had seen this type of skiing display like this in a race.  Chuck kept telling us it was common place to see runs like that in the Cup Series.

Shortly after the turn point Tony tapped out and Viper skied on. We had pre-planned our transition points. Next in the water for us was Chuck.  Tony was wiped and Chuck was fresh.  He'd have to ski head on into the trailing boat rollers all the way back.  He skied at 48 mph for the next four miles through all the rollers, caught and passed MVS, and put us in the lead.  This left us with three skiers remaining to ski.  When Chuck caught a random toe it was the reigning FootStock champion (Chris Van Zeeland's) turn in the water. Chris quickly learned the power of the Ski Pro when he asked for more speed.  He snapped the rope and the boat jumped to 48mph in a second.  His feet quickly burned up on him, but this worked to our advantage in the transition game.  Chuck, Tony and John had walked us through the transition techniques and we all knew what to expect.  John Skobrak's driving had out transitions down to 20 seconds.  That was the difference maker in this race.

Scott Reed was in the water next and again put us in a boat race with MVS.  I was unaware of how many transitions MVS had remaining, so I was now getting excited in the boat.  While transitioning from Chris to Scott, Team MVS passed us and I knew if Scott couldn't run them down, I was going to be called on to hold on for dear life.  John kept re-assuring everyone that Team MVS had only skied 3 skiers to our 4, so they would have to transition twice in the last mile.  We weren't totally sure, so when Scott tapped out with just under 2 miles to go, I was given the bail signal by John Skborak and I heard Chuck tell me to just take my time. I knew I would have to ski fast the rest of the way.  I was pumped and amazed at how smooth the wake was.  So I snapped the rope and the boat jumped to over 50 mph. The next thing I knew we were passing Team MVS as we rounded the corner for the finish.  Just as John had told us, they had to do one more transition, so down they went.  They threw a big stern roller my way, but we had caught up to them and the roller had no time to take me out.  As we crossed the finish line Tony was hanging off the side of the boat in his victory position and Chuck was on the other side. Team MVS finished shortly behind us, with Team Pavestone another minute behind them.

The race was extremely close the whole way and a lot of fun to be a part of.  Chris, Scott and I learned a lot about what it takes to be competitive in barefoot racing.  Its truly a team effort.

So now the part that Dave "the mouth" Mueller doesn't want you to hear about. Mr. Mueller chose again to make a bet against us. He picked team Heat em Up which consisted of Jason Lee, Paul Stokes, Bob Mahnke, Chad Mietz, and Chad ? (sorry I cant remember your last name). Well Bob HAD brought his new MasterCraft to prove you don't need a Ski Pro to win. Well this time that plan back fired as the boat never made the start line due to mechanical problems. So with that Dave, will be wearing a very special speedo at Footstock while we (the entire Team Ace in the Hole) all shoot paint balls at him. Maybe one day you will stop betting against us Dave. Didn't work out last year and I'm pretty sure this loss is gonna be much more painful.

Special thanks to Scott Reed for puttting our team together, Dino Tyne for use of his boat, Tony B. for bringing it out, John Skborak for driving and coaching us. Terri Bell and the Beaver Dam Ski Club did a great job running the event.  The food and everything after was great. Thanks to Chuck at BarefootCentral for making the trip, and a special thanks to Mrs. CVZ and you know why.

We all hung around the bar the rest of the day, evening, and into the night.  I looked up one time and saw Dave, Chuck, and CVZ singing karaoke. You don't see that just any day of the week.

Aaron Schoelzel