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I arrived Sunday the 24th in Minneapolis/St. Paul with the
expectation that I wouldn’t be seeing a boat or water until Monday
morning. To my surprise, we
were loading the boat up with beer and mixed drinks for a fun and
relaxing afternoon. I had
no problem with that! The
US Nationals were over and I was ready to relax and let loose on Prior
Lake in the honey hole.
I got the tour of the lake, which was thirty minutes south of
Minneapolis, as we slowly made our way to the bay and all the eye candy.
After the sun and fun we headed back to Steve’s house and got
tooled up for the three-day clinic.
The first day we went to a secluded private lake that
everyone called Heavenly Lake. They nick named it that to keep
unwanted visitors out. I
don’t even know the real name of the lake, but we had glass calm
conditions all day with no backwash!
We had the famous Mark Youngdal foot’n with us that will be
competing in the Sr. Worlds this year along with Steve Mulryan, Brian
Scoggins, Tom Reagan and John Patterson.
Mark worked hard on his slalom mostly because that’s what
he’ll be competing in at worlds.
We should be expecting him to pull off a 16 + score, so be sure
to check in and see what the results are.
Steve worked on turns and back one foots that’ll be dialed in
for next year.
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LT to RT: Mark
Youngdal, Steve Mulryan, John Patterson, Brian Scoggins, Keith
(photo taken by Tom Reagan)
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I think the best thing about a clinic, disregarding the hard
falls and frustration, is that you’ll learn enough in one day to keep
you busy for the rest of the season.
If you can have everything nailed down by the time I return, that
means you were listening and now ready for further coaching.
That sounds obvious, but I’ve done clinics before, and
when I returned a year later, everyone was doing everything backwards! One clinic I do every year in PA has been one of the most
successful groups of guys I’ve seen on the water as a whole.
Every time I come back the guys are doing exactly what we worked
on in the previous year perfectly.
Now when I come back for the following year we don’t have to
worry about catching up and correcting things all over!
That was just and example.
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Lt to Rt:
Front: Steve Mulryan, Paul Owmen, Dave, Back row: Paul,
Warren
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The second day we went to a public/private lake that
doesn’t get too many visitors, except for the dang Bazooka and Gecko
boats on every shoreline! The
owner of Gecko lives on this lake and since the boats are only good for
tubing , guess what we had to put up with?
BUT, we snuck into a cove that had a slalom course on it and we
where like kids playing paint ball!
We didn’t want to be seen but we wanted to have all the fun
using the paint ball buoys as our own course!
We footed in glass for aaa………bout thirty minutes and yup,
you guest it; someone had to cut us off and slide right into the course
to show us his moves! No
big deal though, since footers are extremely patient, we let them take
their 6-8 runs and the lake was ours once again!
But no, they couldn’t idol out of the cove they had to run
straight across our run just as our skier got in the water.
But we had the lake the rest of the day and we had Paul doing one
foot crosses like he owned his own slalom course!
Not only that, Warren learned his first back deep on the five
foot in two and a half sets, so well done boys!
Unfortunately, we had Dave pull a hammy the week before so he
didn’t get to foot too much.
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Lt to Rt:
Front: Andrew, Rog Negus, Back row: Tim "The Stash",
Keith, Byron
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 On the last day we were skiing with Rod Negus, Byron, Tim
“The Stash,” Steve and the newest barefoot’n member Andrew “Drew
Footer.” Of course being
in Minnesota we skied on another beautiful lake with hardly any backwash
with a super long run. I’d
tell you where it was but it’s Rod’s private pond!
Although, he did tell me that he wasn’t going to foot in the
clinic unless I won the Nationals????
Ah, I can’t give it up! Everyone
skied great and Drew Footer got up for the first time on a ten-foot
extension. He’s only
twelve years old so give your self a pat on the back buddy!
Rod was a great listener and started to figure out his back
one-foot wakes, which was impressive to watch!
Tim worked on back deeps along with Byron on the longline, which
didn’t go quite as planned, but I guarantee they still learned one
thing, PATIENCE!
That must be the word I say more than any other during the
summer! Steve worked hard
on turns with the Footer Extremes and he now owns a pair like the rest
of the world!
So guys, I’d like to thank ya’ll for a great clinic with
many laughs and I hope I get to foot with you again either in the near
future or next year! Good
luck and stay healthy.
KSO
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