Shelburne Free Press
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Export date: Fri Mar 29 12:34:52 2024 / +0000 GMT

Ranch Wake Park holds Ontario Championships, nationals to be held locally




By Robert Belardi

Spray Lake Watersports held the final event of the Ontario Wake Provincial Wakeboarding Championships over the August 28 and 29 weekend. 

The national championships are being held locally, in Shelburne at the end of next week, from Sept. 17 to 19.

In the fourth run of an Ontario series this summer, Spray Lake saw 80 competitors show up on their doorstep, making this one of the largest provincial championships ever held in the sport.

Wakeboarding, a sport that might not be one of the most popular to invest your time and money into, began to gain a lot of traction in 1998 when co-chair of Wake Sports Canada, Steve Jarrett began Wakestock. 

“There were events like a wakeboarding festival that we began in 1998 – in the early years of the sport of wakeboarding – and it helped promote the phenomenal growth of wakeboarding,” Jarrett said. 

“It was a sports festival that attracted tens of thousands for about 16 years. In the board sports scene, it was a big deal. It ended up being one of the biggest wakeboarding events in the world.”

Since the start of the pandemic, many citizens in various age groups, have taken an interest in board sports. Being outdoors, it was a comfortable way to enjoy something new. 

And with King City being the host of one of the largest provincial events in the sport, this is not only a stepping stone for the town, but also for Spray Lake Watersports and their co-founders Scott and Jono Boysen. 

“We are excited with the return of competitions after a year off during the pandemic; we look forward to the coming years hosting more provincial and national tournaments for wakeboarding and waterskiing. We provide an ideal venue for hosting and really want to continue the growth and start working with more local partners for accommodations,” Jono said. 

If any local partners should be interested, they would in fact be collaborating with a world class facility. 

“The venue is two-in-one, in respect to the Ranch Wake Park has a wakeboarding cable. It highlights one part of the sport pulled by a cable. Then it has Spray Lake, that is a boat lake, and it highlights the part of wakeboarding pulled by the boat,” Jarrett said. 

“It's a unique facility that has both a wake park cable facility and also has a wakeboard boat facility. There are not too many facilities that offer both. It's one of our premiere facilities in Canada. It was one of the very first cable wakeboarding cable installations in Ontario. It's gotten a long-standing reputation. It's been around longer than any place. Wakeboarding is still growing and for folks in King City and Newmarket area, I don't think people realize they have a world class facility right in their backyard.” 

Local athletes who participated in the competition made quite the name for themselves.

Newmarket native Riley Dillion won the Open Men Wakeboard Cable Park Event. 

King Township native Austin Farr won the Open Men Wakeskate Boat event and placed 2nd in the Open Men Wakeskate Cable Park event.

In the U9 group, King Township natives Dexter and Damian McCasey finished second and third in the cable competition. 

Over the weekend, The Ranch Wake Park saw a variety of ages participate, from boys and girls under nine years old all the way to participants over the age of 40 (known as Immortals). 

“Ontario actually has some of the best top ranked wake boarding athletes in the world,” Jarrett said. “It was cool to see them all there together at this Provincial Championships. The new up and coming younger kids competing against some of the top ranked athletes who have been there for a while, we're seeing a new growth at the top level and at the entry level.” 

There is a world championship being held in Florida later this month. Jarrett said he doesn't think anyone will be comfortable with travel and will not attend. 

For all results, head to Ontariowake's Instagram handle. 

Post date: 2021-09-09 10:42:58
Post date GMT: 2021-09-09 14:42:58

Post modified date: 2021-09-09 10:43:03
Post modified date GMT: 2021-09-09 14:43:03

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