St. Onge, Male Athlete Of The Year Honors

The International Water Ski Federation has announced that U.S. barefoot water ski athlete Keith St. Onge has been named the world governing body's 2006 Male Athlete of the Year. France's Clementine Lucine, a three-event water ski athlete, was selected the IWSF's Female Athlete of the Year.

St. Onge, of Winter Haven, Fla., put on a remarkable display of barefooting at the 15th Barefoot Water Ski World Championships, Sept. 9-17, in Adna, Wash. The 28-year-old St. Onge won gold medals in Men’s slalom, tricks and overall, and set pending world tricks records in all three rounds of the event. He also contributed 2,000 of the 8,514 points tallied by the U.S. Elite Barefoot Water Ski Team as it clinched its 11th consecutive world team title. Earlier in the year St. Onge set a new world slalom record of 20.6 wake crossings. It was the first time a world record had been approved in the slalom event since 1994.
St. Onge, along with fellow U.S. athletes Emily Copeland-Durham, Todd Haig, Danny Harf, Heather Johnson, Freddy Krueger, also received athlete of the year honors from their respective world sport discipline councils within the IWSF.

Harf and Copeland-Durham were named Male and Female Wakeboarders of the Year, respectively; Mapp and Johnson were named Male and Female Cable Wakeboarders of the Year, respectively; Haig was named Male Water Ski Racer of the Year; Krueger was named Male Water Skier of the Year; and St. Onge was selected Male Barefoot Water Skier of the Year.

Harf, of Orlando, Fla., and Copeland-Durham, of Denver, Colo., each won respective season titles on the 2006 IWSF Wakeboard World Cup.

Mapp, of Pompano Beach, Fla., won his second consecutive Open Men national title at the sixth annual Cable Wakeboard National Championships and earned the Open Men silver medal at the fourth annual Cable Wakeboard World Championships.

Johnson, of Orlando, Fla., won the Junior Women national title at the 2006 Cable Wakeboard National Championships and earned the Junior Women silver medal at the 2006 Cable Wakeboard World Championships.

Haig, of Redlands, Calif., opened the season with back-to-back wins at the Parker International Marathons in March. Following three other wins on the U.S. Marathon circuit, he won his sixth overall Catalina Ski Race title in June. After a brief layoff due to knee surgery, he returned to competition in October and won the 26-32 Men and Open Men titles at the US Open Water Ski Racing National Championships.

Krueger, of Winter Garden, Fla., competed in six professional events and the Pan American Water Ski Championships in 2006. He won every event. But he capped off the season in grand style in his last record-capability tournament of the year on Nov. 5 by soaring 243 feet (74.2 meters) at the McCormick Record No. 5 at McCormick Lakes in Seffner, Fla. If approved by the IWSF's Technical Committee, the distance will officially eclipse Krueger’s current world record of 240 feet (73.0 meters), which was set in October 2005.

Other athletes honored by the IWSF were: France's Lucine (Female Water Skier of the Year); Great Britain's Kim Lumley (Female Water Ski Racer of the Year; Germany's Andreas Pape (Male Cable Water Skier of the Year; Belarus' Joulia Meier-Gromyco (Female Cable Skier of the Year); Australia's Ashleigh Stebbeings (Female Barefoot Water Skier of the Year); Germany's Gerda Pamler (Female Disabled Water Skier of the Year); and Italy's Giancarlo Cosio (Male Disabled Water Skier of the Year).

Source:http://www.barefoot.org

Posted on Monday, January 15, 2007 @ 17:50:33 EST by milla

Posted on Monday, January 15, 2007 @ 17:50:33 EST by milla