Meagan Ethell

October 1 marks the beginning of Breast Cancer Awareness month, something Meagan Ethell–the 6x Wake Awards Best Female Rider winner–has been passionate about for several years. In a continued effort to bring more awareness to the cause, Meagan and Red Bull partnered with Philadelphia’s iconic Boathouse Row on the Schuylkill River to create a series of unique and very pink images.

Inspired by having seen the area lit up pink for breast cancer awareness in the past, Meagan and Red Bull worked with the city of Philadelphia and WeCanRow Philly, a community of breast cancer survivors aiming to help those affected regain their activity and energy levels to light the boathouses pink and create an up-rail out of a rowing scull. Meagan also was inspired by her visit to the Philadelphia Girls Rowing Club (PGRC), which helps promote, stimulate, and support among women an interest in amateur rowing and other forms of athletics.

With a custom, pink-ribbon Red Bull helmet created just for the photo shoot, Meagan made some iconic images in epic fashion, earning her the latest Cover Up feature. The 22-year old Orlando native has worked to raise money, awareness, and help survivors of breast cancer for years, including as a spokeswoman for Boarding for Breast Cancer (B4BC), and teaching survivors in her hometown how to wakeboard every year. Those interested in standing by Meagan as she works to support, advocate, and eradicate this deadly disease can do so by donating to Boarding for Breast Cancer, or by joining B4BC’s 13th annual ‘Skate the Coast’ event on October 25th, and encouraging your community to skate, bike, or roll around your neighborhood for Breast Cancer Prevention. B4BC also encourages those participants to tag @b4bc and #feelinit4b4bc to continue their goal. Additionally, Meagan and B4BC will be auctioning off her helmet to raise money for the cause, with Red Bull matching the donation.

Meagan Ethell

More information for Boathouse Row, WeCanRow Philly, and Boarding for Breast Cancer can be found at these links:

www.boathouserow.org

www.whitemarshboatclub.com/we-can-row/

www.b4bc.org

The post Cover Up – Meagan Ethell x Breast Cancer Awareness appeared first on Wakeboarding Mag.

For each of the last three years, members of Red Bull’s wake crew have put together some epic adventures around Florida. It started in 2018 with “Okeechobee Runnin’” – a journey across Florida from west to east, via Lake Okeechobee and its canals. In 2019 the gang did the “North Florida Loop” – heading north up the St. John’s River to Jacksonville, then coming back south via the Intracoastal. This year a squad consisting of Parks Bonifay, Brian Grubb, Meagan Ethell, Guenther Oka, Massi Piffaretti and Gunner Daft continued the Intracoastal theme – taking the waterway from Cocoa south to Miami. Along the way they found some new places to ride, including countless winch spots. Photographer Bryan Soderlind was once again there to capture all that went down, including Guenther Oka scoring the most recent Cover Up feature. This is the South Florida Run, and per usual, it looks like an epic wake adventure with a rad crew. It goes to show that with some creativity and planning, you can do a lot more than you think with your wake boat. Stay tuned for a video series courtesy of Erik Ruck, too.

The post Sessions – The South Florida Run appeared first on Wakeboarding Mag.

You’ve come a long way from the Oregon grom who spent a lot of time riding the Delta with Josh Twelker and Trever Maur. What’s it like to be living in Orlando full time now and doing the pro wake rider thing from there? Like everything, it’s got its pros and cons, but it’s good, I like it a lot! It’s really warm year round so that makes it way easier to ride in the winter. But Cali will forever be my favorite place to wakeboard.

What’s your living situation like in Orlando, and who do you ride with most out there? So we got a pretty packed house with myself, Guenther (Oka), Max Van Helvoort, Luca Kidd and Sam Brown. I ride with all of them quite a bit, but I also ride with Jake (Pelot), Massi (Piffaretti) and Cory (Teunissen) a lot. It’s pretty fun to mix up who you ride with, it helps me with getting creative and thinking of new stuff.

It’s apparent that your time with riders like Josh and Trever really influenced how you ride now. In what ways specifically do you think they had an impact on you? What gets you the most stoked about wakeboarding? Yeah Josh and Trev have literally been there every step of the way, so they have influenced me the most, especially Josh. When that man wakeboards it’s unreal – so much style, flow and finesse – it still blows my mind every time. I would say there are a couple things they preached to me quite a bit that helped me a lot. Josh probably influenced me the most by how he was able to make every trick he did look good, even the hard tricks. That is definitely something that has stuck with me. Both Josh and Trev always talked about how being different was huge – making tricks your own – and they both do that really well and it’s something I strive for in my riding.

What gets me super stoked is watching riders like Massi, his bag of tricks is just so unique, his grabs are all different and it’s just really sick to watch.

Last year was pretty impressive for you: X Games Real Wake bronze medal, PWT Rookie of the Year, a finalist for a bunch of Wake Awards – including Best Trick when you landed the first ever wake-to-wake switch mute double mobe. How did that all feel when the year ended? I was happy with how I did for sure. Getting the invite to X Games was insane. Definitely the coolest/most stressful time of my life, but so much fun and totally worth all the work put into it! I would have liked to make a couple more finals than I did, but that’s how it goes. Overall I was really stoked on how my rookie year went – definite motivation to keep the momentum going.

With all that you’ve accomplished the last couple years, and how well you’ve been riding recently (most notably with that insane heel 10 off the wake), do you feel any pressure to keep pushing the envelope and living up to these new expectations? (laughing) No not really. I’ve never really thought in terms of people expecting me to do these tricks or do well in that comp, so I think that helps, for sure. I just wakeboard for me and try to push myself to be the best I can be. I remind myself to enjoy it because I am having so much fun on the board right now!

What’s it like being part of the Ronix team and getting to take part in all the craziness at Lake Ronix and Radar Lake? Being on Ronix is the coolest thing in the world. I absolutely love everything about Ronix; everyone is so cool and fun to hangout with. Being at Lake Ronix is crazy, the setup is insane and so much fun to ride. Some crazy stuff goes down there, both on and off the water (laughs).

You’re also one of the newest team members for Supra, and you’ve got the 2018 PWT boat in your backyard. How’s that been? It’s been awesome! Having the SA in my backyard is a dream come true, I’ve wanted a boat sponsor since I was like 12, so it’s crazy that it actually happened and I get to ride it everyday!

What’s up with you making “welcome to the team” social videos that go viral? You’ve done that for both Ronix and Supra the last few years. (laughing) I’m not sure, I just wakeboard, they film and edit. The credit is all theirs for making it look good.

How often do you hit up a cable park? In the winter I ride cable a lot, more than I ride boat, actually. But as soon as everyone starts riding a lot I kinda forget about the cable and only ride boat.

What are your goals for the rest of the season? I would like to stay in the top five of Pro Wakeboard Tour and the Wakeboard World Series. It would be awesome to get my first pro win this season, also to be in the running for a few different things at Wake Awards.

Your heel 10 is definitely a contender for Trick of the Year at Wake Awards. Got anything else you’re working on? I may have a couple tricks I want to try before Wake Awards… Stay tuned.

As a rider who’s had to work hard for some tricks and save them for big video parts (i.e. Real Wake), but who also has to keep up with the daily demands of social media these days, how hard is it to keep the balance? Do you think riders put good stuff out too fast today, or put up too much “just ok” content? It’s really hard to balance (laughs). I think that saving a couple banger tricks for a web edit is so sick, but it’s hard to not just throw it on Instagram because, to be honest, it will probably get more views and traffic that way, which helps you and your sponsors more. I have been trying to put up quality content, but it’s hard to do that a couple times a week or even everyday. I mean it would be sick if everyone put up insanely good content every post, but with how much we are expected to post it’s not possible to do unless you had a full time photographer and videographer working for you.

What’s on your playlist these days? Lot’s of rap to get me hyped to ride, I used to be into the old school rap, but I have been getting into the new stuff lately and I’m liking it.

When you’re not riding in Orlando, what can we find you doing? Hanging out with the boys at the house, we have really been getting into 2K Basketball on the PS4. Spike Ball has been getting really intense lately too (laughs). Other than that you’ll probably find me sleeping. I really enjoy my sleep (laughs).

Who would you like to thank? I have to thank my family, I wouldn’t be doing what I am without them. Josh Twelker and Trever Maur for the influence and mentoring, and the whole Twelker family for taking me in on the Delta all those summers. And thanks to my sponsors: Ronix, Supra, and Active Water Sports.

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Last summer Meagan Ethell approached us with an idea. She wanted to try to get some really unique shots on a location that was near and dear to her heart: Chicago. There are two things that immediately come to mind when you think of wakeboarding and Chicago: 1) “That skyline would look amazing!” And 2) “A Great Lake isn’t going to be easy to ride on…” We knew it was possible though, as several riders had done it in the past. Meagan reached out to her sponsors to see what kind of support she could get, and fortunately Nautique and Red Bull stepped up to the plate to help make it happen. We, meanwhile, hit up Minnesota-native photographer Ryan Taylor, who had just recently photographed Mike Dowdy riding on Lake Superior. If anybody could get the shots we were looking for, it was going to be Ryan.

Once we had dates, schedules, boats, and everything else lined up, we found ourselves with a three-morning window to make a killer photo happen. The photos had to be at sunrise because that’s when the sun lights up the Chicago skyline, and that’s really the only time you might get water calm enough to do some halfway decent wakeboarding in. As fate would have it only two of the mornings worked out, but fortunately it was all Meagan would need. When Ryan’s photos came across our screens after the second shoot, we knew we had a winner. Chicago, as you can see in the photos shown here, is a gorgeous city. During the downtime when they weren’t riding/shooting, Meagan, Ryan and the crew got out and explored as much as they could. From the infamous bean to a cruise through downtown on the Chicago River, they did a lot.

When it was all said and done we sat down with Meagan to get some insight on how she got the idea for the shot and what it was like to actually try to get it.

What was it like growing up riding in Illinois?
I grew up in Illinois and moved to Florida at a young age to pursue wakeboarding. Both places are part of who I am. During the summers, I would come home to Illinois and I would ride on the Kankakee River. It was always a different vibe riding the river than riding the lake. So many good summer evenings were spent going up and down the river with Jeff McDade and his crew and, of course, my dad. Jeff was the one who actually helped out with the Lake Michigan shoot behind the scenes. Without him, this shoot would have been a challenge to make happen.

Had you ever ridden on Lake Michigan before this shoot? What gave you the idea to do something like this?
When I was at a Red Bull Athlete Summit a few years ago and we were asked what our dream project would be, right away, my mind jumped to riding in front of the Chicago skyline. Before this shoot, I had never ridden on Lake Michigan, but growing up, I had always passed the lake and wondered what it would be like. Lake Michigan is a staple in Chicago, so wanting to wakeboard there was something that sparked from a childhood fantasy that I always had in mind, and it was awesome to turn that dream into a reality.

You have to get pretty lucky with conditions on a Great Lake in order to wakeboard, what were they like when you were riding? How hard was it to get good shots?
Throughout the select days that we had to shoot, the conditions were a little crazy. Overall, we were riding on a Great Lake and we were lucky that we didn’t have any rain or a crazy number of clouds, but the water was pretty rough. I just really had to focus and concentrate on the end goal to stay sane during the shoot and get the shots. Ryan was awesome to shoot with and we worked great together, especially with all the conditional factors from the lake. It was a challenge to get good shots, but we got it done. I’m really stoked for everyone to see it!

What was it like to actually ride with Chicago in the background? What was going through your head?
It was pretty unreal. The buildings and skyline were truly insane. The fact that my sport took me back home and gave me this opportunity, I was really taken aback. This year, my grandmother passed away, and she used to take us to Navy Pier and throughout Chicago growing up. I felt like she was with me throughout that shoot and that I was meant to be there at that moment. This shoot in Chicago was so meaningful to me and one that I will take with me forever. While I was riding there, I was feeling really grateful for everything wakeboarding has given me and where it has taken me.

What’s it like cruising through downtown Chicago on a G23?
I have always gone to the city, but I have never actually been able to go through the Chicago River, which is something that I have always wanted to do. It was for sure a cool experience, especially on a Nautique G23 which I am on everyday. It almost felt nonchalant to be cruising through downtown on a boat that I am so familiar with.

What was the story with the boat/car that you got a quick pull behind?! That looked hilarious and awesome!
On the last day that we were shooting, we were really the only boat out on the water that morning, aside from this other boat/car. This boat/car was cruising around and started idling towards us. All of us were like “Ugh what are they doing? Are they about to ask us if they can go wakeboarding?” So this family of four comes up to us, and the dad driving the boat asks if I can ride behind their car/boat. Obviously I said yes because who wouldn’t want to ride behind a boat/car?! So I flipped my black vest around to the flower side and the dad drove me in a massive circle, probably around 30mph. It was a comical experience and made the morning that much better.

What does it mean to you get the first digital cover of WAKEBOARDING?
To connect my sport to my home was a surreal experience. It has been a dream of mine to score the cover of Wakeboarding Magazine since I was a kid. Although WAKEBOARDING isn’t doing regular print issues anymore, I am humbled to get the cover of what will be the first digital cover, and what will be a new normal in our era. It is exciting to obtain what I have been anticipating forever, but in a new form. To work and make it happen in a location like Chicago made it that more special. The fact that I had to make a lot of pieces come together, on top of getting the shot, was a truly rewarding experience for my first cover shoot.

Special thanks to my sponsors: Red Bull, Liquid Force, Nautique Boats, Performance Ski and Surf, my family, Garrett Cortese, Ryan Taylor, Jeff McDade, and WAKEBOARDING for making this whole thing come together!

The post Cover Up: Meagan Ethell + Chicago appeared first on Wakeboarding Mag.

Getting a good double up photo is hard enough from a chase boat, just in terms of making sure both drivers know where to be and when, but doing it from the water is a whole different animal.

For this particular shot, the driver had to time the rollers perfectly so that Jason would be in position to get this photo of Guenther jumping toward him from the opposite wake. That means lining up the angle of the light, timing the rollers exactly, and crossing them so the rider can hit the double up properly. Too far away from Jason and Guenther wouldn’t be visible enough; too close and Jason would be in a washing machine of rollers.

The first two days of shooting were unsuccessful, but on the third all those factors converged perfectly, and this cover was the result.

The post On the Cover: Guenther Oka appeared first on Wakeboarding Mag.

Here’s the scoop: Design your very own cover using our logo templates attached below. Get creative! Feel free to include humor, good photography, good riding, whatever you want! Just keep it family friendly. Email your submissions to brandon.judd@bonniercorp.com. Please submit your cover on or before Sunday March 9th, 2014.

WakeBoarding Magazine Old School Cover Template

WakeBoarding Magazine 2007 Cover Template

Wakeboarding Magazine 2009 Cover Template

Wakeboarding Magazine 2014 Cover Template

All submissions are permissible for WAKEBOARDING to use in social media, online and in print. For those sending large file sizes, a file transfer service like wetransfer.com or hightail.com is acceptable. If you are in need of a different file type, just shoot us an email, and we can get it over to you.[

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**COVER
**Jimmy LaRiche, Melon, Clermont, Florida
Photo: Bill Doster

FEATURES
88 FOREIGN INVESTMENT
What the new CamSur Watersports Complex in the Philippines means for wakeboarding – and you.

98 2007 READERS POLL
Your favorite riders. Your own words. See what you and fellow readers had to say about the best riders of the year.

106 SESSIONS
Winching a top-secret spot in California and some curved rail madness.

DEPARTMENTS
44 AIR TIME
Dude.

52 IN BOX
A wakeboarding haiku, how to keep your lake clean and some dude’s crush on Andrew Adkison.

66 THE PULSE
Brian Grubb lays down a frontside board slide yards away from the Canadian equivalent of the White House. Plus, Mike Ennen and Kevin Henshaw tour Europe, Team Hyperlite films for Drive and Oakley tunes up Push Process.

74 THE PODIUM
Win a dream vacation to the King of Wake final at the Tig

The post October 2007 appeared first on Wakeboarding Mag.

Cover
Andrew Adkison, Winter Haven, Florida
Photo: Bill Doster

**Features

96 SESSIONS
**Mike Schwenne joins the fleet and Ryan Anderson throws down a toeside overhead 900.

**104 PROP POWER
**The right prop can make your boat more efficient, giving you faster acceleration and better gas mileage too. Here’s how.

108 2007 BOAT BUYERS GUIDE
We go deep inside 41 new wake boats to help you find your perfect ride.

Departments

40 AIR TIME
Dude.

48 IN BOX
Keep hittin’ them kayaks.

60 THE PULSE
How JD Webb attempted to pull off the biggest ramp-to-ramp gap in wakeboarding history, and a closer look at 1080s from Danny Harf and Rusty Malinoski. Plus, Boardstock, Wakestock and PB’s third annual Double or Nothing.

**82 THE PODIUM
**How Andrew Adkison became only the third repeat World Champion. Plus, behind the scenes at Nationals and the Tige Pro-Am.

160 STUFF
Inside Brand Byerly: The Legend’s new board, wakeskate and team. Plus, a new product that could have you going bigger than you ever imagined.

170 HIGHER LEARNING
How to extend your season, breathe new life into your wakeskate and hit your first rail.

202 LAST BLAST
Uh, ouch.

The post February 2007 appeared first on Wakeboarding Mag.

BLAST!
Amateur wakeskating talent explodes at grass-roots Tampa, Florida, event

Lake Havasu Blows Up
Seven schools spend spring break at the third annual Collegiate Challenge.

Head Hunting
Phillip Soven takes all in a head-to-head finals format at the first Tour stop in Orlando.

Double Down or Go Home
Thirteen riders lay down all their cards for Biggest Air and Best Trick at Parks’ invite-only double-up contest.

Legendary Contest
Byerly and company push progression at the Second Annual Toe Jam.

Sessions
Contests a la carte

AIR TIME
Contests

IN BOX
Sailors and strippers, an enthusiastic nurse, and what may well be the worst wake trip of all time

THE PULSE
Exclusive photos from The Butter Effect premiere in Seattle, and Darin Shapiro’s new life at Liquid Force

STUFF
Trevor Hansen’s new board, Hypoxic’s take on the winch, and our summer sunglasses preview

HIGHER LEARNING
Driving for double-ups: How to roll up the meatiest ramps

REGIONAL REPORT
College riders throw down at a slider oasis in middle-of-nowhere Georgia.

MIC CONTROL
Thomas Horrell is known as a founding father of wakeskating. The NIC says he deserves that
title in wakeboarding too.

Cover
Shaun Murray takes a session on the Roam board at Radar Lake in Washington.
Photo: Josh Letchworth

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