When Adam Errington headed to the Orlando Watersports Complex for a fun summer day 11 years ago, he had no idea he'd stumbled into a new passion and found the mecca of professional wakeboarding.
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His parents didn't own a boat and neither had backgrounds as competitive wakeboarders. But something about the adventure of creating jumps intrigued him.
"That whole year that I spent at the cable park, I got to know the sport better and quickly learned a lot and realized that's where a lot of the pros went and that's where I wanted to surround myself," Errington said.
A little exposure was all he needed to spark his interest. Errington quickly dropped hockey and soccer to immerse himself in the sport and by the time he graduated from Boone High School, he fashioned himself into one of the best professional wakeboarders in the area.
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Now, the 25-year-old competitor is hoping he can be recognized as one of the best wakeboarders in the world when he participates in the Red Bull Wake Open Friday and Saturday in downtown Tampa. NBC will broadcast the finals live on Saturday from 4 to 6 p.m.
Although the event is just in its second year of existence, wakeboarders consider this the Super Bowl of their sport. For starters, it is an invite-only competition for the top 36 male riders across the world and its one of the few events that incorporates the three disciplines of wakeboarding: Park, big air and boat.
The July 4 holiday weekend combined with the high level of talent compelled an estimated 50,000 observers to watch the free event in front of the Tampa Convention Center last year and resulted in a million-dollar economic impact for the city, according to Tampa Bay Sports Commission executive director Rob Higgins.
At least 75 percent of the invited competitors are either from or reside in Central Florida. Raphael Derome, the winner of the inaugural Red Bull Wake Open in 2012, is from Canada but spends the majority of his time training in Orlando.
Erik Ruck, who is among the oldest competitors in the event, estimates there are at least 100 professional wakeboarders in Central Florida and 95 percent of the top riders live and train in the Orlando area. Ruck grew up in Wisconsin and moved to Orlando in 1999 for greater training opportunities. He has seen the sport radically grow in the past 15 years.
"That's where the original magazines are based out of and there's just so many freshwater lakes," said Ruck, 32. "Wakeboarding isn't really out in the ocean. A lot of the original really, really good riders that progressed the sport were from Orlando, so it kind of became the mecca."
Parks Bonifay, a Polk County resident, can attest to Orlando's melting pot of wakeboarders. Like Ruck, Bonifay grew up in Wisconsin and took the industry by storm shortly after turning pro in 1994. He became the youngest junior to win the X Games at age 14.
"Wakeboarding has grown so much in the past 15 to 20 years to where there's so many different avenues of wakeboarding," said Bonifay, who will serve as a commentator for the NBC broadcast of the Red Bull Wake Open. "It's a way to get them all on the same stage and really find out who the best wakeboarder in the world really is."
