About Ant

Cable operator – 3 seasons PhD student at IC in Electrical Engineering

THE “SPECIAL PICTURE”

Posted on October 25, 2012 by Ant

Rodolphe and Rob both nearly landed tantrums during this session, too.

A couple of years ago, Ant brought his camera and told people “if you want me to take special pictures, let me know“. Of course, he meant “specific” instead of “special” but it was too late: his mis-use of the English language got him a few good laughs and, being French, a reputation of being salacious that would stick for years to come.

Well, on the 24th of October 2012, the WAKEimperial team got together to shoot what really qualified as a “Special Picture”. The idea had been around the club for a little while ago (possibly sparked after Ant bragging about his antics at the staff party at one of the wake club he used to work at), but it had always been dismissed. This year, after a few drinks, the idea was thrown out again and this time, excitement was visible. Plans were immediately made … it was already too late to chicken out. The buzz was there, there was even visible excitement and expectation on the club’s Facebook page a few days before the session.

A few new members also did their first lap on that day

So after a few trial shots the camera was set up, a volunteer was found to press the shutter at the right time, the brave IC wakeboarders proceeded to take off their kit — observed by some amused bystanders — and got ready for the shot. Ant modestly kept a towel wrapped around him, but once he had hit the water — there was no hiding. A couple of laps, two Raileys, and the special shot was taken. The Imperial College Wakeboarding Club ‘s history was written.
It is also worth mentioning that the operators purposefully stopped the cable, thus forcing Ant to do a 25m swim in the rather cold water, in the nude. Thanks boys !

Anyway, it was a good laugh, nice to see everyone showing a bit of bravery. There was also some solid progress shown by our new members for this third session of the year. As usual, the £4.5 Burger+Drink, the 2-4-1 drink deal, the Sauna and Jacuzzi nicely concluded this epic session !

[Show as slideshow]

ETHEREAL (video)

Posted on August 16, 2012 by Ant

As close as a video can get, to convey the feeling of an awesome session.

IC Wake board club rider Tim doing a half-Cab

June 27 `12 was a hot and sunny day. It was also the day where the Emirates Air Line cable car service opened, and to celebrate this, Wake Up Docklands, a system-2 wake park (on the Royal Victoria Dock — right at the foot of the cable car) decided to organise an all-day ride-as-much-as-you want event for £15. That was enough to divert Imperial College student wakeboarders from their studies…
At the end of the day, pretty much every wakeboarder was exhausted, maybe apart from IC Wake riders Tim and Ant, which kept shredding their wakeboards on the obstacles until they got kicked out. The fact that Wake up Docklands is a system 2 meant you could safely have another rider in the water getting some close-up action with a go-pro, and someone on the side of the dock filming the wakeboarder with a standard camera.

The orange glow of the setting sun, close-ups, a few technical tricks, feel-good shots and an epic bail on Tim’s S-Bend attempt prompted for a “feel-good” wake video edit full of slow-mows on a lazy tune … Enjoy !

EHEREAL – WAKEimperial’s latest short clip

UNIWAKE NATIONALS (+ video)

Posted on July 23, 2012 by Ant

WakeImperial used to be a bit of a laid back recreational club, sometimes taking part in Wakeboarding competitions, but not too seriously… This year, a few Imperial College students decided to measure themselves against the other Unis, at the UNIWAKE Nationals in June `12.
So Danielle, Tim and Ant (later joined by Jake) set off to Sheffield for a few days, to train and compete … and party!

The podium for the "most daring drunks" Category

Despite a few falls at the beginning of her runs, Danielle gave all she had and finished 3rd in Women’s intermediate division. Tim wasn’t too excited when he heard the judges had changed the categories, which got him bumped up from the men’s intermediate to the men’s advanced. His qualification run the day before the competition placed him towards the bottom of the 10-men list. With nothing left to loose, Tim went on to be the crowd’s favourite by throwing crazy tricks out of nowhere – bigger, more daring and relentlessly – like, opening his first run with a tantrum off the “dragon obstracle”, a trick he had practiced only once and crashed on. The judges rewarded his daring attitude by pushing him in the four men’s final – a great WakeImperial Glory moment. Ant did pretty much the opposite: by trying a bit too hard not to fall, his tricks weren’t as high … and once again, no mustard was cut. However, he put an outstanding effort in the kneeboard battle, skillfully getting dudes twice his bodyweight off a kneeboard, and managing to ride through the corners at some arm-ripping speeds !

Unfortunately the Imperial College Wake crew had to depart before the big afterparty – Tim did however manage to get involved in the boatrace !

WAKEimperial’s video

Mark’s (Supersaturated) video (The official one)

Video: TOO MANY P.O.V.s

Posted on May 30, 2012 by Ant

Share 3 minutes of the life of Ant and Tim –WAKE Imperial riders. See the wonderful world of Wakeboarding through their eyes…

This video is dedicated to the president of the Imperial College Wakeboarding Society, Danielle “Nuttyer-than-the-Nutter” Barnes, in hope that she will recover soon from her rather violent encounter with the yellow slider featured in this video …

The editor also wishes to apologise for the poor choice of soundtrack and rubbish quality of this edit which was done in a rush before heading into uni!