July 13, 2015 at 2:33 p.m.
Groen flips his way into Hodag Park
Top-ranked barefooter performs with Hodag ski show
Groen flips his way into Hodag Park
Record-setting barefooter Ben Groen skied for spectators in a performance like never before at Hodag Park.
The 23-year-old hails from Otaki, New Zealand and is currently residing in Winter Haven, Florida where he works as an instructor at the World Barefoot Center.
Winter Haven is the birthplace of barefooting and Groen works alongside some of the best barefooters in the world at WBC, providing lessons ranging from beginner to advanced for people from all over the world.
Aside from instructing, Groen is also part of the WBC's elite team, competing in competitions in the United States and New Zealand.
Working alongside some of the world's top-ranked barefooters, Groen has compiled an impressive record.
While he has placed at the top of the rankings in too many events to list, he said the highlight of his career was placing second in the world championships in 2014.
"I am originally from New Zealand," he said. "I am the national record holder in New Zealand in tricks, jump and slalom and last year I placed second at the world championships, which was kind of like the highlight of my career so far. I've also competed in various tournaments over the last few years in the states and back home."
Groen opened the performance at the Hodag Water Ski Show barefooting his way back and fourth across Boom Lake.
Before the show, Groen said he hoped to impress the spectators.
"I am going to do a couple runs through the show. I'm going to open the show and then I think I am going to open the second half of the show after the intermission as well," Groen said. "I will be barefooting. Hopefully, doing something impressive, we'll see maybe I'll throw a full in there."
Impressive the performance was. Towed behind a boat that was travelling at roughly 43 mph, Groen was spinning and flipping all while waving and smiling for the crowd.
During his time in Rhinelander, Groen is working the Hodag Water Ski team, teaching them to barefoot and improve their skills.
Groen said he is working on the fundamentals of barefooting with the ski team with a specific emphasis on show skiing and performance.
"Kind of their core base barefoot tricks, I guess you could say," Groen explained. "Especially for show skiing. Learning how to get up behind the boat without any skis. Learning to ski on one foot rather than two and then teach them how to step off a ski, which is the most general way they learn to ski in a ski show, so it's the most applicable to them."
Grant Olson, a member of the ski team, had plans to learn from Groen during his time here and said just having Groen in Rhinelander to perform and work with the members of the ski team is an amazing opportunity.
"It's a real excitement," Olson said. "Nobody like that has every really touched Boom Lake or the (Wisconsin River) around here, so to have him around and be able to help us out and teach us things, it's just really cool and an opportunity we really don't get around here very often."
Olson, who has been skiing since he was 4 years old, hopes to add to his bag of tricks with Groen in town to help.
"I want to learn how to do a back barefoot deep start out of the water, that's my goal," Olson said. "You are starting in the water face down, the boat pulls you out of the water and you ride on your belly, put your feet in the water and then barefoot backwards."
Andrew and Wendy Petzold, whose daughter Grace is a member of the Hodag Water Ski team, brought Groen to town after she spent some time learning from him in Florida.
"I first met Grace Petzold, the young girl on the ski team," Groen explained. "She came down to Florida to ski with us at the World Barefoot Center, the ski school I work at, and she just really got hooked into it. She did really well so she started coming back on a regular basis and I got to know the family. In the summer time I travel around a lot of different places to teach and they invited me to come up here for a week."
Groen said he enjoyed his time in Rhinelander, working and performing with the ski show.
"Really good. It's been a lot of fun," he said. "I got in on Sunday so I got to watch the ski team do their show then, which was kind of cool, and then spent the last couple of days working with some of the kids on the team. Helping them with some different tricks and starts for barefoot water skiing. It's been a lot of fun."
During Wednesday's show at Hodag Park the Petzolds said they hope to bring Groen back every year to work with the team and perform at Hodag Park.
Lindsey Nylund may be reached at [email protected].
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