Sports
Wetumpka youth readies for ride against World
By Griffin Pritchard
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Ben Watts, 9, soars above the water and the competition during the 2008 wakeboard season. The Wetumpka youth has qualified to compete in World Wakeboard Association’s World Championships in September. Special to the Herald
By GRIFFIN PRITCHARD
Sports Editor
Ben Watts isn’t your typical 9-year-old.
He can’t tell you who his favorite superhero is. But he can tell you who his favorite professional wakeboarders are.
“Shaun Murray and Keith Lyman,” said Watts.
He can’t tell you what his favorite magazine is.
But, he can tell you that he’s going to be in an upcoming issue of Rolling Stone magazine.
“They came down and spent a whole week with us,” said Ted Watts, Ben’s father. “Now that was pretty cool. We had a bunch of pro wakeboarders come down and spend the whole week with us.”
Watts’s childhood is atypical of children his age. That has a lot to do with the reason that he’s qualified to compete in the World Wakeboard Association World Championships in Oklahoma City Sept. 4-7.
“I’m going to see some really, really big competition there,” said Watts, who is making an appearance on the world stage for the first time.
Watts, who can be found today competing in the No Worries Tour, spent the summer riding several stops of the WWA tour series.
The first event of the season, WWA Wake Games in Orlando, Watts captured first place in the Under 9 Intermediate Division.
“I’ve been riding for about two years,” said Watts. “I hope I can move up next year.”
Earlier this month, Watts qualified for the World Championships by winning a heat at the Air Nautique WWA National Championships hosted by Pleasant Prairie, Wis.
“I want to be a professional wakeboarder when I grow up,” said Watts. “I went to a tournament in Guntersville this summer, I’ve gone to all three No Worries stops, went to Nationals. Nationals was like Wake Games. It was like the same tournament, only bigger.”
The competition ran five days and Watts won day four and finished third with 41.22 points, behind Joe Martella’s 60.56 and Ian Rabon’s 50.56.
“My first run at Nationals I did well,” said Watts, who lists his best trick as a Backside 360. “I messed up really bad on my second run. I fell off my first trick and that hurt my score.”
While the National and World tournaments are on the professional level, Watts rides No Worries for fun.
“People get excited when they see someone do good,” said Watts, who competes and sometimes teaches riders well into their teenage years in the Intermediate Division of No Worries. “They have fun and try to enjoy everything that is going on and that makes it a whole lot better.”
During the Rolling Stone shoot, Watts gained favor with several of the professional riders that were visiting the Lake Martin area.
“Ben watched them for a couple of days,” said Keri Watts, Ben’s mother. “Then they went to the dam in Prattville and began doing tricks off it. He jumped in and did a 180 spin off of it and those guys went ballistic. They were shocked. After that, he did everything they did.”
But according to Keri Watts, that commraderie is what makes the sport of wakeboarding so appealing.
“They want to see each other do their best and not fall,” said Watts. “It’s a totally different atmosphere than any other sport. The kids hang around each other and get to know each other and then when the time comes, cheer for each other.”
