SPECIAL CHRISTMAS VOUCHER PRESENTS AVAILABLE TILL DEC 31st

Its Monday already !  Only a few shopping days left to Christmas 2011 and most of us have run out of ideas and don’t have time for lining up in endless queues looking for a proper present.

Why not make it a healthy present this year – and get Golden Falls WATERSKI / WAKEBOARD VOUCHERS for your pals. We can send you the WATERSKI / WAKEBOARD VOUCHER today and you can just print it off at your end. Once we receive the payment, we will simply add it to our VALID list for Season 2012 !

Here are some very SPECIAL DISCOUNTS which are only valid for payments received before December 31st. All you have to do is drop an email here and we will do the rest : des@burke-kennedy.com

The standard  Waterski / Wakeboard Season Lesson Rate is Euro 35.00, including all equipment and one-to-one tuition from our experienced Club Coach Daryl Higgins. However, here are the once-off  CHRISTMAS VOUCHERS rates for all payments received by December 31st

ONE LESSON : Euro 30.00

FIVE LESSONS : Euro 138.00

TEN LESSONS : Euro 250.00

For all those who will bring their CHRISTMAS VOUCHERS down to the Lake in 2012, we know that you will have a fantastic day with us. Bring your suntan lotion and a smile – and we will make it a day to remember !

HAPPY CHRISTMAS FROM ALL THE GOLDEN FALLS TEAM

Healesville on Thursday bids farewell

Following the Celebration of Ray Stokes life in Healesville, Victoria, in Australia on Thursday, Golden Falls Members met today in Dublin to also share some memories on Ray’s visits to the Club in Ballymore Eustace over the past 20 years or more. Some tears and lots of smiles !

Australia’s Ray Stokes made an enormous contribution to the sport of Waterskiing in his short 51 year life. He revolutionised Jump Ski design, converted almost all to a much safer way to score big Jump distances, coached almost every major international Jumper and five National Teams, brought Emma Sheers and June Fladborg all the way to setting World Jump Records, and most of all made global friendships on a scale never seen before in our sport. With over 30,000 individual messages on his CaringBridge pages, his impact was exceptional. Irish Federation President Des Burke-Kennedy was invited to organise his Memorial Ceremony with the Stokes family in Healesville, Australia on Thursday.

Golden Falls remembers Ray today

Today, our Golden Falls Members got together at Chris Terry’s Cafe Du Journal in Monkstown, County Dublin for breakfast and to also celebrate the life of somebody who made so many great friendships over these past 20 years at our Lake. We then moved to DunLaoghaire’s West Pier to share some final thoughts beside the water.

Our condolences go to Ray’s family and June and Mark and Neil and all his closest friends. Our Club was one of the first to invite Ray to provide coaching courses and we will never forget his friendship over the past 20+ years. May he rest in peace.

If your name was Daniel Hearne or Scott Reeves, you would not now be using fur lined boots, waterproof gloves, ear muffs and turning up the central heating while putting more coal on the fire !  In fact, you would be on the white sandy beach over there near Brisbane sheltering under an umbrella and lashing on the suntan lotion before scaring away a few sharks for a laugh  !

Dan & Scotty in the shade !

Dan moved Down Under a two weeks ago and already looks like a local Surfer. Everybody remembers what a fantastic job Scott did for us at Golden Falls a few years ago and seeing Dan and Scott together this morning lets us all know that happy times are never far away.

Siggi and Joe sent us this lovely photo a few minutes ago and the only caption I can think of for this is :

NA NA NA NA NA NA !

Enjoy every moment Dan – and do keep in touch. Great to see Scotty again and hopefully we can all meet up at Moomba 2012 next March at the Yarra River !

THANKS TO BILLABONG FOR THEIR GREAT SUPPORT

We put the finishing touches to the Club site this evening and all looks really good right now. A big thanks to Daryl, Donal, Carl and all the team for getting the place shipshape for our very special RAY STOKES GRAND PRIX.

It has been a very tough week for Ray. Brain surgery, general anaesthetics, blood transfusions, all take their toll but hopefully Ray will now feel better having got over this stage successfully. He hates cold weather and would really prefer to be up on the Gold Coast rather than in Melbourne. I don’t think he would fancy doing Rescue Boat duty when we kick off here at 09.30hrs here tomorrow !

We also launched a RAY RAFFLE just 48 hours ago and have been overwhelmed by the response from our Waterski friends. Just amazing ! The list of donated prizes is extraordinary – see below. Billabong have also donated Winners Prizes as we will give the standard Cash Prize to Ray also to help with his medical costs. As of tonight, we have sold exactly 40 RAY RAFFLE tickets at Euro 20.00 each and all this will also go to Ray.

So, our SLALOM and JUMP athletes will be ready on the dock tomorrow at 09.30hrs sharp – and we hope that the tail end of the USA Hurricanes don’t spoil our party !

Thank you all for your fantastic support. It is really appreciated by our Golden Falls Team.

HERE ARE THE PRIZES DONATED TO OUR RAY RAFFLE TOMORROW :

SkiCaraibes One Week – Island of St Martin – Coaching by Guy Laurent and Brigitte Lethem

Apple iPad – donated by Donal Connolly

Special Party Night at Your Venue – DJ+Full Sound System – donated by Martin Cullinan of TODAY FM

Vintage Champagne – donated by Simon Durham

Vintage Champagne – donated by Fiachra O’Riordan

Complete Utility Pocket Tools Bundle – donated by Dermot Fenton

Custom Monogrammed Car Mats – Your Name for Your Car – donated by Des Burke-Kennedy

Terryglass Cottage Weekend on the Shannon – donated by Jakki Kavanagh

CyclePlus Full Monty Bicycle Service – donated by Steven Cautley

MasterCraft Goodies – donated by Jonny Crawford

Full Winter Fitness Programme – 12 Sessions with the Professionals – donated by Carl Cautley

Get your iPad at Golden Falls

Come for the Skiing – and stay for the RAY RAFFLE PRIZES !

To create some extra fun at our September 10/11 RAY STOKES GRAND PRIX, we put out an urgent call yesterday for donations of interesting items for our special Raffle which will take place before our Podium results are announced on Sunday, September 11th at the Golden Falls Boardwalk.

Within just a few hours, great things happened. We received a sparkling new iPad from Donal Connolly, some rare Vintage Champagne from Simon Durham and a full KEEP FIT Course from Carl Cautley. Many thanks to Donal, Simon and Carl for responding so quickly. What a great start !

Can you add anything to the RAY RAFFLE ?

Just drop a note to Des with the details of anything you can offer so that the proceeds which will go to the RAY STOKES FUND and will be added to the TOTAL PRIZE FUND which is also going to help Ray at the RAY STOKES GRAND PRIX.

des@burke-kennedy.com

The annual Slalom & Jump Grand Prix has now been transformed into the RAY STOKES GRAND PRIX. All at Golden Falls are doing everything possible to make this a special experience in honour of our dear friend Ray Stokes who has been our regular visiting Australian Coach since 1990 – twenty one years ago ! On January 19th this year, Ray was diagnosed with Cancer and given 90 days to live. Eight months later, he still carries on the battle and today is having brain surgery to help ease the burden. To date, 19,875 people have visited his CaringBridge Website to leave get-well messages ! That is a measure of the level of enormous regard for Ray.

So, this year our RAY STOKES GRAND PRIX will have a twist. We are asking all the participants to support our plan to turn all the CASH PRIZE money on offer into a donation to Ray’s Fund. Golden Falls have agreed to add a further donation to ensure that the amount raised will be of help to Ray. All the details are on the Official Notice – see Link below. So, do come along and ski for Ray. Your efforts will make a real difference to the fun on the day.

We are also running a special RAY RAFFLE only for those who are present on Sunday, September 11th. The chances of winning something special must be high. Donated Prizes of any kind will be greatly accepted if you can help. Already Donal Connolly has presented a gleaming all new iPad  !  Wow !

And now for the business details – and if you want to bring along Angelina Jolie and Freddy Krueger, we will have spare seats available !

As usual, this is a THREE ROUND Slalom and Jump PERSONAL BEST competition. It will kick off at 09.30 hrs on Saturday, September 10th. Entry Forms must be returned by Thursday night, September 8th – so that the RUNNING ORDER can be released on Friday. This really does help all concerned to enjoy the entire weekend. Click here for the details :

GFWSC RAY STOKES GP NOTICE 2011a

GFWSC RAY STOKES Entry Form 2011

PLEASE SEND YOUR ENTRY FORMS TODAY TO

des@burke-kennedy.com

]]> http://goldenfallswaterskiclub.com/2011/09/01/ray-stokes-grand-prix-at-golden-falls-will-be-special/feed/ 0 http://goldenfallswaterskiclub.com/2011/08/26/honorary-ramp-award-for-dan-daryl-and-geoff/ http://goldenfallswaterskiclub.com/2011/08/26/honorary-ramp-award-for-dan-daryl-and-geoff/#comments Fri, 26 Aug 2011 10:15:53 +0000 admin http://goldenfallswaterskiclub.com/?p=1008 MAJOR COW CATCHER REPAIRS COMPLETED WITH BLOOD, SWEAT AND TEARS !

MAGIC RAMP LOOKED A BIT SAD !

Our Golden Falls pride and joy, the Magic Ramp, was looking a bit sad this Summer. A few of the immaculate blue aluminium Cow Catcher panels had worked lose and attempts to rivet them back into place were quickly undone once the windy weather did their work. With the RAY STOKES GRAND PRIX just two weeks away, an emergency was declared !

Yesterday, Daniel Hearne came to our rescue. As a solid Skier and also a skilled Fabrication Welder, he joined forces with Dary Higgins and Geoff Clarke. Armed with cutting and welding equipment and a supply of steel, they spent the entire day in, under and out of the water – mostly uner the Magic Ramp. For those who have not had the experience, this is dangerous work and not for the feint hearted. The good news is that by the time sunset arrived, the job was virtually completed with just a little tidying up up needed today and Daryl has already got this in hand.

Thank you so much guys !  Your work has got our Ray Stokes Grand Prix preparations off to a perfect start. Now it is time to round up our troops for the other tasks and we will be sending out help please over this weekend. As some Members will be away next week, we need to now make the most of every day.

FUN ALL DAY ON SUNDAY

This event was created last year by Golden Falls. This year, SIX Clubs are now involved and so it is really becoming a NATIONAL fun day for women on the water.

The whole idea is to increase the number of women involved in our sport. Fully supported by the Irish Sports Council, this project is really working. While female participation was at about 30% in the past years, last month our research showed it at 51% for July – and all time record. Well done to all for making this welcome trend happen.

Tomorrow we kick off at 09.30hrs and will keep going till the last one hangs on !  It should be great fun. Do come and join us and bring those cameras so that we can upload some great photos here on Monday morning.  All you need is your swim gear and a towel – we will supply all the other equipment needed. At a special price of just Euro 15, we hope to be inundated all day long !!!

Jake welcomed home by Daryl

This was a happy week at Golden Falls. ‘Great to have Jake Bridges back with us once again and to see him fully recovered from his heel injury which knocked him out of competition for about a year. Jake got back to fitness for the Europe Africa U21 Championships and is now looking forward to getting back to jumping over 60m once again. Recovery takes time and he is making great progress. That Irish Jump Record will fall again soon – only a matter of time and the name will be JAKE BRIDGES.

Steve Critchley and Danyelle Bennett at the Club

It was also great to have Steve Critchley back with us once again. This time he brought Danyelle Bennett with him – straight from the World Championships in Dubna Russia – and both ran a very successful Coaching Course at Golden Falls over this past week.  It is always a pleasure to have some of the World’s top Skiers with us and you can be quite sure that our younger Golden Falls Skiers will remember this experience for years to come.

We still have this ongoing problem with very high water levels. It is causing dreadful damage to our Lake banks and also undermining the new foundations of our Stone Bridge fencing. We are in contact with the ESB and are still totally puzzled as to why they need such enormous volumes of water which is eroding the banks day by day. Lets hope we can get this resolved quickly.

AND ALSO FOR OUR OWN ALAN DAGG

We have just closed off our own Club Waterski statistics for the month of June – and they really do look good. Even though the first weeks were windy, the 20C water and good second half saw 121 day Visitor skis plus all our full member skis – and that makes it a very special month. Added to that the success of our National Children’s Day where we had 74 visitors on that day alone and got 40 children out on the water, and we can be proud of our efforts

Well done to all our Members who worked hard to bring this fun to our Club – and July already looks like another very busy one !

Broadcasting "Live" from Golden Falls to Perth

Meanwhile, we received a very special request from Perth in Western Australia. The great news was that Golden Falls own Alan Dagg, now living in that beautiful City, also a past Irish Federation President and a totally dominant Jumper and Slalom Skier here at home, was about to be inducted into the Western Australia Waterski Hall of Fame. The request was for a surprise video clip from our Lake to put on the big screen in Perth during the Ceremony. It was also needed in about 48 hours !

Its on that screen over there in Perth !

So, if you saw a mini Studio erected at our Boardwalk recently in glorious sunshine and a mad character talking to a tiny video camera on a tripod, he had not completely lost his marbles. That recording was on the big screen in Perth within a few hours – and Alan got the big surprise and Award which he justly deserved. We had a nice note from him shortly afterwards to say thank you for the Golden Falls effort.

Alan receives his Award from Kevin Green

Congratulations Alan.