This coming weekend will see the very best in the sport of Wakeboard from eleven countries competing for the coveted International Waterski & Wakeboard Federation (IWWF) World Cup title in what will be the 46th Stop of this highly successful global series. The series includes Dun Laoghaire based wakerboarder David O'Caoimh from Killiney. Afloat.ie readers will recall O'Caoimh's training exploits at Dun Laoghaire Library last March.

The World Cup programme kicks off this Friday at Noon with Pro Women’s Wakeboard Practice followed by the Pro Men. The magnificent Linyi Waterfront Stadium was purpose built five years ago for the World Cup Series. Located in Shandong Province on the banks of the Yi River between Beijing and Shanghai, Linyi City’s history dates back over 2,400 years. Today it is a major Wholesaling centre in China.

On Saturday, the Riders will attend the Official Opening Ceremony on site at 09.00hrs – always quite a spectacular display on both land and water. This will be followed by the Quarter-Finals and Last Chance Qualifiers rounds. The following nations will be represented: Australia, Canada, China, France, Great Britain, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Republic of Korea, Mexico and USA.

Weather forecasts are good with 26C / 80F and sunny skies predicted.

Australia and USA have certainly fielded top quality Riders with both experience and past performances on their sides. Included from Australia will be Cory Teunissen, Dean Smith, Tony Iacconi, Nicolas Rapa, Chloe Mills and Amber Smith. Cory Teunissen has to be a hot favourite having taken the previous World Cup title plus the 2016 Nautique Wake Series in Toronto a few weeks ago. The very strong contingent of USA Riders will include Steel Lafferty, Daniel Powers, Mike Dowdy, Daniel Thollander, Tarah Benzel Mikacich and Taylor McCullough. Both Taylor McCullough and Tarah Benzel Mikacich are rarely off the podium and expected to push hard for honours at this World Cup Stop.

On Sunday, a Waterski Show will start the day at 09.00hrs, followed by the Wakeboard Semi-Finals and Finals. The Awards Ceremony at the Grandstand is scheduled for 15.45hrs. 

Dun Laoghaire Library is the newest wakeboard venue in Ireland, according to pro boarder David O'Caoimh. The Killiney man turned the fancy South Dublin amenity into Ireland's wakeboarding cable park in February and captured it on video below.

The champion boarder rigged up his own electrically–driven cable tow rope, and got right to it, in the library's new water feature!

But the water may have been too cold for O'Caoimh. The Irish champion has since moved on to to an adventure at Xtreme-gene in Spain, where the 'lake is like glass' and probably a lot warmer too.

'Man, It Feels Good to be Back Shredding' , he told friends on social media and posted this video below.

#wakeboard – Having taken the Bronze Medal at the World Games in Colombia last summer, David O'Caoimh (20), from Killiney, Dublin, managed to achieve an impressive 6th place in the finals of the Wakeboard World Cup which was just held in Mandurah, Australia.

The World Cup Series, which is an 'invitation only' event and just twenty of the world's top male riders are invited. The Series attracts around 100,000 spectators at each stop.

Four times Irish National Wakeboard champion, O'Caoimh has taken a gap year from UCD to achieve his dream of making it to the very top of his sport and is spending most of the year training and competing overseas.

'I'm so happy and delighted that all my training has paid off' said O'Caoimh , "And I'd like to thank my sponsors Monster Energy, Billabong, O'Brien Wakeboards and Xtreme Gene, who help to make it all happen."

With an estimated 30 million active water skiers and wakeboarders world wide, wakeboarding is the most rapidly growing water sport in the world and was shortlisted for the 2020 Olympics. It is hoped that the sport will be in the 2024 Games.

*Wakeboarding is derived from a combination of water skiing, snowboarding and surfing. It involves the wakeboarder being towed behind a specially designed speedboat at speeds of 20 to 25 miles per hour. The rider uses the wake of the boat to perform flips, spins and combinations of both.