It was another early start to the day today with my phone ringing at 6:30 AM. It was Sean Kilgus on the line confirming we were still on to head out to the secret blue lake. He was a little concerned about the wind and the fact we still needed to get Danny Harf’s boat on the trailer so we could tow it to the location. He said get organized and head over to meet him at Danny’s as soon as possible. I shook out the cobwebs and organized all of my gear for an anticipated great day of shooting. Danny’s lake, Lake Minnehaha was looking a little blown out on the south side but the shoreline in front of Danny’s house on the north side was calm. There were a few barefooters getting their early morning sets in.

Already waiting at Danny’s was Kilgus, Bob Sichel and photographer Spencer Smith. There didn’t seem to be a lot of action going on and Kilgus was on his phone. He’s already left a few voicemails and texts for Danny, but there was no answer. Turns out Danny had gone to the Orlando Magic game the night before and then went out downtown to a few clubs. Rusty showed up a few minutes later and offered to break into Danny’s house, but he said there was no way he was going to wake him up. We waited a little while longer, but then final decided the shoot was going to be a lost cause. Kilgus was pretty ticked off and felt bad for getting everyone out of bed, but we made plans to head over to Rusty’s a hit some double-ups.

After a quick stop for breakfast, the crew reconvened at Rusty’s and headed down to the dock where his fully loaded Mastercraft XStar was waiting. Rusty made a quick call to his neighbour and commandeered a Malibu slalom boat for us to shoot chase boat photos from. Kilgus, Big Spence and myself hopped into “the media boat” and Bob jumped behind the wheel of the XStar. After a few less than successful double-ups we swapped drivers to see if Kilgus could serve up some meaty one’s. The one end of the lake was pretty blown out so we moved back down in front of Rusty’s. We were going for big air shots and double-ups on that shoreline at that end of the lake meant he had to hit them switch heelside. Turns out it wasn’t a problem; he took a couple of tries to get them dialed in, then started going off. And Kilgus was serving up huge doubles: they were so big he had to lift himself off the drivers seat to brace for impact as he crossed his own roller line. Rusty smashed out some huge hits and we were having so much fun the XStar ran out of gas. Our media boat still had a little left in the tank so we towed them back to the dock.

This was Rusty's first switch heeside hit. Levitt photo

Check out the close-up crop of Rusty's face from the above photo; even he's blown away. Levitt photo

Rusty and the media boat clicking into full gear. Levitt photo

Big Spence doing double duty as chase boat driver and photographer. Levitt photo

Kilgus demostrating his double-up driving techinque (or flexing his guns?). Levitt photo

With that shoot done, I grabbed lunch with Kilgus, Rusty and Big Spence then made the 50 mile journey across Orlando to The Projects where I had to finish up the interview with Pat Panakos and snag one or two more riding shots. We had talked about getting a shot on the kicker/spine by using one of the System 2’s they have in their rail park lake. Like the true veteran pro that he is, Pat and I banged out the shot for the magazine in about 15 minutes. After the on-water shoot we planned to head back to Pat’s metal fabrication shop to shoot some portraits, but didn’t really find anything that interesting to use as a background. Instead of trying to force the issue, we called it and went into Pat’s office to do the interview. I’ll preface this by saying that I’ve known Pat pretty well for a long time and I thought I knew most of what has gone on in his life, but I barely scratched the surface until yesterday. Pat gave a detailed account of his 18 years in the industry and 4 hours later I not only have enough info to write the interview, I have enough to start on his biography. Truly an amazing story and I’m really looking forward to sitting down and transcribing the interview.

Pat his this kicker over and over until his knees started feeling a little creaky. Levitt photo

We were going for something along these lines, but weren't really feeling it. Levitt photo

Because the interview went so long, I had to call it a day; I still had another 50 mile drive back to Clermont . I originally had intended to go to Kevin Henshaw’s beach b-day party bash and then back to Rusty’s to watch UFC 122, but I was done. A long day, but a good one: 1 failed photo shoot, 2 successful photo shoots, 1 incredible interview, 100 miles of driving and nearly 18 hours straight on the go. Yeah, it was a good one.

On a side note completely unrelated to me, congrats to Darin Shapiro for getting inducted into the Waterski Hall of Fame last night (saw some photos on Watson’s FB page). And congrats to Trevor Hansen and his wife Kaley on the birth of their daughter, Tailyn Brooke: stoked for you, bro.