Great news for local waterskier Jaimee Bull.
While sitting at home with ice on her cheeks recovering from wisdom teeth surgery performed locally that same morning by Dr. Michael Jackson, Jaimee received an unexpected and uplifting email from Candido Moz, the Head Judge of the World Waterski Federation.
"U21 World Record Holder," Jaimee stated on social media.
"Super stoked to announce that my score of 1 at 41 off from the Hilltop Pro Am this summer has been approved as a U21 Women's Slalom World Record. Many thanks to all my coaches, sponsors and family for their support over the years."
In August, Jaimee completed the 10.75m pass for the first time in competition and ran 1@ 10.25 m en-route to her first Pro-level tournament victory at Hilltop Lake near Seattle.
This score was immediately submitted to Waterski Canada as a pending U21 Canadian record and was approved in September. She didn’t realize until later that it was also submitted to the World Waterski Federation as a pending U21 World Slalom Record.
Record score scrutiny is an arduous job that involves boat path measurements, among many other stringent qualifications. But on Tuesday morning, the email from Candido Moz, that brightened her day, confirmed that her score was approved as a world record.
After the tournament in Seattle, Jaimee returned to school in Louisiana. She only spent a couple of days there getting her schooling organized and evacuated to Texas to avoid a series of hurricanes that devasted Southwestern Louisiana. While continuing her schooling online, she trained in Texas for 10 days and then headed to Florida to train and compete in a few tournaments. At the Travers Grand Prix Tournament in Clermont FL, she finished second to current world champion Manon Costard and at the Swiss Pro Tournament, she finished 3rd behind former world champ Regina Jaquess and Manon Costard. At the JT Classic, Jaimee was able to complete the 10.75 m pass in two of the three tournament rounds scoring 0.5 buoys at the 10.25 m line length and 2 buoys at the 10.25m line length. The score of 2@ 10.25 m was also submitted as a pending world record but unfortunately due to a driving intolerance was recently not approved.
Jaimee returned to North Bay in early October and recently finished her semester online and finished with a 4.0 GPA in her 3rd year of Mechanical Engineering. Universities in the United States typically changed their semester dates in order that students would not have to return to school following American Thanksgiving.
As the Covid-19 Pandemic continues, her future plans are uncertain, but next summer the U21 World Waterski championships are scheduled for August near Pensacola Florida and the Open World Waterski Championships are scheduled for October in Orlando.