The Waterski and Wakeboard World Cup series is about to reach some significant milestones in the coming days. For a sport with an estimated 30 million active participants throughout the world, it is certainly in a growth phase.

Next weekend, November 8/9, the International Water Ski Federation (IWSF) will celebrate the 25th World Cup Stop in the exotic location of Putrajaya, Malaysia, a short distance from Kuala Lumpur.? This 25th Stop will feature Slalom, Shortboard and Jump. In addition to this, the host venue Perbadanan Putrajaya and the Malaysian Water Ski Federation have worked with Pullman, the official hotel, to open a section of their vast and spectacular new resort facility two months before their actual scheduled deadline just for the athletes and guests of the World Cup series this weekend. It will close again next Monday to complete the last phases of construction. Finally, this will be the first time the very impressive facilities on Putrajaya Lake will be seen by a global audience. They include an impressive waterside grandstand, a four storey all glass control tower, catering and first aid facilities, air-conditioned broadcast, communication and media rooms plus a world class waterski facility on the lake. This 25th Stop is certainly the most ambitious World Cup Stop undertaken to date.

To bring all the excitement of the coming November 8/9 Putrajaya World Cup Stop to a global audience, the World Cup team will make all the action available on a free-to-view? LIVE Webcast programme throughout next Saturday and Sunday. Access for all is simple. Just log in to the official World Cup Web site Home Page at the weekend for the link at :

www.waterskiandwakeboardworldcup.com

To ensure that you do not miss the Webcasts, the local Timetable will be posted. Viewers should allow for the time zone differences. Putrajaya is GMT +8 hrs and EST +13 hrs.

The official first guests of the Putrajaya Hotel arrived on site yesterday to a very warm welcome plus some cooling coconut milk - and they were all World Cup Waterskiers !?? These included Clementine Lucine FRA, Ageliki Andriopoulou GRE, Jimmy Siemers USA, Ryan Dodd CAN and Kyle Eade NZL. They have just completed a successful World Games test event in Kaohsiung, Taiwan.

Clementine Lucine is the World Overall Champion. She set a pending new World Shortboard / Tricks Record two weeks ago of 8840 points making her a hot favorite for the Putrajaya title. Akeliki Andriopoulou is the World Jump Champion, currently ranked number one and also a hot favorite for next weekend. Jimmy Siemers, a past World Trick and Overall Champion is in top form, having taken two major Tricks titles this year - the Masters in the USA and the Pan American title. Ryan Dodd has won six major Jump titles this season, including a MasterCraft ProTour title, the London and Moomba Masters Night Jump titles plus the Pan American title. Kyle Eade has taken no less than 15 National Jump titles in New Zealand and has just achieved a new Personal Best score of 69.7m which could well open a World Cup podium position for him this weekend.

Apart from the free LIVE Webcast this weekend, local TV coverage will be extensive. On Wednesday, TV1 News will interview the World Cup stars on site for a 20.00hrs prime time news slot and event posters are already positioned on hundreds of locations between Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya. With 32C temperatures forecasted, expectations are high for a memorable 25th World Cup Stop at this spectacular Putrajaya venue. As for all 25 World Cup Stops to date, MasterCraft will supply the competition boats and the technical support crew.