If you're from the Midwest United States, you've seen thousands of images like this over the last couple years.  But we're not the only skiers that experience the wrath of Mother Nature.  These pictures are from Brisbane, Australia.  World Champion skier Gizy Halasz took these pictures of her back yard, and training location the morning after their city was devastated by huge rain storms.  Giz and John Price and train on the river and woke up on February 10 to find their boat and floating dock displaced by the flood waters.   During the peak of the flood, they could see other boats, and a large amount of debris flowing down the river. 

Despite the flood setbacks, just seven days later Gizie scored 3,800 pts in a regional barefoot tournament.  She continues to post world class trick scores that most men would kill for.  A fact that few know is that Giz posted that score with two broken toes, which she broke during the flood. 

Australia has spent many years grooming their youngsters to be the next world champions.  And the scores coming out of the country are starting to show the fruits of their labor.  Ashleigh Stebbeing's continues to improve.  Her latest score of 3,300 is a World Junior Record, and her 18.5 meter "INVERTED" jump is a new Australian record. It looks as though Ashleigh continues to train hard in order to make it that much more difficult to defeat her at the next World Championships.  She's dating Heinrich Sam. Our bet is they have a personal goal of being co-World Overall Champions.  But Ashleigh will have to defeat the Heller girls, Laura Szwed, and Emily Goldie, again.  A task she should be able to accomplish if she stays focussed.

But Ashleigh's not the only junior girl phenom in Australia.  Young Megan Roberts is posting scores of 2,610 in the sub-junior girls bracket. and word has hit she's working multiple turns and toe turns.  She's the first sub-junior girl to do all 4 turns.  The time Gizie and other coaches like John Price, Peter O'Neil and Oscar Foot have put to help train the young girls in Australia over the last several years is paying large dividends these days.

For more information on the Australian barefoot scene, visit their website at 's are doing, visit