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 On
its tenth outing to find the Worlds Fastest Drummer ®, NAMM
International again featured this highly charged interactive phenomenon
at NAMM Summer Session 2007 in Austin, Texas. The contest consisted of
two categories, Battle of the Hands™ and Battle of the Feet™. The
Preliminary Heats were held July 27th and 28th. Included in the event
were technical demonstrations, insight sessions and appearances by WFD
Champions and World Record Holders Johnny ‘3 Bomb’ Rabb, Matt ‘The Kid’
Smith and Mike ‘Machine’ Mallais.
The top ten
Fastest Hands and top ten Fastest Feet then stepped into battle at WFD
World Finals, on Sunday, July 29th. Also appearing was the ever
beautiful and talented Miss WFD 2007 Christine Johnson from Moncton,
NB. Christine was crowned Miss WFD 2007 at the NAMM Winter Session.
“This year’s Finals were totally insane! We had contestants from
all over the globe. One contestant flew some 20 hours from Italy. We
saw the youngest group of competitors in WFD Extreme Sport Drumming
history. We had a 7 year old hit 716 and a 16 year old hit an
astounding 1194. It was the ‘shoot out’ I envisioned some 32 years ago,
especially with the influx of teenagers and high scores we are now
seeing,” said Boo McAfee, co-founder of WFD.
The winners
The Battle of the Hands winner was 16 year old Thomas ‘Tommy Gun’
Grosset of Canada with the highest score ever recorded during WFD
competition of 1,156 Singles. Daniel Rice placed second (1,039), while
Riccardo Merlini of Italy placed third (1,013). The Battle of the Feet
winner was Matt McKasty with a score of 907 Singles, followed by Joe
Gonzalez (844), and Kevin Bernardy (834).
The records
Six new WFD World Records were set. Thomas ‘Tommy Gun’ Grosset
blazed an 1196 during preliminaries making him the new WFD 16 and under
World Record Holder plus ranking him third in the world.
WFD Champion Matt ‘The Kid’ Smith set an astonishing WFD 5 Minute World Endurance Record of 5132.
Clayton ‘The Slammer’ Felty became the 7 year old WFD Record Holder
with 713. Michael ‘Big Stick’ Lowe set a WFD ‘Giant Sticks’ record of
111 Singles in 10 seconds.
Eric Okamoto has two new records consisting of closed doubles at 1620 and Paradiddles at
1155.
The prizes
Over $12,000 in prizes were provided by Pearl, Zildjian, Remo,
Axis, Pro-Mark, Power Wrist Builders, Alfred Publishing, Kelly Shu and
Drumometer.
The World's Fastest Drummer contest is sponsored by The Music
Edge.com, NAMM’s teen promotional initiative. For more information on
WFD and upcoming events please visit WorldsFastestDrummer.com.
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