By Jack Burden

The International Waterski & Wakeboard Federation (IWWF) has named Joel Poland and Hanna Straltsova its 2025 Male and Female Athletes of the Year, honoring two seasons of near-total dominance at the sport’s highest level.

Both athletes entered 2025 as reigning IWWF Athletes of the Year. Both finished it as world champions, tour champions, and the clear benchmarks for elite jump and overall skiing.

For Poland, the season bordered on perfection. The Briton went undefeated in every professional jump event he entered, capturing both the World Jump title and the Waterski Pro Tour Jump Championship. He was equally untouchable in overall, sweeping the WWS Overall Tour for a third consecutive season without a loss. The year’s defining moment came at the WWS Fluid Cup, where Poland set a new World Overall Record—the eighth of his career—further extending one of the most extraordinary résumés the discipline has ever seen.

Straltsova’s 2025 was no less remarkable. The Eastern European claimed World Championship gold in both jump and overall, securing back-to-back world titles across the two disciplines. She also captured the Waterski Pro Tour Jump title, reinforcing her status as the most dominant women’s jumper in the sport. Most notably, Straltsova broke the longest-standing world record in waterskiing, eclipsing Natallia Berdnikava’s overall mark that had stood for more than a decade.

The Overall Athlete of the Year honors were selected by the IWWF Executive Board from the broader list of 2025 IWWF Skiers & Riders of the Year, announced December 29. Both Poland and Straltsova were also named Waterski Discipline Athletes of the Year, underscoring their supremacy within the sport’s flagship category.

In a season defined by rising performances and relentless competition, Poland and Straltsova stood apart—not just for what they won, but for how completely they controlled 2025. The IWWF’s recognition merely formalized what the results had already made clear: they remain the mark to beat.