By Jack Burden

Modern water skiing has become increasingly specialized. The best slalom skiers are chasing fractions of a buoy at short line, trickers are pushing the limits of speed, precision and difficulty, and jumpers are reaching distances that demand an entirely different set of physical and technical skills.

That makes Joel Poland’s achievement in Calgary particularly significant. He did not simply add a professional slalom title to an already impressive résumé; he completed a feat that has become increasingly rare as the sport has evolved. Poland has spent years competing at the highest level in all three disciplines, against specialists who have never been better.

It is a club dominated by Australians, largely because Australia was the birthplace of professional water skiing. For its first 11 years, the Moomba Masters was the world’s only professional water ski tournament, before the California International Cup launched the first American professional event in 1972. Those early competitions gave Australian skiers a head start in building the kind of all-around résumés that have become increasingly difficult to replicate.

Poland is now the latest to do it.

Here are the 12 athletes who have conquered all three of water skiing’s disciplines at the highest level.

Poland celebrates his maiden professional slalom victory (image: @johnnyhayward_photo)

Joel Poland

Confirmed professional titles (2021-Present): 35 — 1 slalom, 2 tricks, 15 jump, 17 overall

Poland’s arrival is perhaps the most fitting addition to the group because versatility has been the defining characteristic of his career.

After a breakout 2021 season in which he broke the world overall record and became embroiled in one of the great modern overall battles with Dorien Llewellyn, Poland has gone on to win four consecutive WWS Overall Tour season titles, remaining undefeated since 2022 and setting nine world records.

The Brit has also developed a reputation as one of the sport’s most innovative and exciting trick skiers, inventing multiple new flips while consistently featuring on professional trick podiums. In jump, he has established himself among the best in the world, winning back-to-back Waterski Pro Tour season titles and the 2025 World Championship.

Until Calgary, though, there was one conspicuous omission.

Slalom.

The water skiing world had few doubts about Poland’s ceiling in the event, particularly after his redemptive and dramatic entry into the 41-off club at the 2023 World Championships. He had found his way onto multiple professional slalom podiums, but gold had eluded him.

That changed at the Rocky Mountain ProAm.

After tying Charlie Ross at 3 @ 10.25m (41′ off) in the final, Poland took the runoff when Ross fell coming out of five at 10.75m (39.5′ off). Poland then completed the six-buoy pass to claim his maiden professional slalom title.

The reaction made clear what the victory meant. Poland had won almost everything else there was to win. Now he could finally say he had won professionally in all three events.

At 27, there is still plenty of time for 35 titles to become a much larger number.

Jaquess is arguably the greatest water skier of all time, male or female (image: @regina_jaquess)

Regina Jaquess

Confirmed professional titles (2000-Present): 84 — 72 slalom, 5 tricks, 5 jump, 2 overall

If Poland’s inclusion is new, Regina Jaquess has been sitting in the club for years.

It is difficult to find a more complete résumé in the history of the sport. Jaquess won her first World Championship title in tricks at 17 and went on to win five World Championship overall titles, along with 19 World Championship medals and three Pan American Games overall titles.

Slalom, however, became the foundation of her career.

She has broken or equaled the women’s slalom world record nine times and has held the record continuously since 2009. She has run 10.75m more times than every other woman combined and has won more than 60 percent of the professional slalom tournaments she has ever entered.

Her professional record now stands at 84 titles.

That includes five professional trick titles, five in jump and two overall titles, enough to make her the only woman this century in the three-event professional club.

Her longevity is almost as remarkable as her dominance. Jaquess has continued to win professional titles into her 40s while also running a business outside the sport.

Poland joining her in this particular club feels appropriate. Both are skiers who have spent much of their careers refusing to be defined by a single event.

Karen and her husband Mick made up one of the sport’s greatest duos through the 1980s (image: VINTAGE WATER SKI PHOTOS)

Karen Bowkett Neville

Confirmed professional titles (1979-1993): 26 — 3 slalom, 9 tricks, 2 jump, 12 overall

Karen Bowkett Neville was one of the central figures of Australia’s golden generation and one of the greatest overall skiers of the 1980s.

She won the World Championship overall title in 1985 and 1991 and stood on the overall podium at four consecutive World Championships. Her influence extended beyond her individual results, too, as she helped lead Australia to three consecutive runner-up finishes in the team competition from 1985 through 1989.

The Moomba Masters was where Neville was particularly dominant. She won eight overall titles and accumulated 20 titles across the four disciplines, placing her alongside Kaye Thurlow Faulkner as the most successful skier in the history of the tournament by total victories.

Her versatility was not an accident. Tricks were arguably her strongest event, but she was capable of winning wherever she competed, including overall victories at both the U.S. Masters and U.S. Open.

She remains one of only six women to have won the World Championship overall title more than once.

The Queen of Water Skiing (image: VINTAGE WATER SKI PHOTOS)

Deena Brush Mapple

Confirmed professional titles (1977-1993): 99 — 25 slalom, 1 tricks, 58 jump, 15 overall

Deena Brush Mapple’s résumé is enormous even by the standards of this group.

Known as the “Queen of Water Skiing,” the American spent 25 years at the top of the sport, winning back-to-back World Championship overall titles in 1987 and 1989 and collecting 15 World Championship medals.

Her dominance at the U.S. Masters was even more striking. She won 20 titles across slalom, jump and overall, including 14 after the event became professional in 1985. In women’s overall, she lost only once at the Masters between 1985 and 1993.

Jump was her defining event. She won four World Championship jump titles and broke the world jump record five times, pushing the mark from 39.3 meters (129 feet) in 1979 to 47.5 meters (156 feet) by 1988.

But she was hardly a one-event skier.

Brush Mapple also broke or tied the world slalom record five times, won three U.S. Masters slalom titles and claimed a Moomba Masters slalom title. She even won the overall season championship on the PAWS Budget Rent-a-Car Waterski Tour in 1990.

Her presumed 100-plus professional titles remain one of the largest totals in the history of the sport.

Mick Neville

Confirmed professional titles (1981-1990): 15 — 2 slalom, 8 tricks, 1 jump, 4 overall

Mick Neville was the last man to accomplish what Poland just did.

Neville was one of the great trick skiers of the 1980s, winning the Moomba Masters trick title seven times and appearing on every World Championship tricks podium from 1981 through 1987.

He was also a formidable overall skier, winning two World Championship silver medals in two of the closest overall races in the history of the tournament.

His greatest season came toward the end of his career in 1990. Neville won overall at the U.S. Masters, took the tricks title at the U.S. Open and added two tour victories on the Michelob Dry Waterski Tour, one in slalom and one in jump.

That was enough to give him professional victories in all three events.

It took 36 years for another man to join him.

Todd’s comeback season in 1975 was an almost instant success (image: VINTAGE WATER SKI PHOTOS)

Cindy Hutcherson Todd

Confirmed professional titles (1977-1988): 25 — 10 slalom, 2 tricks, 9 jump, 4 overall

Cindy Hutcherson Todd was one of the defining figures of professional water skiing before the U.S. Pro Tour fully took shape.

After stepping away from the sport as a teenager, Todd returned to competition in the mid-1970s and immediately made up for lost time. In her comeback season in 1975, she broke the world slalom record and won the Open Women’s title at the U.S. Nationals.

Over the course of her career, she would break the slalom record four more times, moving the mark from 2 @ 12m (35 off) to 2 @ 11.25m (38 off).

Her versatility was remarkable. Todd won three World Championship slalom titles, four U.S. Masters overall titles and eight Masters titles across slalom, tricks and jump.

She was also a seven-time World Championship medalist and one of the great overall competitors of her generation.

Image: Yvon le Gall

Mike Hazelwood

Confirmed professional titles (1977-1987): 50 — 3 slalom, 2 tricks, 39 jump, 6 overall

Mike Hazelwood is perhaps the most obvious example of how many great jumpers begin as talented overall skiers.

The Brit became one of the biggest names on the professional circuit during the 1980s, winning jump in three of the first four seasons of the Coors Light Water Ski Tour. But his career began much earlier as an extraordinary three-event skier.

Hazelwood won the men’s overall title at the 1977 World Championships and remained a fixture on the World Championship podium for the next six years. He won eight consecutive European overall titles from 1976 through 1983 and four consecutive U.S. Masters overall titles from 1978 through 1981.

One of very few skiers who can sincerely say they conquered the Yarra River, Hazelwood won titles in slalom, tricks, jump and overall during his golden run in the late 1970s and early 1980s. That included setting his first world jump record at Moomba in 1980 and an incredible five consecutive Moomba overall titles from 1977 to 1981.

Image: Graine de Sport

Bruce Cockburn

Confirmed professional titles (1970-1978): 14 — 5 slalom, 3 tricks, 4 jump, 2 overall

Bruce Cockburn was a prodigy in tricks before becoming one of the best slalom skiers and jumpers of his generation.

He won the World Trick Championship in 1969 and helped pioneer tricks such as reverse toe turns that would become staples of the event. As his career progressed, he shifted toward slalom and jump, eventually becoming a dominant force on the Yarra River.

When professional skiing got a foothold in the United States, Cockburn became the first Australian to regularly compete abroad, winning multiple titles at the California International Cup in the mid-1970s.

His 14 professional titles were spread across all three events and overall, making him one of the earliest examples of the kind of versatility that would become increasingly difficult to find as the sport specialized.

Kaye Thurlow receives her Australian team blazer for the 1969 World Championships in Denmark (image: VINTAGE WATER SKI PHOTOS)

Kaye Thurlow Faulkner

Confirmed professional titles (1968-1977): 23 — 2 slalom, 5 tricks, 7 jump, 9 overall

Kaye Thurlow Faulkner was one of the dominant women of the early professional era.

She represented Australia at five consecutive World Championships from 1967 through 1975, collecting eight medals across tricks, jump and overall. She also competed in the 1972 Olympic demonstration in Munich, finishing second in tricks, jump and overall.

Her greatest stage was the Moomba Masters.

Thurlow Faulkner won 20 titles on the Yarra River, including eight overall championships. To this day, no skier has exceeded her record haul of Moomba Masters victories.

In the early years of professional skiing in the United States, she also tasted success. At the 1976 California International Cup, she narrowly missed a clean sweep after falling in tricks to Florida’s Pam Folsom, but took the slalom, jump and overall titles.

image: VINTAGE WATER SKI PHOTOS

Colin Faulkner

Confirmed professional titles (1965-1970): 4 . 1 Slalom, 1 Tricks, 1 jump, 1 overall

Completing the second husband-and-wife duo on this list, Colin Faulkner was a mainstay during the first decade of the Moomba Masters, winning jump in 1965, slalom and overall in 1967, and finally tricks in 1970.

It may be tempting to dismiss his achievements as coming at a far-flung tournament that was still in its fledgling years, but Faulkner’s victories came against visiting superstars such as Chuck Stearns, Mike Suyderhoud and Ricky McCormick throughout the late 1960s. They were no small feats.

Faulkner also set an unofficial world slalom record in 1966, before the IWWF kept official records, with two buoys at roughly 13 meters (32 off) and 61 kph (38 mph). It came in the last year before the men’s top speed was reduced to 58 kph (36 mph).

During this period, he also became the first Australian to win a World Championship medal, finishing runner-up in men’s slalom in both 1967 and 1969.

Image: Waterski and Wakeboard Australia

Margaret Calvert

Confirmed professional titles (1963-1967): 10 — 2 slalom, 3 tricks, 3 jump, 2 overall

Margaret Calvert was the greatest champion of the early years of the Moomba Masters.

In 1965, she became the first, and to this day the only, woman to sweep the Moomba Masters, winning slalom, tricks and jump and, naturally, the overall title.

She came close to repeating the feat in 1967, again winning all three events, although the overall title ultimately went to South Africa’s Deidre Barnard under the scoring system used at the time.

A professional show skier who honed her craft at Surfers Paradise Ski Gardens, Calvert’s winning streak across the Moomba Masters and Australian Nationals during her short competitive career remains unmatched.

image: VINTAGE WATER SKI PHOTOS

Colin Birmingham (1962)

Confirmed professional titles (1962): 4 . 1 Slalom, 1 Tricks, 1 jump, 1 overall

At the second edition of the Moomba Masters, Colin Birmingham became the first, and to this day the only, man to sweep a professional tournament.

Admittedly, Moomba was effectively a local derby in its first two years. It was not until 1963 that organizers managed to lure big names from abroad, including Hall of Famers Jimmy Jackson and Chuck Stearns.

But Birmingham was a mainstay of the Australian team from 1961 through 1967 and won four Australian titles. His sweep in Melbourne established the standard that every subsequent member of this club would strive to meet.

More than six decades later, Joel Poland has joined him.

Note: The records of professional wins from the last century are incomplete, and despite extensive research, some totals are almost certainly undercounts.