CHUNCHEON, SOUTH KOREA — About 11:30 a.m. Saturday Lake Gaston’s premiere wakeboarder Adam Fields became the world wakeboard champion at the World Water Ski and Wakeboard Federation Championships in South Korea.

Contributed photo | Daily Herald Adam Fields is shown practicing his wakeboarding in this file photo. Saturday, he won the world wakeboarding championship during competition in South Korea. Advertisement

Fields, a resident of Lake Gaston, has been skiing and wakeboarding since he was a child with his parents Lewis and Marie Fields. He’s been competing professionally for several years and owns wakeboard schools in Lake Gaston and Florida.

“I just won the world wakeboard championships,” Fields exclaimed to his Facebook fans over the Internet. Fields left for South Korea Monday. Thursday, in the quarter finals, he made an impressive run. “I won my quarterfinal heat, which turned out to be the most stacked of all the heats. There was a lot of talk of a rider from Thailand who was the one to watch ... which quickly turned to the talk of Adam Fields who did the Pete Rose 540 in competition!”

Fields won the quarter final heat, but was worried when he took two falls. “I unfortunately had two falls in my run, both on my last trick of each pass, but still went on to win the heat with the high score of the day. If I stand up my passes from here on out I should do really well,” he said in an e-mail Thursday evening. “Thank you for all the support! I can't wait to bring home the gold! Time to focus!,” he said. His focus took Fields all the way to the championship.

Fields won with a score of 70, according to the World Championship Web site. Brad Smeele of New Zealand took second with 56.57 points and American Austin Hair was third at 53.11.