The IFPA is pleased to announce that our Player of the Month for February 2013 is Robert Sutter from Switzerland. Robert earned 101.42 WPPR points in February, including a 2nd place finish in both the Main and Classic tournaments at the Dutch Pinball Masters. In addition, Robert had a 3rd and 2nd place finish in the Main and Classic tournaments at the Nordwestschweizer-Flippermeisterschaft.

The rest of the top 5 for the month of February included Trent Augenstein from Delaware, OH with 101.41 WPPR points, PAPA 10 World Pinball Champion Jorian Engelbrektsson from Sweden with 97.63 WPPR points, 4-time World Pinball Champion Bowen Kerins from Salem, MA with 89.96 WPPR points, and Aaron Nelson of the US with 72.47 WPPR points.

Congratulations to Robert and the other top WPPR point earners of the month!

Last week we announced who will be representing Team Europe in the inaugural Epstein Cup. With IFPA10 registration now officially closed, we're excited to announce that the roster for Team USA has now also been finalized.

Representing Team USA at the 2013 Epstein Cup will be IFPA8 World Pinball Champion and team captain [player]Cayle George[/player] (ranked 3rd in the world), [player]Zach Sharpe[/player] (ranked 4th in the world), [player]Trent Augenstein[/player] (ranked 6th in the world), [player]Josh Sharpe[/player] (ranked 12th in the world), [player]Joshua Henderson[/player] (ranked 15th in the world), [player]Andrei Massenkoff[/player] (ranked 24th in the world), [player]Lyman Sheats[/player] (ranked 22nd in the world) and [player]Jason Werdrick[/player] (ranked 36th in the world).

The IFPA is pleased to announce that our Player of the Month for January 2013 is [player]Steve Zahler[/player] from the US. Steve earned 89.36 WPPR points in January, including a 2nd and 1st place finish in the Main and Classic tournaments at the Maryland Pinball Championship. In addition, Steve won the Middletown NY Pinball Open, and finished in 12th place at Pinferno.

The rest of the top 5 for the month of January included Stéphane Pinck from France with 59.88 WPPR points, [player]Steven Bowden[/player] from Somerset, NJ with 54.16 WPPR points, IFPA8 World Pinball Champion [player]Cayle George[/player] from Seattle, WA with 48.30 WPPR points, and [player]Tim Tournay[/player] of the US with 46.87 WPPR points.

Congratulations to Steve and the other top WPPR point earners of the month!

There is less than one week left of open registration for the IFPA10 World Pinball Championship, but with the top 8 ranked players from Europe all having signed up to compete, the roster for Team Europe has been finalized. Representing Team Europe at the inaugural Epstein Cup is current World Pinball Champion and team captain [player]Daniele Celestino Acciari[/player] (ranked 2nd in the world) from Italy, Jörgen Holm from Sweden (ranked 5th in the world), [player]Jorian Engelbrektsson[/player] (ranked 8th in the world) from Sweden, [player]Franck Bona[/player] (ranked 9th in the world) from France, [player]Robert Sutter[/player] (ranked 13th in the world) from Switzerland, [player]Levente Tregova[/player] (ranked 17th in the world) from Switzerland, David Grémillet (ranked 14th in the world) from France, and [player]Julio Vicario Soriano[/player] (ranked 18th in the world) from Spain. The Epstein Cup will be held Thursday evening prior to the start of IFPA10.

Back in early November the IFPA reported on the race for #2 in the World Pinball Player Rankings for 2011 between [player]Jorian Engelbrektsson[/player] and [player]Cayle George[/player]. As the year now comes to a close, it's looking like Jorian will finish slightly ahead of Cayle in the world rankings.

What we didn't see coming was Switzerland native [player]Robert Sutter[/player] exploding in the final 6 weeks of the season to overtake the #2 position! Robert participated in three tournaments within Switzerland since November finishing in 1st place twice and 2nd place once.

In addition to finishing #2 in the World Pinball Player

Rankings, the IFPA is proud to announce that Robert is the 2011 IFPA Player of the Year! This award is based solely on WPPR points earned during 2011, rather than the 3 year rolling period that the World Pinball Player Rankings are based on.

Congratulations to Robert for his spectacular 2011 season!