Week #1 of the month long Flippin' With the Greats tournaments has begun, running through January 12th!

Check out the LIVE standings HERE!

The IFPA and Gridiron Support are teaming up to host a series of pinball tournaments to raise money for Mike Ditka's Gridiron Greats Assistance Fund, while giving the chance for players to compete for WPPR points and over $20,000 in prizes, including a BRAND NEW pinball machine.

FLIPPIN' WITH THE GREATS will consist of 4 weekly tournaments run at 3 different locations – Modern Pinball NYC in New York, the Silver Ball Museum in Asbury Park, NJ, and the Pinball Gallery in Downingtown, PA. Tournaments will run January 6th-12th, January 13th-19th, January 20th-26th, and January 27th-30th culminating in a Grand Final the day before the Super Bowl on February 1st, 2014 at IFPA Headquarters at MPNYC.

For details on the tournament including registration fees, format, prizes and more, click HERE.

The IFPA is excited to announce that the following players have been now qualified for the $tern Rewards Program based on their December 2013 IFPA endorsed tournament performance! These players have until August 15th, 2014 to exercise their reward option.

TOP 250 RANKED PLAYERS
Any eligible players that finished in the top 250 for the end of the year World Pinball Player Rankings.

BIGGEST MOVER AWARD – [player]David Spasic[/player]
David moved up 11,306 spots by finishing in 14th and 16th place in the Happy Dog Annual Pinball Tournament Main and Classics Divisions respectively. David also won the Side Tournament at Flip Off Hunger – Cleveland, along with a 12th place finish Main Tournament. This netted Layne 18.95 WPPR points and moved him up to a rank of 1675th in the world.

BIGGEST MOVER AWARD – [player]Ashley Shaw[/player]
Ashley moved up 9170 spots mainly due to her 20th place finish at the Flip Off Hunger – Seattle tournament. She also finished in 13th place at the Full Tilt Ballard Weekly tournament, 5th place at the John Johns Tuesday Flip Off, 7th place at Olaf's Monthly, and 10th and 22nd place at the two Add-a-Ball Wednesday Flip Off tournaments she played in. In total, Nathan earned 1.88 WPPR points from these performances, which has moved her up to a rank of 6036th in the world.

BIGGEST MOVER AWARD – [player]Troy Kellogg[/player]
Troy moved up 6936 spots by earning 1.95 WPPR points from his 52nd place finish in the Seattle Pinball League. This moved Troy into now being the 5650th ranked player in the world.

Detailed rules for the $tern Rewards Program, including an updated list of qualifiers, and updated list of rewards available can be found HERE.

The IFPA is pleased to announce that the following players saw the biggest jump in their world ranking based on their December 2013 tournament performance.

The biggest movers for December 2013 included [player]David Spasic[/player] from Cleveland, OH, who moved up 11,306 spots by finishing in 14th and 16th place in the Happy Dog Annual Pinball Tournament Main and Classics Divisions respectively. David also won the Side Tournament at Flip Off Hunger – Cleveland, along with a 12th place finish Main Tournament. This netted Layne 18.95 WPPR points and moved him up to a rank of 1675th in the world.

[player]Ashley Shaw[/player] from Seattle, WA moved up 9170 spots mainly due to her 20th place finish at the Flip Off Hunger – Seattle tournament. She also finished in 13th place at the Full Tilt Ballard Weekly tournament, 5th place at the John Johns Tuesday Flip Off, 7th place at Olaf's Monthly, and 10th and 22nd place at the two Add-a-Ball Wednesday Flip Off tournaments she played in. In total, Ashley  earned 1.88 WPPR points from these performances, which has moved her up to a rank of 6036th in the world.

[player]Troy Kellogg [/player] from Seattle moved up 6936 spots by earning 1.95 WPPR points from his 52nd place finish in the Seattle Pinball League. This moved Troy into now being the 5650th ranked player in the world.

Congratulations to David, Ashley and Troy, as well as the other players that saw a jump in their ranking from their November tournament performance!

The IFPA is pleased to announce that our Player of the Month for December 2013 is [player]Andrei Massenkoff[/player] from San Francsico, CA. Andrei earned a total 127.23 WPPR points in December, winning the fall season of both the SFPD League and BAPA League. Andrei also swept the Main and Classics divisions at City Champ, and a 1st/2nd place finish in Main and Classics respectively at the Nutcracker Duel.

The rest of the top 5 for the month of December included [player]Eden Stamm[/player] from White Rock, BC, Canada, with 97.19 WPPR points, [player]Tatsunori Naruke[/player] from Japan with 96.06 WPPR points, [player]Joshua Henderson[/player] from Plainfield, IL with 90.26 WPPR points, and [player]Trent Augenstein[/player] from Delaware, OH with 86.23 WPPR points.

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

If anyone is interested in helping us continue to raise some funds, we put together the "World Pinball Tour" list of events for 2013.

Number of distinct tournaments went up from 343 in 2011, to 431 in 2012, to 622 in 2013. Number of players is also approaching 22,000!

$3 from each t-shirt sale goes into the IFPA funds, so help us raise some funds and get a t-shirt or two.

Click HERE to visit our online store.

The IFPA is proud to announce that registration for the 11th Annual IFPA World Pinball Championship is now open! For more details check out the registration page HERE!

The initial invite list is open for the top 100 players in the World Pinball Player Rankings as of 1/1/2014. Based on the interest of the top 100, we may extend the invite list additional spots so please monitor the registration page at your leisure. Should you be interested, please send payment to the IFPA as your way of committing to attending the tournament. Should you not be interested, it is equally important that we know, so please send an email to the IFPA stating you will not be available to participate.

Should you have any questions about our qualifying process or to find out more information about the tournament, please contact the IFPA at ifpapinball@gmail.com.

One of the 64 spots will also be available at the 2014 Lyons Spring Classic, to be held the weekend before IFPA11. More details will be available soon.

The IFPA is proud to announce that [player]Zach Sharpe[/player] has finished at #1 on the World Pinball Player Rankings, thus earning IFPA’s top honor as the 2013 “World’s Greatest Pinball Player”. No single tournament victory will ever secure this title for a given year. Only consistent play at the highest level over the course of multiple years leads to players reaching the pinnacle of the World Pinball Player Rankings. This is the 8th time that the IFPA has crowned the World’s Greatest Pinball Player, with Zach now becoming the third player in history to earn the honor. [player]Jorian Engelbrektsson[/player] earned the top spot in 2009, while [player]Keith Elwin[/player] captured the honor the other 6 years.

Ultimately it was Zach's European tour in the fourth quarter of 2013 that helped him secure the #1 spot in what was the closest race for the World's Greatest Pinball Player title in IFPA history (7.92 WPPR points). Zach earned victories at the Danish Pinball Open in Denmark, the Dutch Pinball Open in the Netherlands, as well as the Planet Comics tournament in Italy.

Overall, Zach won 40% of the events he played in, while placing in the top 4 at 62% of his 2013 events, a truly remarkable achievement. Zach will be given his award at the IFPA11 World Pinball Championship, scheduled for May 23-25, 2014 in Denver, CO. Congratulations to Zach, and best of luck to everyone on the upcoming 2014 season in the race for #1.

Qualifying for the inaugural IFPA State Championship Series is now complete, and it's now time for us to find our qualifiers for the 28 different IFPA State Championship finals. These finals will all be held simultaneously on February 8th, 2014, with 448 finalists competing for not only a State Championship title, but also a spot in the first IFPA US National Championship.

The final player count for the 2013 SCS reached 5235 included in the various IFPA State Championship standings (view current standings HERE).

IFPA State Representatives should be sending out emails to the top 50 from each state shortly. Important to note that if the IFPA does not have your email address on file, we have no way of being able to contact you. If you feel you should have received an invitation to one of the IFPA State Championships and did not, contact the IFPA immediately at ifpapinball@gmail.com, or Click HERE to edit your profile.

Registration for all 28 states closes on Saturday, January 12th at 7pm CST. Any player that has not accepted their invitation by that time will be ineligible to participate.

Remember that no player is allowed to compete in multiple IFPA State Championships. Players that qualify for more than one IFPA State Championship will have to make their choice during this open period of registration. This will mean that many states will go far past the top 16 players in order to fill all 16 spots.

For those states that plan on running a Charity Challenge side tournament, all proceeds will be donated to Kids Fight Cancer, with those proceeds match dollar for dollar by both Stern Pinball and Jersey Jack Pinball.

Any questions about the SCS, or anything IFPA related, please contact us at ifpapinball@gmail.com

Updated: As State Representatives alert us to who is attending, we will be updating this page.

The IFPA is excited to announce that the following players have been now qualified for the $tern Rewards Program based on their November 2013 IFPA endorsed tournament performance! These players have until August 15th, 2014 to exercise their reward option.

BIGGEST MOVER AWARD – [player]Layne Sandt[/player]
Layne moved up 10,151 spots by finishing in 1st place at the November Pinball Gallery Monthly Tournament, as well as 5th place at the Black Friday Pinball Tournament. This netted Layne 4.27 WPPR points and moved him up to a rank of 3218th in the world.

BIGGEST MOVER AWARD – [player]Nathan Patterson[/player]
Nathan moved up 9064 spots from his 11th and 7th place finishes at the Shawnee Pinball OpenMain and Classics tournaments respectively. In total, Nathan earned 3.43 WPPR points from these performances, which has moved him up to a rank of 3990th in the world..

BIGGEST MOVER AWARD – [player]Felix Holm[/player]
moved up 6630 spots by earning 2.13 WPPR points from his 111th place finish at the 2013 Swedish Championships. This moved Felix into now being the 5347th ranked player in the world.

Detailed rules for the $tern Rewards Program, including an updated list of qualifiers, and updated list of rewards available can be found HERE.

The IFPA is pleased to announce that the following players saw the biggest jump in their world ranking based on their November 2013 tournament performance.

The biggest movers for November 2013 included [player]Layne Sandt[/player] from Easton, PA, who moved up 10,151 spots by finishing in 1st place at the November Pinball Gallery Monthly Tournament, as well as 5th place at the Black Friday Pinball Tournament. This netted Layne 4.27 WPPR points and moved him up to a rank of 3218th in the world.

[player]Nathan Patterson[/player] from Lenexa, KS moved up 9064 spots from his 11th and 7th place finishes at the Shawnee Pinball OpenMain and Classics tournaments respectively. In total, Nathan earned 3.43 WPPR points from these performances, which has moved him up to a rank of 3990th in the world.

[player]Felix Holm[/player] from Stockholm, Sweden moved up 6630 spots by earning 2.13 WPPR points from his 111th place finish at the 2013 Swedish Championships. This moved Felix into now being the 5347th ranked player in the world.

Congratulations to Layne, Nathan and Felix, as well as the other players that saw a jump in their ranking from their November tournament performance!