The IFPA is proud to announce that registration for the 17th 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 1/1/2020. 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 [email protected].

Two of the 64 spots will also be available for the highest ranked finisher not already in the IFPA field. One is reserved for the 2019-20 IFPA North American Pinball Championship and one is reserved for the 2019-20 IFPA European Pinball Championship.

With the 2019 pinball season officially behind us, the World Pinball Player Rankings continues to show no signs of slowing down within the competitive pinball community. We wanted to take a quick look back at the growth we’ve seen during 2019.

We’re proud to say that the total number of IFPA sanctioned events for 2019 was 7,555.  This represents a 31% growth from the end of 2018 where we had 5,776 IFPA sanctioned events on the calendar. Total player attendance at those events was 173,378, up 30% from 2018.

In addition, the number of unique players that played in an IFPA endorsed tournament during 2019 was 24,380, up 14% from the number of players that were active during 2018.

The IFPA website also hit a record 4 million page views for 2019, the most we’ve ever had for a single year.

The IFPA wishes to thank everyone in the competitive pinball community for continuing to support everything we do to spread the world about our incredible sport to the masses.

Here are the December 2019 IFPA winners for Player of the Month and Biggest Movers:

Player of the Month:
Emil Dreiborg (164.81 WPPR’s)

Biggest Movers:
Mark Farina Jr (+29,300 spots), Jerry McCoy (+18,091 spots) and Bryce Althouse (+17,338 spots)

These players have now all qualified for the Stern Rewards Program for 2019. Congrats to everyone!

We’ve also added any eligible players that finished in the top 1000 for the end of the year World Pinball Player Rankings to the Stern Rewards Program.

In conjunction with Stern Pinball and PAPA, the IFPA is proud to announce the Stern Pro Circuit event list for the 2020 season. 15 events from the 2019 season remain on the tour, with 5 new events joining the ranks for 2020.

Check out the list HERE.

Fort Wayne’s NBC ran a piece featuring the upcoming IFPA Indiana State Pinball Championship. Click HERE to watch.

The IFPA is excited to announce that Stern has added Elvira House of Horrors Premium to the rewards program. A reminder that the 2019 rewards earned by players expire December 31st, 2020.

The following games are now available under the program (subject to change at anytime): Deadpool Pro (in stock), Deadpool Premium (May), Elvira House of Horrors (in stock), Iron Maiden Pro (in stock), Iron Maiden Premium (February), Jurassic Park Pro (March), Jurassic Park Premium (March), Guardians of the Galaxy Pro (March), Star Trek Vault Pro (in stock), Star Wars Pro (May 2020), Star Wars Comic Book Pro (in stock), Star Wars Premium (May 2020), Star Wars Comic Book Premium (in stock),
Munsters Pro (in stock), Munsters Premium (in stock), Beatles Gold (in stock), Black Knight Sword of Rage Pro (in stock), Black Knight Sword of Rage Premium (in stock)

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

Süddeutsche Zeitung in Germany published an article on Johannes Ostermeier and the dramatic IFPA16 World Pinball Championship final. Click HERE to read the article.

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Just a reminder that registration for the 2019-20 IFPA North American Championship Series closes tomorrow, Tuesday, January 7th at 8pm CST. Any player that has not accepted their invitation by that time will be ineligible to participate.

If you are having trouble connecting with your IFPA State or Provincial Representative, feel free to email us at [email protected].

As State/Provincial Representatives alert us to who is attending, we will be updating the registration page HERE.

The IFPA is pleased to announce a new award from the 2019 season, and that’s the Rookie of the Year award. This award is given to the player that earns the most WPPR points in their first year of active play. Our Rookie of the Year for 2019 is Axel Blonde from Vancouver, BC, Canada.

Axel racked up an incredible 366.09 WPPR points during 2019. Axel participated in his first IFPA sanctioned tournament in April 2019. Fast forward 8 months and Axel currently sits as the 226th ranked player in the world, and is the top seed in the upcoming 2019-20 IFPA British Columbia Provincial Championship.

Axel’s greatest achievement of 2019 was his 16th and 9th place finishes at the NW Pinball Championships Main and Classics events, one of the stops on the Stern Pro Circuit during the 2019 season. Overall, Axel won 27% of the 44 events he played in during 2019, while placing in the top 4 at 73% of his 2019 events, a truly remarkable achievement.

Congratulations to Axel, our first IFPA Rookie of the Year! Best of luck to all the players that have yet to start competing on their journey to becoming IFPA’s next Rookie of the Year.