If anyone is interested in helping us continue to raise some funds, we’ve put together the IFPA World Pinball Tour t-short, showing the list of IFPA endorsed events for 2012.

Number of unique tournaments went up from 52 in 2006, to 74 in 2007, to 102 in 2008, to 182 in 2009, to 228 in 2010, to 343 in 2011, to 431 in 2012!

Number of players has now also passed 16,000 from 39 different countries!

$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 pleased to announce that the following players saw the biggest jump in their world ranking based on their April 2012 tournament performance.

The biggest movers for April 2012 included [player]Morten Månsson[/player] from Denmark, who moved up 9819 spots with a 16th and 6th place finish at the Danish Pinball Championship in the Main Tournament and Classics Tournament respectively. [player]Kevin Strasser[/player] from the US moved up 8510 spots from his 14th place finish at the Little Shop of Games Openhouse. [player]Jeff Davis[/player] from the US moved up 7906 spots from his 30th and 33rd place finish at the Pinball at the Zoo Main and Classics tournaments. [player]Dan Jensen[/player] from Denmark moved up 7293 spots from his 5th place finish at the Flippermaskiner.com Workshop. Finally, [player]Benjamin Bussy[/player] from France moved himself up 7142 spots from his 33rd place finish in the LNJF League.

Congratulations to Morten, Kevin, Jeff, Dan and Benjamin, as well as the other players that saw a jump in their ranking from their April tournament performance!

Seattle's Pinball Zine, Skill Shot recently published an article in Skill Shot 23 about the IFPA's World Pinball Player Rankings. Check out the article HERE.

Players interviewed included current IFPA World Pinball Champion, and #2 ranked player [player]Cayle George[/player], [player]Jeff Gagnon[/player] (ranked 92nd), [player]Raymond Davidson[/player] (ranked 68th), [player]Julie Gray[/player] (ranked 134th) and [player]Maka Honig[/player] (ranked 69th).

All 5 of these players will be competing in IFPA9, the upcoming World Pinball Championship being held just outside Seattle starting 6 weeks from tomorrow.

The Denver Westword just wrote an article on the upcoming Rocky Mountain Pinball Showdown. Featured is show organizer [player]Dan Nikolich[/player] (ranked 1096th in the world). The 2012 Rocky Mountain Pinball Showdown, now in it's 9th year is one of the nearly 350 IFPA endorsed tournaments where players can earn World Pinball Player Rankings points to qualify for the World Pinball Championship. To view the article click HERE. For more details on the Rocky Mountain Pinball Showdown, click HERE.

Pinballcenter will hold its first International Pinball Festival this spring in the beautiful Edwin-Scharff-Haus convention center located on the Danube river banks. Up to 192 competitors can participate in the IFPA (International Flipper Pinball Association) sanctioned tournament. It will be one of the largest pinball tournaments ever held in Europe. The World Pinball Player Rankings includes more than 13,000 competitors worldwide.

The legendary pinball designer Steve Ritchie will be the featured speaker of the festival. Over his 35 years in the industry, he has designed many beloved innovative classics, among them: Firepower, Terminator 2, Star Trek: The Next Generation and Spiderman.
He will be discussing his latest creation, themed after the multi-platinum Rock n’ Roll enduring legends: AC/DC. At least 100 pinball machines will be available for unlimited free play all weekend with the paid admission. Many enthusiasts from all over Germany and neighboring countries will be contributing their games of all eras: from electromechanical classics of the 60s to the popular hits of the 70s, 80s and 90s, and of course the brand new AC/DC pinball machine. There is room to host up to 300 machines. Keep your eyes out for some very special rare games.

The tournament participants will be evenly split according to their World Pinball Player Rankings between four main pools of 48 contestants each for the match-play qualifiers. Players will then be assigned to initial groups of four depending on their rankings. Unranked players will be assigned randomly. The groups are intended to allow players to play with people of different levels.

There will be five rounds of match-play, each involving one game on two different machines. After each round the rankings within each pool are updated and new groups of four players are determined depending on the cumulative results of the rounds. So each
participant is guaranteed several hours of fun will playing 10 four-player games at the minimum.

Eight players from each of the four pools will advance to the play-off tournament bracket. In each bracket, two players will face off in best-of-three games on an assigned machine. The winner advances to the next bracket. The first Pinballcenter Festival Champion will be decided by a single game on the same machine between the top four players. For more details, please refer to the pinballcenter festival tournament webpage: http://www.flipperfestival.de

The IFPA is pleased to announce that the following players saw the biggest jump in their world ranking based on their March 2012 tournament performance.

The biggest movers for March 2012 included [player]Charlie Gehlhaus[/player]from the US, who moved up 8864 spots by finishing in 31st place at the Texas Pinball Festival. [player]Matt Brown[/player] from the US moved up 6679 spots from his 21st place finish at the Louisville Arcade Expo. [player]Russell Willoughby[/player] from the US moved up 6572 spots from his 7th place finish at the Louisville Arcade Expo. [player]Cameron Spohn[/player] moved up 6557 spots from his 98th place finish at the Texas Pinball Festival. Finally, [player]Nick Campbell[/player] moved himself up 5983 spots from his 19th place finish at the Midwest Gaming Classic in Milwaukee, as well as his 21st place finish at the 1up Monthly Tournament in Colorado.

Congratulations to Charlie, Matt, Russell, Cameron and Nick, as well as the other players that saw a jump in their ranking from their March tournament performance!

The IFPA is pleased to announce that our Player of the Month for March 2012 is former World Pinball Champion, [player]Daniele Celestino Acciari[/player] from Rocca di Papa, Italy. Daniele earned 131.38 WPPR points in March, finishing in 1st place at the Stern AC/DC Launch Party Tournament in Rome, 1st place at the Spring Pinball Tournament, 1st place in both the Main and Classics divisions at Pinb-Owls Nest 2012, along with a 2nd place and 5th place finish at the Les 24H Du Mans Flipper in the Main Tournament and Classics Tournament respectively in France. 

The rest of the top 5 for the month of March included [player]Trent Augenstein[/player] of the US with 83.63 WPPR points, [player]Michael Trepp[/player] of Switzerland with 79.77 WPPR points, [player]Cayle George[/player] of the US with 72.54 WPPR points, and [player]Nick Zendejas[/player] of the US with 70.89 WPPR points.

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

29 people competed in this year's 2012 Amusement Expo tournament out in Las Vegas. Utilizing the Pin-Golf style format on Stern's latest game AC/DC, players played 3 pin-holes in an attempt to get as few strokes as possible. The top 4 players qualified for the finals, with the next highest 4 finishers ranked under #250 qualified for the Novice Finals.

[player]TJ Beyer[/player](ranked 1435th in the world) defeated [player]David Burrier[/player](ranked 1075th in the world), [player]Shelley Paule[/player](ranked 1013th in the world) and [player]Roger Sharpe[/player](ranked 342nd in the world) to win the Novice Finals. Current World Pinball Champion, and world ranked #2 player [player]Cayle George[/player] defeated [player]Zach Sharpe[/player](ranked 9th in the world), [player]Bob Matthews[/player](ranked 30th in the world) and [player]Nick Zendejas[/player](ranked 215th in the world) to take home 1st place in the Masters Division. Full results of the tournament can be found HERE.

The Amusement Expo tournament is one of the nearly 350 annual IFPA endorsed tournaments where players can earn World Pinball Player Rankings points, and qualify for the IFPA World Pinball Championship.

This month the Seattle Pinball League held a tournament at the house of [player]Todd MacCulloch[/player]. During the tournament, [player]Maurizio Gagno[/player], father of Canada’s top ranked player [player]Robert Gagno[/player] had a chance to capture about 10 minutes of footage. Check out that video HERE.

This amazing venue will be the place where 64 of the world's greatest pinball players do battle in determining who will become the next World Pinball Champion.

Besides playing host, Todd's miraculous play during the 4th quarter of the pinball season secured Todd one of the final spots amongst the field of 64. Entering the weekend of October 23rd, 2012, Todd was ranked 216th in the world, with little hope of being able to represent Canada at the World Championship. With his victory over six of the world's top 10 players, including a finals victory over former multiple World Pinball Champion, [player]Lyman Sheats[/player] at Chicago's Pinball Expo Flip Out Tournament, Todd started his trek up the World Pinball Player Rankings.

Following his trip to Chicago, Todd flew back to Seattle where he captured victory at the Stern Transformers Launch Party that same week. The conclusion of the VRPA League in December saw Todd earn a 2nd place finish, along with over 20 additional WPPR points. Last but not least was the Freezing Fingers Christmas Classic out in Vancouver. Todd finished in 7th place in the main tournament, with a 2nd place finish in the Classics Division, netting him nearly 10 additional WPPR points.

In total, Todd earned over 90 WPPR points in the final two months of 2012, shooting him up to the 103rd ranked pinball player in the world, and earning him a seat amongst the world's best and a shot at the title. With Todd being extremely familiar with home court advantage during his years of battling for an NBA World Championship, will his home court advantage help bring him a World Pinball Championship title?

All these questions will be answered June 8th-10th!

The IFPA is pleased to announced that the following players saw the biggest jump in their world ranking based on their February 2012 tournament performance.

The biggest movers for February 2012 included [player]Steve Ritchie[/player] from the US, who moved up 7480 spots by finishing in 27th place at the AC/DC Launch Party in Chicago. [player]Mikael Mammen[/player] from Switzerland moved up 6442 spots from his 16th place finish at the Cityclub Flipperturnering. [player]Jenny Möller[/player] from Sweden moved up 6062 spots from her 49th and 85th place finishes at the Borås Pinball Classic Open in the Main and Side Tournaments respectively. [player]Victoria Semarjian[/player] moved up 5647 spots from her 5th place finish at the Billy Rays Open, 20th place finish at the Ground Kontrol Tournament and 17th place finish at the Slingshot Lounge Tournament. Finally, [player]Martin Stensson[/player] moved himself up 5418 spots from his 4th place finish at the Borås Pinball Månadstävling, as well as his 86th and 53rd place finish at the Borås Pinball Classic Open in the Main and Side Tournaments respectively.

Congratulations to Steve, Mikael, Jenny, Victoria and Martin, as well as the other players that saw a jump in their ranking from their February tournament performance!