Jessica Berg-Collman, 16, began her professional log rolling career at the Fisherman’s Picnic Lumber Camp log rolling competition and earned $175 for her efforts.
Jessica Berg-Collman’s first professional log rolling match didn’t go as well as she had hoped. Before she could blink she was in the drink and lost three straight falls to Leah Stanton.
But in front of friends and family at the Fisherman’s Picnic Lumberjack Camp, the 16-year-old Grand Marais native shook off her opening round loss to Stanton to take three straight falls against Lauren Schrader of Hayward.
In her third match, Berg- Collman faced Meredith Ingebritsen, the current Boom Running world champion, and in a tense match prevailed three falls to two.
Round four saw Berg- Collman facing Gretchen Greene of Madison, WI. Greene trains with current log rolling world champion Shana Martin and is a very experienced pro, but Berg-Collman won three falls to one.
Because of her first round loss, Berg- Collman was moved into the consolation bracket where she faced the winner of the Taylor (Duffy) Biser/ Jenny Atkinson match. Biser defeated Atkinson, Berg-Collman’s coach, and then Berg-Collman rolled Biser for third place.
Biser, last year’s women’s log rolling world champion, lost the first fall to Berg- Collman on the three log after they had timed out of the two log. But then the experience of Biser and her notorious splashing took a tired Berg- Collman off the log three straight times to give Biser third place.
Overall, Berg-Collman finished a very respectable fourth place out of 11 professional rollers.
Leah Stanton defeated current world champion Shana Martin to win the women’s log rolling crown, and current men’s world champion Darren Hudson of Nova Scotia defeated Alec Duffy of Hayward to win the men’s crown.
After the competition
Berg-Collman said, “It was absolutely awesome to roll against these competitors. I learned a lot and it was a great experience. I was happy my first tournament was in my hometown. I would like to give a big thank you to my coach Jenny Atkinson and her husband Niel for putting on such a great event every year.”
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