13-year-old is new pinball world champion
The pinball world has its youngest-ever world champion.
Over the weekend, the Professional & Amateur Pinball Association held its world championship and a 13-year-old boy from Colorado took home the Division-A title.
Escher Lefkoff played through 12 different tables on his way to victory. Games included classics like The Jungle Queen and Twilight Zone, but also newer tables like The Walking Dead and World Poker Tour. Because tables have different point systems, all scores were converted into a 0-100 point system so that they could be compared.
In a dramatic finish, the finals came down to a single-ball tiebreaker, with Lefkoff attempting to hold off longtime veteran and former world champion 41-year-old Bowen Kerins in a one-on-one duel. He managed to score enough points on 1980 machine Skateball to hold his lead and earn the trophy. With that, Lefkoff became the youngest PAPA champion in history.
Lefkoff is a pinball prodigy, having attended tournaments with his father Adam for most of his life. In 2016, he finished 25th at the PAPA Division-A world championships and has had an impressive collection of finishes during his young career. Previously, he had taken home Junior Division titles in 2011 and 2013.
He even wrote an extremely adorable history of pinball back in 2014 for what we can only assume is a school project. And all that without being deaf, dumb, or blind.
Escher’s pinball wizardry runs in the family. His father Adam Lefkoff is no slouch, often being ranked among the top 50 players in the world by the International Flipper Association. He’s even got a top 4 Division-A finish at the PAPA championships, as well as a Classics II first place title.
Follow Taylor Cocke on Twitter @taylorcocke.
