Drew Mrowiec-Barnhart
Introduction
There are many factors that go into choosing players for our team. The most important thing is that we have good people - and by good we mean good hearts and souls. People that will cherish those moments with you at a contest. People that will go out of their way to help you learn a trick. People who are just human and full of life.
Our latest addition, Drew, is the embodiment of this ideal. His passion for yo-yoing and living reaches far beyond the stratosphere. We are blessed to have the opportunity to stand by his side as he continues his yo-yoing journey.
Welcome aboard Drew!
YoYo History
"When I was younger, I wasn't exactly the most social kid. I was always trying to pick up weird hobbies to fill time with, but none of them stuck until yoyoing. I first started yoyoing back in August 2011 shortly after seeing Ian Johnson on 'Americas Got Talent'. Finding out that someone who lived so close to me could develop such a skill like that really motivated me pick it up. At first I was one of the generic forum lurkers just trying to learn whatever I could about yoyoing and the people and companies involved in it. My first yoyo was the Duncan dragonfly, soon followed by the Yoyojam SFX. I was never finding any companies that stuck at first, just using whatever yoyo I liked that spun long enough for me to learn a trick. While stalking the posts on YoYoNation one day, I came across the CODE1 idea. The concept of the whole community coming together to help design a yoyo just absolutely blew my mind. I saved up money to buy a red CODE 1 (which I recently got another of, just for the nostalgia of it all), and since that mail day I was hooked on One Drop. Two yoyoers I idolized who later turned out to be two of my best friends both in and outside of yoyoing were Nehemiah Peterson and Noah Bachofen. About a year after coming across their videos, I saw the cheese crew at the Chicago yoyo club. We ended up hanging out a lot more, and they both pushed me to become a better yoyoer, and there's no way I would be where I am now without them. Mark Peterson (Nehemiah's dad) ended up driving the three of us to contests around the nation, from as short of a distance as Minnesota all the way to a 32 hour nonstop trip to Las Vegas. At every contest, I tried my best to spread the good that OD was doing for the community. For the future I plan on attending as many contests as possible and encouraging the younger generation, because when I first started I thought there was no way I would reach this point in yoyoing. It's been a long time coming with a lot of support from the community and those close to me (huge thank you to Reagan Prestley for all of her support, I'm nowhere without you), and I'm incredibly thankful to be able to represent such a great company run by people with such a strong passion for yoyoing and doing what they love. Expect big things for the future, because I am nowhere near done progressing, and I'm really excited to ride with OneDrop to the next big step in yoyoing."
