The late 80s and early 90s marked a new chapter in surf history. Boards got smaller. Turns got bigger. Music got louder and clothing got bolder. These were the days when surfers started wearing pink and purple. And suddenly, surfwear became a trend — even far from the beach.
Quiksilver have re-visited their legendary archives to bring it all back. MAD WAX, a curated selection of wearable yet eye-catching pieces inspired by the cult movie of the same name.
Kelly Slater has formally withdrawn from the Rip Curl Pro Bells Beach, due to an ongoing foot injury.
The champ has undergone more surgery his foot but unfortunately the injury has not fully healed.
I think it’s best that I properly rehabilitate the injury and choose to surf wholeheartedly. I’ll be back when the time is right,” Slater said.
South African surfer Michael February will replace Slater at Bells where he will face standouts Filipe Toledo and Griffin Colapinto in Round One.
The British Home Nations (Surfing England, WSF, SSF, CI Surf) have released their Olympic Statement. In essence:
• Back to ‘Surfing’ GB team for Welsh, English, Scottish, CI surfers at 2019 World Games.
• No funding from UK Sport who don’t believe Team GB will win any medals.
• Not confirmed if surfing will be in the 2024 and 2028 Olympics at all
Full statement here
In August 2016 the International Olympic Committee announced that Surfing would be included in the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics as a demonstration sport.
On 16th March 2018 the International Olympic Committee (IOC) released to all the National
Olympic Committees (NOCs) the approved qualification system for Surfing’s Olympic debut
at Tokyo 2020. The key elements of the qualification system are as follows:
• 20 men, 20 women.
• Maximum of 2 surfers per gender per National Olympic Committee (NOC).
• Qualification spots will be earned on an individual basis, by name.
• In accordance with IOC guidelines, the qualification events have been determined in hierarchical order of qualification, as further explained below; If two surfers of a gender have qualified through the first hierarchical order, that NOC will not be able to qualify more surfers of that gender through qualifying events lower in hierarchical order.
• All surfers selected by their respective National Federations for their national teams must participate in 2019 and 2020 ISA World Surfing Games in order to be eligible for Olympic qualification. The final details of the eligibility requirements are still under review by the ISA and the IOC.
The hierarchical order of qualification will be as follows:
1. 2019 World Surf League Championship Tour: First 10 eligible men and first 8 eligible
women.
2. 2020 ISA World Surfing Games: First 4 eligible men and first 6 eligible women.
3. 2019 ISA World Surfing Games: 4 men and 4 women selected based on their continent.
Top finishing eligible surfer of each gender from Africa, Asia, Europe and Oceania.
4. 2019 Pan American Games: First eligible man and first eligible women in the surfing
competitions.
5. Host nation slot: One man and one woman slot will be guaranteed for the host nation
of Japan, unless already filled through the above hierarchies. Should athletes from
Japan qualify regularly, their slots will be reallocated to the highest ranked eligible
surfers from the 2020 World Surfing Games.
Channel Islands, England, Scotland and Wales athletes will represent Great Britain at the ISA
World Games 2019 & 2020 and the Olympics if selected, please see excerpt from official ISA
Statement below;
Country Representation for Athletes without an NOC
For events serving as official Qualifying Events for the Olympic Games, and in accordance
with the Olympic Charter, surfers may only represent an ISA Member from territories with
representation of a National Olympic Committee (NOC). ISA Members without NOC
representation (Channel Islands, England, Hawaii, Scotland, Tahiti, Wales) will not be allowed
to participate in Qualifying Events.
The surfers who have once competed for Member Federations without NOC representation
will therefore be subject to selection for the National Team with NOC recognition of their
territory (Channel Islands, England, Scotland, Wales: Great Britain; Tahiti: France; Hawaii: USA)
Athletes will return to represent the home nations at the ISA World Games after the Olympic
Qualification events are completed. 2 out of every 4 ISA World Games could potentially
become Olympic Qualification events should surfing also be included in subsequent Olympic
Games.
In the mean time we can confirm that all surfers will be required to make themselves available
to be part of Surfing Team GB for the 2019 and 2020 World Surfing Games, and if selected will
be required to participate. Failure to meet this requirement will render the surfer ineligible
for the Olympic Games. Information on the selection process for Team GB will be released in
due course.
Funding
We have made submissions of funding requests and submission of all relevant data to UK Sport.
On extensive analysis, UK Sport believe it is currently unlikely that currently any British surfer
will win a medal in Tokyo 2020. UK Sport investment is wholly focused on medal winning
performances to inspire our nation.
It is also yet to be confirmed if surfing will be in the 2024 and 2028 Olympics which also makes
attracting investment into surfing a challenge. We will continue to collectively work to source
performance funding.
We collectively recommend to all interested surfers that in order to attract funding from UK
Sport, podium results in major international events needs to be achieved. Should podium
performances be achieved, this would be clear evidence of medal potential at the Olympics
and allow us to put forward a better case for UK Sport funding. Collectively the Home Nation
Federations will continue to monitor the status of the Olympic pathway and we are in close
communication with all the relevant governing and decision-making bodies.
If you have any further questions, please contact your respective home nations body and for
further information please visit their websites or the International Surfing Association website.
Scottish Surfing Federation
Surfing England
Welsh Surfing Federation
Channel Islands
The brilliant cold water surf film by Ben Gulliver ‘The Seawolf’ is now available to buy or rent on iTunes.
For all of £6.99 you’ll get the stunning film, partly filmed on our shores, and support independent creators to help them make more good stuff!
To entice you in to parting with a few quid here’s director Ben Gulliver’s bonus ‘The B-Wolf’ a short with a load of clips that didn’t make the main feature. You might remember the mag feature we did on the film last year when it was playing in cinemas.
After months of speculation the bods at the ISA have delivered the news on how getting to the Olympics in Japan is going to work in surfing. The short version is 20 guys, 20 gals, max 2 per gender per nation, with priority to WSL riders. For the non-surfing super powers the ISA World Games are the gateway to Olympic glory. The host nation gets a spot so there are 19 places up for grabs. So if we understand this correctly the guys from the smaller nations on the WCT have it all to play for. As the US/Oz/Brazilian superpowers will predictably use their allocations from the CT.
A CT example being: USA: John John and maybe a young buck like Griffin Colapinto, doubtful Kelly will hold out long enough. Brazil: Medina and Filipe, pretty lethal combo and Yago, Italo and more nipping at their heels. Australia: Owen Wright and Julian Wilson and there’s plenty of depth in the ranks with Wilko and new blood like Mikey Wright. France: Bourez and Flores, Joan Duru as sub SouthAfrica: Jordy is arguably a dead cert at this stage.
Then the last spot could be a bun fight between: Japan: Kanoa Igarashi Portugal: Frederico Morais Italy: Leo Fioarvanti
So you can see how the smaller nations on the CT will be scrapping for that spot on the 2019 tour. Huge profile boost to be an Olympian.
For the rest of the world these will be the keenest fought and highest level attended ISA World Games ever. Expect ex-CT guys from all nations to be in attendance. Make the finals and you’re in the Olympics … and there’s a lot of talented riders from a lot of countries, it’s going to be fierce. Wouldn’t want to be the judges making the calls in those events. Good luck one and all.
The key elements of the qualification system are as follows:
20 men, 20 women.
Maximum of 2 surfers per gender per National Olympic Committee (NOC).
Qualification spots will be earned on an individual basis, by name.
In accordance with IOC guidelines, the qualification events have been determined in hierarchical order of qualification, as further explained below; If two surfers of a gender have qualified through the first hierarchical order, that NOC will not be able to qualify more surfers of that gender through qualifying events lower in hierarchical order.
All surfers selected by their respective National Federations for their national teams must participate in 2019 and 2020 ISA World Surfing Games in order to be eligible for Olympic qualification. The final details of the eligibility requirements are still under review by the ISA and the IOC.
The hierarchical order of qualification will be as follows:
2019 World Surf League Championship Tour: First 10 eligible men and first 8 eligible women.
2020 ISA World Surfing Games: First 4 eligible men and first 6 eligible women.
2019 ISA World Surfing Games: 4 men and 4 women selected based on their continent. Top finishing eligible surfer of each gender from Africa, Asia, Europe and Oceania.
2019 Pan American Games: First eligible man and first eligible woman in the surfing competitions.
Host nation slot: One man and one woman slot will be guaranteed for the host nation of Japan, unless already filled through the above hierarchies. Should athletes from Japan qualify regularly, their slots will be reallocated to the highest ranked eligible surfers from the 2020 World Surfing Games.
It’s been a big weekend for British long boarding with competitors at the Espino Pro and Noosa Festival of surfing excelling on the global stage.
Justine Dupont and Edouard Delpero of France took to the winners podium after a hard fought battle through two-days of size-able surf at the Longboard Pro Espinho
Edouard Delpero (FRA) consistently charged through his heats netting several of the event’s highest heat and beating Ben Skinner in the final.
“I just wanted to surf well,” said Delpero of the final. “Ben (Skinner) surfed really good through the event. We both had a lot of trouble paddling out and we both got really smashed. In the two last heats I broke two of my boards, just snapped them.”
“To win would have been great,” said Skinner. “But to be in the final with Edouard is great too. He’s such an amazing surfer and to me, he and his brother Antoine are the two best longboarders in the world. And it was nice to at least take one of them down, but nice to surf against Edouard in the final.”
In huge surf there were several broken boards, a 15-minute paddle out attempt by last year’s champ Emilien Fleury. Britains newest WSL world tour competitor Jack Unsworth was third, losing out in the semis to winner Edouard. South Devons Ben Howey was fifth losing out to Skindog in the quarters.
Justine Dupont had one game plan in mind throughout the entire event – make it to the outside and get the bigger set waves – to take the women’s event
“My strategy was to go outside and to take the best two waves and to make it through each heat,” said Dupont. “Not to stress and just to go heat-by-heat and to take it easy.”
Bude’s Emily Currie was narrowly defeated in the semis finishing third, Jennifer Pendlebury finished in fifth.
Over at the Noosa Festival of Surfing James Parry finished 7th in the Logger Pro, Chris Griffiths finished 3rd in the Men over 50’s, Connor Griffiths finished 7th in the Mens Open, Chris and Connor finished 2nd in the family challenge.
