World surfing on crest of wave
SURFING is on the cusp of a new “golden era” according to the sport’s major powerbrokers, who are gathered on the Gold Coast ahead of the Quiksilver and Roxy Pro.
Peter ‘PT’ Townend, the sport’s first world champion and the man credited with helping to legitimise professional surfing, was among those yesterday predicting “winds of change” were in the air.
With the Gold Coast establishing itself as Australia’s surfing capital for both industry and top athletes, Townend said the city was an ideal position to take advantage of the changes that include:
• Surfing’s inclusion in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, which could open the sport up to its biggest ever audience.
• The expected restructure by the World Surf League of the world tour to create a “Superbowl style” event from the 2019 season.
• The inclusion of an artificial wave pool in the world tour, and potentially also the Olympics, as the WSL gears up for their first public wave pool event in two months.
• A changing of the guard in Australian surfing with threetime world champion Mick Fanning retiring from the sport next month bringing new surfers to the fore.
• The WSL, bankrolled by billionaire owner Dirk Ziff, calling sporting industry big guns – including new CEO Sophie Goldschmidt, the Joseph Carr formerly with the UFC and Will Chignell formerly of the America’s Cup – to guide the organisation.
“Thank God surfing has a supporter like Dirk Ziff, be- cause otherwise we wouldn’t be where we are at,” Townend said. “And really where we’re at is, ‘what’s surfing going to look like at the end of the decade?’ because we are going to have been in the Olympics.
“That’s the opportunity: all the other nations who aren’t exposed to surfing are going to be opened up to it.”
Townend, who is the coach of China’s Olympic surfing team, said the Olympic Games would open up surfing to millions of people.
“China has a thousand miles of coastline and 400 million people who live close to the beach. What happens when surfing becomes cool for all those people?” he said.
“It’ll be like what happened here and in America in the 1960s, when everyone wanted to get a board and go surfing. We’ve been (surfing for) 100 years, China’s been doing it for ten.
“So, from a business perspective what does that mean for the Rip Curls, Billabongs, Quiksilvers and Volcoms of the world?”
Townend said the Kelly Slater Wave Company, owned by the WSL, was building a wavepool in Tokyo “but they don’t have an agreement with the International Olympic Committee (to use it) so who knows where that will end up.”
Townend said the city was well positioned to benefit for these changes.
“You would have to say today the Gold Coast has become the surf capital of Australia,” he said. “It’s whether Queensland Tourism and Gold Coast Tourism want the international exposure and with everything they’ve been doing to get it you would have thought they want it.”