The top professional surfers in the world compete on the WCT – world championship tour. They compete in 10 contests at some of the best surf locations in the world. The leading surfer at the end of this time is crowned the world champion.
Stop number 7 of the tour brings the surfers to the best beach break in the world at this time of year, Hossegor – South West France. Hossegor is an upmarket stretch of coastline in the Basque region of France. It is famous for huge, hollow, barrelling waves that are impressive to watch but scary to surf.
We headed down to watch, very excited to see the surfers we have only seen on TV or in magazines before. This year is special as the most successful surfer of all time Kelly Slater is attempting to become world champion for an amazing tenth time. He is the Pele, Lance Armstrong or Michael Jordan of the sport.
The night before the contest started the place began to buzz, a rock concert style stage was erected as well as a huge contest site village put up on the beach. Fans started to arrive, we noticed Australians, Americans, Brazilians, Germans, Dutch, Spanish, English and of course French.
The next day we got a real taste of what watching professional surfing can be like; frustrating. You see the contest has an 11 day waiting period in which to get about 3 days worth of surfing in, so it’s not always on. Also because the contest is being televised worldwide on the web they have chosen 4 possible locations along miles of coastline, so you are not sure where it will be on. They even have a mobile judges unit so they can pick a new surf spot. This is to ensure the surfers ride the best waves in the area. Good for the web viewer, not so good for the spectator on foot. Day one after lots of waiting around it was called off.
A day later it started and it was impressive. They compete in heats and are given 20 to 30 minutes to catch waves. The surfer that can carry out the most impressive manoeuvre in the most critical part of the wave gets the highest mark from a panel of judges. The surfer’s top 2 waves count. Basically it’s who can ride the wave in with the most style.
It is amazing with surfing how close you get to the actual surfers. Many a time surfers will run past you or step over you to get to and from the sea. We got some great pictures. The French worship Kelly Slater and when he competes they go crazy flocking around him like he’s a rock star.
On a whole we got really lucky with the contest. When it was off we journeyed north to surf quieter waves and when we came back to watch we barely seemed to miss a heat.
The most impressive surfer we thought throughout was an Aussie called Mick Fanning. It came down to a final between Fanning and Slater. Fanning won in huge hollow waves that were double over head. We enjoyed the show but were glad to head to quieter spots straight after.
Stop number 7 of the tour brings the surfers to the best beach break in the world at this time of year, Hossegor – South West France. Hossegor is an upmarket stretch of coastline in the Basque region of France. It is famous for huge, hollow, barrelling waves that are impressive to watch but scary to surf.
We headed down to watch, very excited to see the surfers we have only seen on TV or in magazines before. This year is special as the most successful surfer of all time Kelly Slater is attempting to become world champion for an amazing tenth time. He is the Pele, Lance Armstrong or Michael Jordan of the sport.
The night before the contest started the place began to buzz, a rock concert style stage was erected as well as a huge contest site village put up on the beach. Fans started to arrive, we noticed Australians, Americans, Brazilians, Germans, Dutch, Spanish, English and of course French.
The next day we got a real taste of what watching professional surfing can be like; frustrating. You see the contest has an 11 day waiting period in which to get about 3 days worth of surfing in, so it’s not always on. Also because the contest is being televised worldwide on the web they have chosen 4 possible locations along miles of coastline, so you are not sure where it will be on. They even have a mobile judges unit so they can pick a new surf spot. This is to ensure the surfers ride the best waves in the area. Good for the web viewer, not so good for the spectator on foot. Day one after lots of waiting around it was called off.
A day later it started and it was impressive. They compete in heats and are given 20 to 30 minutes to catch waves. The surfer that can carry out the most impressive manoeuvre in the most critical part of the wave gets the highest mark from a panel of judges. The surfer’s top 2 waves count. Basically it’s who can ride the wave in with the most style.
It is amazing with surfing how close you get to the actual surfers. Many a time surfers will run past you or step over you to get to and from the sea. We got some great pictures. The French worship Kelly Slater and when he competes they go crazy flocking around him like he’s a rock star.
On a whole we got really lucky with the contest. When it was off we journeyed north to surf quieter waves and when we came back to watch we barely seemed to miss a heat.
The most impressive surfer we thought throughout was an Aussie called Mick Fanning. It came down to a final between Fanning and Slater. Fanning won in huge hollow waves that were double over head. We enjoyed the show but were glad to head to quieter spots straight after.
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