The local surfing community is welcoming the return of the Surf Pro Series and World Surf League (WSL).
During a press conference at the Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc (BTMI) Headquarter in Warrens on Saturday, Director for the Caribbean and Latin America Corey Garrett said his team is looking forward to the events and the exposure the island will have from it.
“Of course Barbados is very happy to host a major sporting event of this type after the two year hiatus … events like the World Surfing League are important as we look to diversify our tourism product, and many of the discussions these days are about how can we market Barbados more to the world with surfing seen as a global sport,” Garrett said.
“Some of our competitors are coming from the USA, Canada and some as far as Latin America, so we’re quite proud to have them here.”
Local surfing promoter Louis Venezia, who is also the father of former surfing sensation Zander Venezia, announced that the focus of the event is to put a spotlight on Barbados regarding sports tourism.
“The main objective is to promote Barbados as a sport tourism destination increasing the volume of visitors to Barbados by hosting and promoting surf events,” he said.
Currently there are 206 confirmed entries for the competition, of which 144 are men and 62 are women.
Venezia said this partnership with the WSL as the governing body of professional surfing is a huge opportunity for Barbados.
“The WSL is the governing body of professional surfing and after a two year hiatus due to the pandemic Surf Promotions has paired up with them to bring this event. The WSL hosts over 175 global events annually broadcasting over 800 hours of surfing and promoting air time. It has over 2250 athletes worldwide and in 2017 it paired up with Facebook and Instagram and collectively has estimated over 50 million followers so it is a huge opportunity for Barbados to go to the world through these three avenues.”
Chief Executive Officer of BTMI Jens Thraenhart said that his organisation is looking forward to having more private partnerships.
Surfing sensation Chelsea Tuach told Barbados TODAY that she is excited for the start of competition and loves the spin-off effect it would have in promoting the island.
“It’s huge for tourism and its huge for our surfers because not only is the world seeing our surfers and seeing our waves but our young surfers are seeing these international surfers, the best of the best from the region coming out and seeing our shores and surfing our waves and seeing how it’s done and it’s helped my career and I know it would help theirs.”
The events are scheduled to take place at Bathsheba’s Soup Bowl beginning Monday and are scheduled to end Sunday, April 3.
The surfing events are sponsored by Diamonds International and Breitling. (MR)
