While You Were Sleeping | Bite Size!

The worlds three largest sports brands, ESPN, Nike and Adidas (in that order, Forbes magazine) will soon dominate surfing industry including product distribution, the world tour events and broadcast rights. they deserve it too..

If Billabong, RipCurl, Quiksilver and the ASP wanted to be taken seriously they should have gotten rid of their half cocked pretencious “surfing” executives and replaced them with proper, educated executives who understand the dynamics of running global fashion labels, retail businesses and pro sporting events.

I look forward to the ESPN World Surfing Tour with 12 events a year, a grilling marathon where you are on the road week in week out, where only the fit and focused survive. One event a month, three week waiting period, twenty to thirty surfers at the most iconic locations, both good and not so good waves, big and small waves, lefts and rights) including the Gold Coast, Bells, Tahiti, Fiji, Indo (G-land?), Africa (J-Bay and maybe Morocco?), Europe (France, Portugal and Spain – Munduka?), South America (Chile, Argentina and an event in the over populated Rio?) California, Hawaii (Pipe) and hey why not chuck in a wave pool with lefts and rights and a stadium? this elite tour will be fed by a tour similar to the QS with an event every week an ultra gruelling qualification tour..

You want surfing to shake of the “it’s not a even a sport?” mentality then get serious get some ultra fit, ultra focused athletes and get rid of the hipster elitist surfing isn’t for the masses attitude because it is has out grown that. the masses now want it, more than ever.

Sal Masakela brings a brand of douche so strong the UN regulates it as a WMD. Fuck him and fuck the X-Games. That shits foul.

Great point. The Lowers comp had 600,000 tweets at their hash tag in 24 hours…and yet the (current) big 3 industry companies are crying about their return on investment?! They arguably need pro surfers to build their brand, but pro surfers need a Tour. I would love to see Nike, and ESPN take over. No offense to current announcers, but having a mish mash of different guys doing whatever event their sponsor is doing is lame too. GT in a sailor suit?!? Please. Sal Masekela brings cred from his ESPN roots, as well as professionalism to the field of surfers doing the events. That alone gains viewers. Get full time announcers, PLUS the color guys that add to them. Make a real tour, like the X-Games, not a half assed one, run by individual companies w their own agendas. The Surf Industry alone is not capable of taking pro surfing where they want it to go, and they are proven to be unable to sustain it as a coalition of disparate entities w a weak ASP. This QS at Lowers is better than any of the CT events in webcast quality, overall presentation, and apparently viewership.

cost of ct is 2 mil. cost of qs is 500,000. read here: http://balibelly.tv/news/210

The ONLY reason an utter tool like ‘GT” even has an announcing gig is because Billabong bought Von Zipper, and he works for them…if THAT is not douche, then I have no idea what is. uneducated surfers, working their way up in the ‘Industry’, does not make competent management. Has been, semi-pro reps, that bro bro up wards may be the very reason the ASP, and the surf Industry is stuck as a collection of wannabe big dogs. I’d personally love it if everyone forgot about surfing, and we just surfed. Its not going to happen though, and since we watch it, and like it, why not make it good. Lat year they couldn’t add up points to pick a winner. Nike has hardly ruined anything they’ve been a part of…why? They have real, educated management, and a broad financial base. They also have a proven track record. Guess it was a good idea to pay Brodie Carr 200k a year to run the show.

Someone needs to explain the monetary difference between a Prime, and a CT event…The dream tour is losing events like JBay, that somehow is still on as a Prime event because its economically viable!? The CT is now going to Rio, by far the most sub-par surf on the docket, while QS events are being added in Indo. Is it just me, or shouldn’t the ‘Dream Tour’ be stocking up on such locales to round out its schedule? If the big 2 (Quicksilver, Billabong) cannot pony up, isn’t it time for a more rounded sponsor list? Once again, it may be the length of the waiting period, but what the f is the diff between a major QS comp, and a Ct event?

cost of ct is 2 mil. cost of qs is 500,000. read here: http://balibelly.tv/news/210

So this contest is only open to Indo surfers .. what a joke ,

Thanks for the link on the cost factors. I have to admit I’m still still skeptical of the numbers presented, because so much of it is based on ‘ROI numbers’, which are fuzzy at best. World Tour events are somewhat self promoting for the internet audience, and often times the webcasts are better for the QS events. I get that the economy is poor, but if an extra 500k is the baseline to make a good event, then it seems you could distribute amongst co-sponsors. The point is, that after a ridiculously great 2011, the Tour is shorter, the events weaker, and the QS is getting better events than the the CT. Thats a problem. Volcom is most likely going to pull out after this year, Rio is big on ‘ROI’, but the waves suck, Santa Cruz is as hit or miss as Mundaka without the possibility of being epic, and obviously no more Jbay. The tour needs to find a way to round out its schedule, and centralize its sponsorship of events so as to properly fund major events.

The worlds three largest sports brands, ESPN, Nike and Adidas (in that order, Forbes magazine) will soon dominate surfing industry including product distribution, the world tour events and broadcast rights. they deserve it too..

If Billabong, RipCurl, Quiksilver and the ASP wanted to be taken seriously they should have gotten rid of their half cocked pretencious “surfing” executives and replaced them with proper, educated executives who understand the dynamics of running global fashion labels, retail businesses and pro sporting events.

I look forward to the ESPN World Surfing Tour with 12 events a year, a grilling marathon where you are on the road week in week out, where only the fit and focused survive. One event a month, three week waiting period, twenty to thirty surfers at the most iconic locations, both good and not so good waves, big and small waves, lefts and rights) including the Gold Coast, Bells, Tahiti, Fiji, Indo (G-land?), Africa (J-Bay and maybe Morocco?), Europe (France, Portugal and Spain – Munduka?), South America (Chile, Argentina and an event in the over populated Rio?) California, Hawaii (Pipe) and hey why not chuck in a wave pool with lefts and rights and a stadium? this elite tour will be fed by a tour similar to the QS with an event every week an ultra gruelling qualification tour..

You want surfing to shake of the “it’s not a even a sport?” mentality then get serious get some ultra fit, ultra focused athletes and get rid of the hipster elitist surfing isn’t for the masses attitude because it is has out grown that. the masses now want it, more than ever.

Sal Masakela brings a brand of douche so strong the UN regulates it as a WMD. Fuck him and fuck the X-Games. That shits foul.

funny how arrogant surf execs are.. and how useless they are… all they need are the pros input and for the normal execs to collaborate with the surfers.. the old blow hards that act like we “have a surf family” are filled to the brim with suck-ups that limit their potential and now look at the tour this year.. .a mess…

of course, those “family employees” aka socal drug heads that never made it… still lurk around the offices and they could be axed tomorrow and the world would be just fine. i will enjoy seeing heads roll at the major surf brands.. they don’t deserve a dime for their over priced arrogance. brand loyality… yeah right.

The ONLY reason an utter tool like ‘GT” even has an announcing gig is because Billabong bought Von Zipper, and he works for them…if THAT is not douche, then I have no idea what is. uneducated surfers, working their way up in the ‘Industry’, does not make competent management. Has been, semi-pro reps, that bro bro up wards may be the very reason the ASP, and the surf Industry is stuck as a collection of wannabe big dogs. I’d personally love it if everyone forgot about surfing, and we just surfed. Its not going to happen though, and since we watch it, and like it, why not make it good. Lat year they couldn’t add up points to pick a winner. Nike has hardly ruined anything they’ve been a part of…why? They have real, educated management, and a broad financial base. They also have a proven track record. Guess it was a good idea to pay Brodie Carr 200k a year to run the show.

-1′