WSL To Throw Miami Pool Party in 2019?

The base drum comes across the air, thick with Caribbean spices—ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove—the lunchtime crowd thick on a Monday aftternoon.

Cha Cha Cha Chicken’s line’s down the block, and we’re stuck in a daydream, of machine-made waves like so many electric sheep, interrupted by Will Smith’s 1997 smash single…

Party in the city where the heat is on all night / On the beach till the break of dawn

It’s amazing the things you overhear hanging around the WSL’s Santa Monica bunker.

With Founder’s Cup done and dusted, certainly a posmortem was underway, fleets of well-heeled WSL suits stepping into bustling conference room, laundry lists of concerns scribbled on yellow legal pads… 

While there were certainly Lesson’s Learned in Lemoore for the WSL, according to information gathered over plantains and rice, most of them are moot, because…

Did they just say Miami?

According to sources close to the WSL, if Surf Ranch Florida is completed as scheduled, we could very well see a World Tour event rolling into Palm Beach County in 2019. 

Mar-a-logo, here we come!

Welcome to Surf Ranch Florida. Photo courtesy PBC Gov.

According to the esteemed South Florida Business Journal, “on Oct. 26 [2017], the Palm Beach County Commission unanimously approved a zoning change for Surf Ranch Florida within the Palm Beach Park of Commerce. It would be developed by an affiliate of the World Surf League, which acquired a majority stake in Kelly Slater Wave Co. and its “perfect wave” system.

The first surf range is in the small town of Lemoore, California. The new facility west of Jupiter would be larger and have more amenities on the 78.9-acre site, which is at the intersection of Bee Line Highway and Park of Commerce Boulevard.”

Photo courtesy PBC Gov.

With Kelly and the WSL behind the park’s development, it should come as no surprise to see the organization turn its attention to the Florida park’s development. 

As many WSL employees have noted, the Lemoore prototype was never really intended for large attendance events, nor necessarily with competition in mind, but merely as a proof of concept for future KSWave Co facilities. 

The Florida facility is designed for Prime Time. 

What does it all mean!? Photo courtesy PBC Gov.

In a presentation given to the Palm Beach County Planning, Zoning & Building Department on July 17 last year detailing the WSL and KS Wave Co.’s “Worldwide Product Launch,” the Surf Ranch Florida’s programming was listed as:

WORLD SURF LEAGUE TRAINING CENTER FOR ATHLETES.

SURF SCHOOL – ACCESS FOR COMMUNITY, AFFORDABLE.

LEARNING CENTER – EDUCATION ON WATER QUALITY, RENEWABLE ENERGY, ADJACENT NATURAL AREAS.

UNDERPRIVILEGED PROGRAM – FREE ACCESS AND INSTRUCTION FOR KIDS WITH FINANCIAL NEED.

And alllllllll the way at the bottom:

WORLD SURF LEAGUE EVENTS AND SURFING COMPETITIONS. 

In the hearing, much of the discussion surrounded the facility’s “Special Events.”

While much of this is still very much in the air—including, what, if any evolutions in technology we’ll see at Surf Ranch Florida—it’s doubtful we’ll hear confirmation from the WSL until the Floridian train runs on time, but you heard it here first: the WSL’s heading back to Florida—and not the weird, admittedly acquired taste Florida, either. 

Fuckin’ Miami. 

Imagine the poolside scene, the very real Jimmy Buffet mixing amongst linen-clad impostors, chatting up the area’s very, um, healthy co-ed talent pool, if you will… surely Pitbull or Enrique Iglesias DJing…

And one must ask, with surfing’s star on the mainstream rise, would the Donald dare miss such a historic event? Would Kelly welcome him with open arms, take him up on a couple rounds at Trump National, the POTUS and the GOAT, unlikely drinking partners, bellied up at Mar-A-Logo…

What we do know is the WSL, and specifically, Slater, will be given a Heroe’s Welcome from the Sunshine State should plans solidify. 

Construction has already begun on the 80-acre Palm Beach County property.

Welcome to Miami / Bienvenidos a Miami…

XOXO