Meet your 2016 World Tour Rookies:

Holy fuck, has there been a more exciting class of rookies since John John Florence and Gabriel Medina qualified around 2011 (remember the weird mid-year rotation)? There’s been a whole lot of moving parts, as there is every year, when it came to who’d qualify for the 2016 World Tour. Nothing is definite until the last Q event of the year wraps (and even then, there’s still variables for those on the cusp). And, that last Q event, the Vans World Cup at Sunset, just wrapped – won by Mick Fanning. In its wake, we now have a grip of new rookies.

In case you’re unclear, the 2016 World Tour will be comprised of the top 22 surfers from the 2015 World Tour, and the top 10 surfers from the 2015 QS rankings. This in mind, people can double-qualify through both rankings. And if they do that, then the CT takes precedence and a spot opens up on the QS top 10. For example, Filipe Toledo is currently ranked fifth on the QS, but he’s also ranked second on the CT. So, his spot on the QS will vacate and allow someone else to slip through. That person, in this case, being Ryan Callinan.

Now, there are some World Tour surfers that need their QS qualification since they haven’t qualified through the CT (yet): Kolohe Andino, Miguel Pupo and Alejo Muniz. But if Kolohe or Miguel double qualify by improving their World Tour ranking with a good result at Pipe, then Stu Kennedy could still get in through the QS.

Anyway, here’s what you came for: The new rookies for the 2016 World Tour.

Rookie Qualifiers
Caio Ibelli
Jack Freestone
Kanoa Igarashi
Alex Ribeiro
Conner Coffin
Davey Cathels
Ryan Callinan

Non-rookie QS Qualifiers
Kolohe Andino
Miguel Pupo
Alejo Muniz

Based on their video output, Jack, Conner and Ryan are particularly exciting new assets to the tour. 2016 is gonna be a good year. More to come from Sunset soon.

Conner Coffin will bring his sparky brand of power to the 2016 World Tour. Photo: WSL/Masurel