The WSL Just Iced The Entire Aussie Leg Of The Tour

As of right now, the WSL Championship Tour and all other WSL events have been either postponed or canceled through May:

“Due to the continued evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic, the World Surf League is postponing or canceling all events, at all levels of competition, through the end of May,” reads the WSL press statement.

It goes on to explain that all of the events of the Australian leg of the CT (Bells and Margaret River), as well as the WSL Big Wave Awards have been postponed. 

“The Quiksilver Pro G-land – scheduled to take place in a remote part of Indonesia in June – will either be canceled or moved to an area with more infrastructure,” reads the statement.

Due to the increasing threat of the COVID-19 pandemic and the growing number of quarantines and lockdowns happening around the world, there was no other way forward at this moment in time. 

“We have every intention of commencing the 2020 Championship Tour season, and all our tours, as soon as possible. We are already hard at work doing scenario planning for what a reimagined 2020 tour might look like,” said WSL CEO Erik Logan in an accompanying video.

Logan also sent out a personal message to the CT surfers discussing next steps. He sites the rulebook in which all surfers will receive last-place prize money for all canceled events. 

“I’m certain one of a number of questions you may have is the overall status of the 2020 Championship Tour and if we are going to crown World Champions. The honest answer is that we are going to do everything in our power to make this happen. But first we had to make this decision and now we will begin the work of addressing those two questions,” writes Logan, who also indicates this may not be the end of the postponements. 

Obviously, news and events continue to unfold and this situation is ever-changing. Surfers in European countries such as France, Spain and Italy are all on lockdown, basically closing down the entire surf scene. In the U.S. places like the San Francisco Bay Area and New York are just now implementing strict restrictions. And it’s much the same in Australia.