Over the weekend, something happened that’s never happened before. The very first stadium-style surfing event went down at Surf Snowdonia, and Albee Layer won it in convincing fashion.
Over 2,000 people showed up on September 19th in North Wales as the final eight faced off for the Red Bull Unleashed event.
The event put spectators in front row seats, something that hasn’t exactly been done in a surfing contest before. The format of the contest was different, too: the man-on-man events saw two surfers in the water, going wave for wave in a best out of five format.
Holding a surfing event in man-made waves might not really be considered surfing, exactly. Sure, technically it is, but real surfing needs the ocean’s moods. It needs those shitty days. It needs the wrong tides, it needs onshore slop, and it needs long, lully sessions. But man-made waves take away many of the issues in competitive surfing today–scoring things like speed, power, and flow are nearly impossible to do without some kind of measuring device, and as it stands right now, it’s basically a judgment called disguised as fact with numbers. The ocean is constantly changing; judging fairly from heat to heat with something as moody as Mother Nature is impossible. But at Surf Snowdonia, every wave can be created equal.
Of course, it will never be as exciting as actually surfing. It will never measure up to that Code Red swell. It will never measure up to watching third reef Pipe feathering lightly, then feeling the impact thunder through the sand. But it will be fair. And for a sport to turn into what the World Surf League wants it to turn into, judging needs to be accurate, it needs to be more obvious to the layperson exactly what maneuvers are happening and exactly how many points they’re worth. Which is boring. But at least it will be fair. Might this be the future of competitive surfing?
Red Bull Unleashed 2015 UK – Snowdonia – Action Clip from world of freesports on Vimeo.
