After a highly succesful Mexican campaign where incredible waves were scored, surfing’s “dream tour” will head to the Billabong Pro to be held in South Africa. Location Jeffreys Bay, Eastern Cape, South Africa: Jeffreys Bay lies on the southern South
After a highly succesful Mexican campaign where incredible waves were scored, surfing’s “dream tour” will head to the Billabong Pro to be held in South Africa.
Location
Jeffreys Bay, Eastern Cape, South Africa: Jeffreys Bay lies on the southern South African coastline, around 45 miles west of Port Elizabeth and several hours’ drive east of Cape Town.
The archetypal surf town is regarded as the soul of South African surfing and is known world wide as ‘J-Bay.’ The bustling tourist destination has grown from a small fishing village and now surf shops, clothing factories and shaping bays occupy every other corner.
Status
The Billabong Pro marks the half way point on the 2006 Foster’s Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) Men’s World Tour – being the sixth of eleven events.
The Foster’s ASP Men’s World Tour crowns the annual men’s professional world surfing champion each year. The Billabong Pro is Africa’s most prestigious surfing tournament and Jeffreys Bay is universally acknowledged as one of the planet’s top 10 high performance waves.
Event Dates
A total of four full days of competition are required to finalize the event but the tournament has an 11-day waiting period to score the best possible surfing conditions from July 12 to 22.
Field
The Billabong Pro will feature the world’s top 45 full-time touring professional men surfers and three wildcards taking the field to a total of 48.
Prize-money
Total prize-money for the Billabong Pro is $280,000. The winner receives $30,000 and 1,200 ratings points.
Defending Billabong Pro champion Kelly Slater (Florida, USA) secured a dramatic victory over defending event and three-time world champion Andy Irons in 2005. Needing a near perfect 9.23 points, the Floridian was awarded 9.5 by the judges for his last ride, 30 seconds before the final siren sounded, to become the first three-time winner at Jeffreys Bay. He then went on to secure an unprecedented seventh world title.
Cheron Kraak
Regarded as the unofficial Mayoress of J-Bay, Cheron is the Billabong South Africa licensee and owner of Country Feeling. The only female senior surf industry owner/operator in the world, Cheron employs more than 200 people and runs the biggest business in town.
Respected and loved by surfers and the surf industry alike, Cheron was voted Eastern Cape Woman of Distinction and also received the ASP International Cultural Award in 2004 in recognition of the contribution the Billabong Pro J-Bay makes to the World Tour.
Cheron started the Surf Classic in the early 1980s and it has gone on to become the most prestigious and longest running event on the South African coastline, with 2006 seeing the 22nd edition and the winner’s names representing a Who’s Who of international and South African surfing.
South African Competitors
South Africa boasts three top tour-ranked competitors in this year’s line-up for the first time since the two-tiered ASP world tour format was adopted in 1992. Seasoned campaigner Greg Emslie, who finished a career-high third in last year’s Billabong Pro, and rising star Travis Logie are joined by rookie campaigner David Weare.
Von Zipper
Wildcard Trials
Three prestigious Billabong Pro main event wildcards are on offer via the Von Zipper Trials. An international field of 12 trialists will compete in three four-man heats with the winner of each heat earning a main event wildcard where he will come up against one of the top seeds in the first round.
The field comprises six Von Zipper nominated South Africans and six internationals with the locals including giant-killer Sean Holmes, St Francis Bay brothers Ryan and Shaun Payne, former ISA world junior champions Warwick ‘Wok’ Wright.
