Bodyboarding contest Surf contest organizers and the city have reached an agreement to allow the men's World Bodyboard Championship at Pipeline to be held between Jan. 30 and Feb. 7.
gets second wind
The women’s portion of the meet
may miss the prime surf periodBy Craig Gima
cgima@starbulletin.comBut it appears the women's bodyboarding championship will not be held in what's considered the prime surf period, and organizer Carol Phillips said she was still waiting to see if the contest can be held in March.
"We're not happy about moving to March this year," Phillips said.
She said it's unfair that the only all-women's event at Pipeline has been pushed back.
Organizers said both competitions, considered to be the most prestigious contests in both men's and women's professional bodyboarding, were in jeopardy of being canceled because the city had not issued permits for the events.
The men's event has been held at Pipeline for the last 20 years, while World Championship of Women's Bodyboarding is the oldest organized women's wave-riding event.
Both men and women bodyboarders protested in front of Honolulu Hale on Tuesday because while their events didn't get permits, three stand-up surfing contests were.
Men's bodyboarding championship organizer Robert Thomas said he met with the city and other surf contest promoters yesterday and worked out an agreement to hold the bodyboarding championship during the same time period as the Pipeline Bodysurfing Classic.
Thomas said the bodysurfing event needs only one day of competition and the bodyboarding championship can have the other two days allowed under the permit. He said he is still trying to get another day or half-day of competition to allow more bodyboarders to compete and to hold a qualifying round for professional bodyboarding's World Super Tour.
The bodyboarding contests appear to be caught up in a larger problem of too many surf contests and too little public access to Pipeline, which many consider the ultimate wave-riding spot.
A group called the Let's Surf Coalition has threatened to sue the city if it doesn't stop issuing exemptions to its guidelines in issuing permits. The group says recreational surfers are suffering because surf contests take up too many of the best surfing days.
Both Thomas and Phillips say the problem is made worse because the city was late in putting out a schedule for surfing contests, making it difficult to plan and line up sponsorships.
Phillips believes women's ocean sports are ready to boom after the success of the movie "Blue Crush," but she complained that when potential sponsors, tourists and media call about her event, she can't tell them when it will be held.
"It's disruptive to promoting women's sports," she said.
In response to the protest, Mayor Jeremy Harris issued a news release saying he was transferring responsibility for scheduling ocean events from the Department of Parks and Recreation to the Office of Economic Development and that the administration is drafting new rules and regulations for future competitions.
"Our goal is to immediately start to work on next year's schedule with promoters of all water sports events so that the city can support and promote competitive surfing, bodyboarding and bodysurfing events to expand sports tourism in Hawaii," Harris said in the release.
Department of Parks and Recreation
Office of Economic Development
City & County of Honolulu
