Noosa Festival of Surfing 2012

Dog surfing comes to the Noosa Festival of Surfing in March, thanks to sponsors VetShopAustralia.com.au, and Chris De Aboitiz’s Natural Balance dog training program. With Council permission, we’ll be running an exhibition event prior to the opening ceremony, Sunday, March 11 at 4.30pm.

This will be dog surfing like you’ve never seen it before! Former world tandem surfing champion Chris De Aboitiz has been surfing with his dog Lani propped up on the nose of his board for years, in the tradition Chris first learnt as a Waikiki beach boy, at the beach where dog surfing started back in the 1920s. Since establishing Natural Balance dog training programs, he’s also taught many other dogs to enjoy the waves.

Since the early beach boys started taking their dogs out in the surf with them at Waikiki more than 90 years ago, the sport has made stars out of some of them. California surfer Jim Bailey and his dog Rusty were featured in a full page photo in National Geographic back in 1944, but the most famous of all surfer dogs was Scooter Boy Kaopuiki’s Sandy, a Honolulu mongrel that Scooter Boy rescued from a life of scurrying from bin to bin in a lane behind restaurant row in Chinatown. Moving upscale to Waikiki, Sandy surfed all day and lived on scraps from the best beachfront restaurants. Scooter and Sandy appeared on early reality show, “You Asked For It” in the 1950s, and were later featured in the early surf films of Bud Browne.

According to surf historian Matt Warshaw: “When Sandy died in 1958, the Waikiki beach boys bore his ashes to sea in a flotilla of canoes.”

There are now dog surfing contests annually in California at Huntington Beach and Coronado in San Diego, where owners get very serious about hanging paws. The VetShopAustralia.com.au Dog Surf Spectacular will be an exhibition only, and strictly for fun, but Vetshop is promising pet supply prizes for all competitors and something special for “best in surf”. Chris De Aboitiz will be conducting a couple of dog surfing clinics in Noosa in the coming weeks, so if you can ride a board and have a dog who’s game, let us know at info@noosafestivalofsurfing.com

Three pro specialty events will offer a total of $7000 at the Noosa Festival of Surfing, presented by Global Surf Industries, March 11-17. Festival director Phil Jarratt said that while the emphasis at the 2012 festival was on fun for all competitors, with free beach entertainment every day, the money events would be hotly contested by an international field.

Money events are:

• Laguna Bay Longboards Logger Pro ($2500)
• Golden Breed Noserider Pro ($2500)
• Seaglass Project Finless Pro ($2000)

“The specialty divisions are filling up fast, with world champion Taylor Jensen leading a top class international field,” Jarratt said. “The pro divisions will have a different look this year, with the focus on particular skills, and that’s going to really open up the field. In the Laguna Bay Logger, for example, we’ve got the best all-round longboarders going head to head with the traditional specialists. Some of these guys are maybe not so well-known, but they have mastered the art of traditional longboarding and it’s beautiful to watch. It will be interesting to see how the pros like Taylor and Josh Constable will adapt to that challenge.”

The festival’s entertainment schedule is also filling fast, with three surf movie premieres on the beach screen, plus live music every night on the Zinc Stage from sunset at the PJ Burns Festival Village on the beach at First Point. Legendary surf guitarists Tim Gaze and Peter Howe will head up a house band playing every night, with special appearances from Band of Frequencies, Asa Broomhall Band, Frank Benn, Carl Wochner, and Mayor Bob Abbot’s killer blues band rocking the house on opening night. The Village will also host book launches, shaper’s forums, a Captain Goodvibes live appearance, Summer & Salt fashion parades and zumba classes. All beach entertainment is free and all ages, with the festival beach bar open daily from 4pm.

Greetings from a surfless Noosa! We’re getting rid of all the flat days now so that it will be pumping the whole week of the festival, trust me! As I’m sure you’re all aware, it hasn’t been the easiest of years to put together a festival that relies so much on the generosity of the surf industry and the regional business community, both of which have been hit hard. But, we’re stoked at the faith so many people have shown in us, particularly our major sponsors Global Surf Industries and Tourism Noosa, and I’m now very confident that the 2012 Noosa Festival is going to be one of the very best.

Stuff you need to know

We’re just about to unleash the whole day-by-day program of events, both surf and social, but until then here are a few things you need to remember.

• Festival runs Sunday 11 March to Saturday 17 March, so if you’re taking a week off work and coming from afar, you’ve got a travel day either end.
• Competitor registration will be open in the Beach Bar at First Point on Saturday, 10 March from 4-8pm, and at the festival office on the beach site every day after that. Please register early to pick up your goody bag, and if you haven’t already, fill in the survey form to multiply your chances of winning a Hawaiian Airlines trip to Hawaii for two which will be drawn at the presentations on Saturday 17 March. Other great prizes will be drawn each afternoon in the Beach Bar at 5pm, or when surfing finishes for the day.
• Our Festival Beach Bar and Stage at the PJ Burns Festival Village will be the hub of activity throughout the week, with free music, movies, fashion parades and chat shows every evening. We will be offering the best and cheapest food and drink prices in town, so please support the Festival by planning to hang around over the sunset hours while enjoying great family entertainment right on the sand at First Point.
• Just another reminder: the entertainment program every arvo is absolutely 100% free and family-friendly. In order for this festival to survive, we really need you to support it by having a beer or a wine in our bar and eating at one of the dining options we’ll have for you right there on the beach. Of course, you’re going to want to have that special night out, and may we suggest booking dinner at Humid in Noosaville (see our website for details), where Mary and Michelle will present the best tucker Noosa has to offer.
• No LQS events this year. We’re sorry that we do not have sponsorship for a men’s and women’s LQS event in 2012, but we do have a great program of specialty money events. We will continue to support pro longboarding in Australia however we can, but the reality is that the interest level is highest in the emerging specialty events. The Golden Breed Noserider, Laguna Bay Longboards Logger and the Seaglass Project Finless will all offer prize purses worth getting in on (details on website soon).
• Open entries all divisions this year. This means that you can compete in both money events and amateur age divisions as you desire. All specialty events are also open to women and we’d love to see our best girls in there.
• SUPS are amateur events this year, but we’re working on some nifty prizes for the 5K race.
• Teams events open soon. We’re stoked to welcome back Classic Malibu Surfboards as sponsor of the Clubs Tag Team Challenge, which will kick off with first round on opening day, Sunday, 11 March, and progress through the week. Please note that this year it will be an open teams event, meaning that any four members of a club can constitute a team. Put up your best four surfers, or let the juniors and girls have a go too. (How sexist is that!) Limited entries available for this, so get your club entry together now. All clubs must be affiliated with Surfing Australia or state body.
• To keep up to date on all festival plans visit the festival website at www.noosafestivalofsurfing.com, or follow us on Facebook and receive up to the minute info. Facebook link – www.facebook.com/#!/GSINFOS .
• Finally, from festival manager Sam Smith, contest director Al Atkins and myself, a very sincere thank you to all our competitors for supporting the Noosa Festival, whether it’s your first or 21st time! 2012 is going to be a cracker year, spread the word.

Sunshine Coast Airport has thrown its support behind the increasingly popular stand up paddle division at the Noosa Festival of Surfing, sponsoring the 5K ocean paddle race and amateur open men’s and women’s SUP surf events.

Festival director Phil Jarratt said he was delighted to welcome back the airport as a bronze sponsor. “ CEO Peter Pallott heads up a team of very keen surfers at the Sunshine Coast Airport, but in recognition of the impact that stand up paddling is having on tourism in our waterways, they decided for 2012 to direct their support to that division, starting with the popular ‘battle of the paddle’ style race, to be held just before the festival opening ceremony on Sunday, March 11.”

The SUP surfing events will follow in the early part of the week, with most of Australia’s leading SUP-surfers competing.

All SUP divisions are now open for entry.

Laguna Bay Longboards will present Noosa’s first ever “logger pro” as a new addition to the specialty division. The logger concept, popularized by Joel Tudor’s Van’s Duct Tape series in the US and Europe over the past two years, puts the judging emphasis firmly back on the traditional aspects of longboarding.

Laguna Bay’s Tully St John said there was a growing movement towards logging in Australia. “With so many surfers riding all kinds of boards in all kinds of conditions these days, traditional longboarding has really come to the fore,” he said. “We want to showcase the incredibly high standard of logging in this country by inviting the top loggers to surf against the best of the rest who make it through elimination trials.”

Unlike the Old Mal amateur division, competitors in the Logger Pro can ride new or old boards, but they must be at least 5.5kg in weight, single fin and ridden without a leg-rope. Judging would be based on style and execution of traditional manoeuvres.

SEAGLASS PROJECT FINLESS PRO BACK FOR SECOND YEAR

The Seaglass Tuna, the traditional alaia and all manner of finless surfboards will be in action at the festival with the return of the Seaglass as a competitive event. After two years as a demonstration event, the finless got serious in 2011, producing some sensational free-flowing finless surfing.

According to Seaglass Tuna creator Tom Wegener, the fin-free fraternity will be out in force in 2012, hoping for some inside out First Point barrels.

GOLDEN BREED NOSERIDER RETURNS

The world’s most exciting nose-riding event returns under its original sponsor, Golden Breed, in 2012. We’re stoked to have the GB team back with the event that they helped us create way back in 2000. Since then we’ve seen some unbelievable tip-time performances at First Point from locals and internationals alike. Footage from the GB Noserider has been seen all over the world, with toes, heels and leg-shaking antics by the likes of Christian Wach, Jai Lee, Harrison Roach and CJ Nelson setting the benchmark for nosework.

The Golden Breed Noserider is filling fast, so get your entry in. Prize money details and event format coming soon.