O'Neill Cold Water Classic Events Expand to More Places

O'Neill Upgrades 2009 ASP WQS with Global O'Neill Cold Water Classics

SANTA CRUZ, California, (August 29, 2008) - Building on the iconic event in Santa Cruz and the much-lauded Highland Open in Scotland, O’Neill has added ASP WQS events in Tasmania, South Africa and Canada to make the O’Neill Cold Water Classic series a huge and much welcomed addition to the world of professional surfing.

"We wanted to provide a unique and challenging experience for the world’s best surfers," Bernhard Ritzer, O’Neill Global Event Manager, said. "The Cold Water Classic series is the perfect extension of our existing events - it remains true to our spirit and innovation and adventure, pushing the boundaries and exploring the limits. The CWC series events will take us to incredible and unique locations around the world, where we will let the cold know that we’re not afraid."

Kicking off in March 2009, the series will first travel to Tasmania for the most Southern event within professional surfing. The island state, 240 kilometers off of mainland Australia, boasts big, powerful surf and a variety of world-class reef and beachbreaks in a rugged and challenging environment, with an average water temperature of 13 degrees Celsius in March.

"Tasmania is pretty much as wild as it gets," Jarrad Howse, former ASP World Tour campaigner and current ASP WQS battler, said. "It offers the more adventurous a surfing experience like no other in Australia. I love the reefs in Tassie - usually really hollow and magnets for any swell. It’s a cold, rugged and beautiful place that deserves an event."

In May, the CWC series will head to Scotland for the popular Highland Open event, providing world-class reef breaks in the wilderness of the Scottish Highlands at Thurso East and Brims Ness.
Cape Town will host the third event on the CWC series in June. With powerful swells sweeping into the peninsula, the event will no doubt take full advantage of the mobile format of each of the events on the series in order to find the optimum waves available.

The coldest surf contest on the planet follows as the CWC series heads up to Nova Scotia in Canada in October. This will be the first professional ASP event ever held in Canada. Known more for its snow than its surf. Canada’s wild and rugged shoreline actually offers a huge variety of pointbreaks, reefs and beachbreaks that can work on a wide combination of winds and swells. Fog, snow, freezing temperatures and ice-cold water add to the extremity of this event.

The Cold Water Classic series will end up at the iconic Cold Water Classic event in Santa Cruz in November - Northern California’s premier ASP event since 1987. Now upgraded to an ASP WQS 6-Star event, the Nor Cal contest will be where the 2009 CWC Champion is crowned.

Brodie Carr, ASP International CEO, believes the introduction to the Cold Water Classic series will have a significant and positive impact on the ASP World Qualifying Series (WQS): "The O’Neill Cold Water Classic series represents an exciting and unique addition to the ASP International Calendar. The established events of Scotland and Santa Cruz are already hugely popular with the surfers and the addition of the high-rated events in Canada, Tasmania and South Africa really broadens and supports not only this series, but the ASP WQS as a whole."

The CWC series will be officially launched during the Cold Water Classic event, running from October 21-26, 2008 in Santa Cruz, California.