BUTUAN CITY (MindaNews/23 April) – Forty professional women surfers from Indonesia, Taiwan, Malaysia and other parts of Asia and the world are expected to compete in the famous surf of Cloud 9 in Siargao Island for an Asian-wide competition on May 1-4.
The Asian Surfing Championship (ASC) circuit for women will be held in five countries – Indonesia, Taiwan, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines. Women surfers from all over Asia will converge at Cloud 9 surf break in General Luna for the Philippine leg as they vie for the P300,000 (close to US$7,000) total prize-money.
“This is a historical landmark in the progression of Philippine surfing as it is the first time that ASC included Philippines in a multi-country, multi-event professional surfing competition circuit,” said Zeny Pallugna, secretary-general of the Philippine Surfing Federation (PSF), said in a statement.
Pallugna pointed out this international event is a very good indication that Siargao’s tourism is flourishing.
“The ASC works with local, national and multinational event sponsors and organizers to maximize the results of the competitive surfing events towards accomplishing the goals of sharing the sport of surfing and bringing positive economic, social and environmental benefits to the people in these Asian countries,” said Pallugna.
According to the ASC, their ultimate goal is to grow the sport of surfing in Asia from the grassroots level by assisting each country in creating organized and sanctioned events that will develop the skills of their surfers in healthy competition as well as to draw attention to their area for the progression of surfing locally, nationally, and throughout the Asian region.
The Surigao del Norte provincial government revealed that as the events counterpart, Gov. Sol Matugas has released a P200,000 financial assistance to General Luna Mayor Jaime Rusillon to help fund the event.
Ivonnie Beltran Dumadag, of the Provincial Tourism Office, said in a phone interview that all the necessary things needed for the event are already in place.
“We are all ready for the coming event, the transportation and accommodation facilities are all in place. We are now just finalizing the side events like beach volleyball and the nightly live musical entertainment,” said Dumadag. (Erwin Mascariñas / MindaNews)