Windsurfing Wave World Contest Scene Unifies
If you know us, you know we still love Windsurfing. For years following the Windsurfing Wave contest scene required splintered into a series of disparate and disconnected events. That is til now. (photo by John Carter/PWA)
First a little history. Back in the day before kiteboarding, before Wings, and before Foiling, Windsurfing was the fastest-growing sport on the planet. As all these new ways to play on the water came to market they all chewed away at the windsurfing's user base. As that user base shrank it became very hard for contest organizers to run profitable events and the contest scene continued to disorganize.
The sports governing body, the Professional Windsurfers Association (PWA) did an admirable job trying to keep events running, but over time continued to cancel only the biggest of the world's events. As time went on the United States found itself with no organized events. Enter the International Windsurfing Tour and its passionate organizer Samantha 'Sam" Bittner. Over a decade ago The IWT organized to start a new grassroots calendar of events here in the US. Through years of hard work, the blood, sweat, and tears kind, the IWT found a solid footing and then came a surprising turn of events. The tour started to grow. Sponsors came back and momentum was picking up and it seemed like Windsurf Wave Sailing had found its savior. (photo IWT)
And a savior indeed was found in Sam's passion for running fun well organized contests and the success did not go unnoticed. Just last week the PWA and IWT found that a unified approach was once again possible so we are stoked to announce that Professional Windsurf Wave Sailing is back and back to stay. The unification of the two bodies will result in one strong center that should serve as a platform to send windsurfing in the next millennium.
We will certainly keep you update as news and events are sure to be coming soon. With that said we could not be more excited to see what the future holds. With that said we all owe a big thanks to Sam Bitner. Her passions and puritanical work ethic sustained over such a long time have made this day possible. Thanks to Sam and everyone on the IWT Team now let's bring an event to San Francisco in 2024!
