The Assessment Part I: Conditions of Access for ASP Top 34 Newcomers
John John Florence (HAW), 19, and Gabriel Medina (BRA), 17, are both newcomers to the elite ASP Top 34 following Septembers midyear rotation and have already made a major impact on the world's elite.
COOLANGATTA, Queensland/Australia (Wednesday, October 19, 2011) – The past 24 months have bore witness to a radical transition within the ASP. Spawned in the ASP Board Meetings of October 2009, these transitions dealt specifically with the system for determining the world’s best surfers who would ultimately decide the undisputed ASP World Champion. In August of 2010, we reduced the number of elite-level surfers from 45 down to 34 and introduced the current 36-man event format. In December of 2010, we used a bridge qualifying criteria which took a select number of surfers directly off the ASP World Title rankings and another select number of surfers directly off the ASP World Rankings.
Commencing in 2011, this transition took full flight with the launching of the ASP World Rankings and the rolling 52-week determination of an individual surfer’s ranking. In August of this year, the ASP completed its first official rotation of the ASP Top 34 with newcomers Gabriel Medina (BRA), 17, Miguel Pupo (BRA), 19, John John Florence (HAW), 19, and Travis Logie (ZAF), 32, becoming full-fledged members of the ASP Top 34 beginning with the Hurley Pro at Trestles. The ASP Technical Committee, comprised of surfers, events and ASP administrators, has been monitoring the situation closely and will continue to do so. Renato Hickel, ASP World Tour Manager and multi-decade veteran of the ASP, was kind enough to offer his perspective on a number of questions that will be providing in segments and here’s the first. This…is his story…
Conditions for the newcomers to break into the Elite Top 34:It was never easy before and it certainly isn’t now – the system has never been designed for “easy access” to the elite level of competition. After all, we all want to have the best Top 34 surfers in the world at every Rotation competing at the elite level of competition.
For those who doubted the system, we have had an answer in the campaign of Gabriel Medina, a competitor that qualified into the Top 34 as seed #16. Medina beat (utilizing only opportunities in Prime and Star events) 17 of the Top 34 surfers – his best results: a First and Second-place in ASP Prime events and two ASP 6-Star wins. If Gabriel Medina did it, it is because it is attainable. Medina would subsequently prove the validity of his spot on tour by tearing through the field in only his second event as an elite ASP Top 34 member to claim the Quiksilver Pro France…but more on that later.
With less brilliant but nonetheless effective campaigns, we had Pupo and Nicol as well as Logie making their entrance into the Top 34 as well. The other side of this equation – to prove the system is working, is the case of Cory Lopez. Cory not only competed in all major Primes, but also had a start in all six ASP World Title events prior to the midyear Rotation. Unfortunately for Cory, he didn’t have a good first half of the season, placing 25ths and 13ths in all six WT events. He didn’t qualify within the Top 32, exactly the way we expected the point structure to work: If a Top 34 surfer is only having 25th and 13th results, he shouldn’t cut it come the next Rotation.
There has been criticism of adding surfers on tour midyear who cannot win the ASP World Title. This is not the point. The surfers the newcomers are replacing were not contesting for an ASP World Title either (hence they unable to remain on tour). The idea behind the midyear rotation is to have the best surfers in the world updated faster than in previous years – every six months now instead of annually.
A lot was prophesized during the course of the transition year last season and during the start of the 2011 season by the “Critics at Hand”, saying that most likely all eventual newcomers would drop-off the Elite at the very first rotation. The result of this mid-year Rotation showed us exactly the opposite. Out of the five new guys that qualified via the ASP World Rankings last December, not one was expelled from the Top 34. ALL five made this first Rotation and will continue on the Elite for the second half of the year.
More to come in the coming days…
For a look at who’s sitting where, check out the
ASP WORLD RANKINGS
Source:
The Assessment Part I: Conditions of Access for ASP Top 34 Newcomers
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