Feb 16, 2021
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Today, the World Surf League (WSL) confirmed the updated schedule for the Championship Tour (CT) Australian leg, announcing the three upcoming events in North Narrabeen (NSW), Margaret River (WA), and Rottnest Island (WA). The WSL also announced the cancellation of the 2021 Corona Open Gold Coast pres. by Billabong and the Rip Curl Pro Bells Beach.
Australian Leg of 2021 WSL Championship Tour : All tour stops and dates subject to change due to applicable COVID-19 related restrictions, including global travel restric
tions.
Rip Curl Narrabeen Classic pres. by Corona: April 16 – 26
Boost Mobile Margaret River Pro pres. by Corona: May 2-12
Erik Logan gives us the rundown. Photo: Erik Logan
What a wild year it’s been. Everyone on Earth has been impacted, not the least of which professional sports leagues. The World Surf League has certainly felt the full brunt of the pandemic. When Erik Logan took over a year ago, the WSL was on a high – Italo Ferreira had just won a world title at Pipe on the last heat of the year. Carissa Moore had won her fourth crown. Things were definitely looking up. Then 2020 happened. A pandemic never before seen gripped the Earth. The World Surf League cancelled the entirety of its season.
Witches Rock, Costa Rica: Seductive as Ever
Nic Von Rupp chaperones groms on a Costa Rican boat trip
Surfline
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Witches Rock is not a destination that immediately comes to mind when talking about Portuguese big-wave pro Nic Von Rupp. But a boat trip is still a boat trip, the tropics are still the tropics, and an empty dreamscape of barreling A-frames will still seduce even the craziest surfers. “Portugal is facing an extreme lockdown with several restrictions for circulation and also surfing,” Nic explains. “Before things got any worse, I booked my flight to Costa Rica, where some pretty good swell appeared. I’ve had this dream of surfing the iconic wave of Witches Rock and, with some advice from Pat O’Connell, it was finally possible three straight days of epic surf, which I shared with Hurley’s young European teamriders, Sam Piter and Dean Vandewalle.”
Staff
Way back in 1994, Endless Summer 2 came out. It was, as you’re aware, the sequel to Bruce Brown’s iconic 1966 film in which Robert August and Mike Hynson traveled the globe looking for waves. In ES2, Robert “Wingnut” Weaver and Pat O’Connell took on the roles of surf-searchers, and in that film, a little place called Tamarindo was exposed to the wider world.
While Tamarindo and those nearby surf spots like Witch’s Rock and Ollie’s Point weren’t secrets, per se, they weren’t exactly household names, but Robert August had a role in ES2 that basically kickstarted the area’s surf tourism industry. In his segment, the 48-year-old August cruises down the line at Witch’s Rock, and when the film was released… well, the cat was well and truly out of the bag. And while there’s a small chunk of the Costa Rica section in Nic Von Rupp’s latest installment of Von Froth above, here’s that little piece of filmmaking perfection in its entirety:
Dive Brief:
This is the first roadmap the utility filed since announcing a clean energy goal and an accelerated exit from coal generation, which PNM director of integrated resource planning Nick Phillips said is set to take place by 2024. The IRP lays out several potential paths to full decarbonization by 2040 as PNM retires its gas generators over the course of the late 2020s and the 2030s.
However, environmental groups say the plan does not actually achieve true decarbonization, with the Sierra Club criticizing PNM s decision to sell its interests in the Four Corners coal plant. The sale, according to senior attorney Matthew Gerhart, may serve to prolong the plant s operations.