Surfers on the ASP World tour aren’t allowed to compete in any event that the ASP doesn’t sanction. If they neglect the papers and choose to compete in such an event regardless, the board of directors could kick the surfer off tour and take back that year’s prize money. Strict, huh. To a surfer, it sounds a lot like playing with fire.

Which is exactly what the X-Games is all about. Fire, explosions, Mountain Dew, bad tattoos — these are the lifeblood of the Extreme Games. In the early 2000s, surfing had a brief and nervous romance with the X-Games. A gaudy team format combined with Huntington Beach dribble to create a relationship that was of little worth to anyone. There was attempt to salvage by relocating the event to Puerto Escondido, but the damage was beyond repair. And after a few short years, the X-Games ditched us stone cold in the sand. To their credit, they did leave
us with a few cases of Monster energy drink and a pretty cool lanyard.

But they came crawling back. And this time around, they’ve changed. There will be no teams or Huntington Beach. There won’t even be bullhorns and singlets. Instead, there will be video cameras and Final Cut Pro. In an event called Real Surf, a sweet sixteen surfers were invited to compete by producing 90-second video clips. The segments were put on the web, matched into man-on-man heats and voted on by fans of democracy and slob grabs.

Earlier this year, Surfing America and ESA announced they had rejoined forces, after functioning as separate entities for the past several years. The decision hinged on several key factors within the organization and came over a period of time as new executive leadership took the helm at both Surfing America and ESA, explains Surfing America President Greg Cruse.

“I think ESA thought that Surfing America was overreaching on our attempts to get all the member organizations to standardize on divisions, judging criteria and online registration,” says Cruse. “There was also some hesitation in having all ESA members pay Surfing America membership. Also, some viewed the Surfing America Prime series going East as an incursion.”

Despite issues that had stacked up between the two associations over the years, Surfing America and ESA have started on new terms to work together in building upon the USA Surf Team and fostering the talented amateur athletes as they move up the ranks and continue to push the limits of surfing,

TransWorld Business talked with Cruse to find out the details behind the reunion, what it means for the future of amateur surfing, his stance on surfing in the Olympics, and how the groups hope to work together to strengthen the future of the sport.

Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) International announced today the appointment of Michael Lynch as its Chief Marketing and Revenue Officer. Lynch joins ASP shortly after the organization announced Paul Speaker in the role of ASP Chief Executive Officer. Together they will work to build surfing’s new global sports league.

In his new role, Lynch will be responsible for helping the organization optimize its growth potential worldwide and specifically manage all ASP marketing, communications and sponsorship activities for professional surfing’s governing body. As 2013 is a transitional year, Lynch and other ASP executives will use this season to focus on data-gathering, analysis and preparation as they build toward the 2014 ASP World Championship Tour (WCT) launch.