More than 100 SUP surfers to shred waves at Wrightsville Beach this weekend

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — A major SUP surf competition originally scheduled in April will be held this weekend at Wrightsville Beach.

The Carolina Pro Am SUP Surf Competition will be held Oct. 31 – Nov. 1 on the south end of the beach.

The pandemic has forced some big changes for this year’s event but after tweaking some procedures, organizers say they’re good to go.

WWAY’s Good Morning Carolina co-anchor Donna Gregory talked with co-organizer Haywood Newkirk about what people can expect from this year’s competition:

DG:  Thanks for joining us, Haywood! What are some of the changes to this weekend’s event due to the pandemic?

HN:  We had to move the event from April until October because of Covid shutdown mandates. These mandates didn’t just take place within North Carolina, many of them took place around the world and in locations where we would normally get a lot of our professional competitors from such as France, Brazil, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Hawaii and California. The pandemic shut down the entire APP World Tour this year, which is paddle boarding’s pro tour. Last year was our first year as an APP Event. But this year we had to scale back and are making it an amateur only event. So, Covid had a tremendous impact, but we adjusted and are really focusing on our amateur competitors this year. We will also be implementing covid guidelines at our event, such as social distance between competitors, organizers and spectators; we will have temperature checks for everyone involved throughout the weekend; we will sanitize jerseys; and our check in, awards and competition will all be held outside.

DG:  How many competitors are you expecting this year?

HN:  We are expecting 40-50 competitors this year, but most of them will enter 2-3 categories. So, by the end of the weekend we will have 100-150 entries across multiple categories, such as longboard, men’s open, women’s open, juniors, etc.

DG:  Where do people register to enter?

HN:  Competitors can register Friday at South End Surf Shop in person from 5-7 PM. Prior to that they can go online here.

DG: What are the specific dates and times?

HN:  It’s Saturday and Sunday at Wrightsville Beach, South of Crystal Pier. Saturday, 10/31 from 8am-6pm and Sunday, 11/1 from 8am-4pm. Awards are all outdoors and start at 5:30pm Sunday. Our awards ceremony will be outside next to South End Surf Shop late Sunday Afternoon. We will be following all WPA Guidelines which we will go over prior to our start Saturday Morning. We will award top finishers in the men’s open, women’s open, longboard, juniors and first comp competitors. Each of these categories will be broken down into separate age groups depending on the number of entries.

DG: What will spectators see on Saturday?

HN: At this point the swell forecast shows a larger swell and a little more wind on Saturday, so we will be sending out our more experienced competitors for the preliminary rounds starting around 9 AM or so. These would be the longboard, men’s open and women’s open categories. We will go on Saturday as long as possible, based on conditions.

DG: What about Sunday?

HN:  On Sunday, the swell forecast looks a little more manageable for our less experienced competitors so we will start with our First Comp Heats and our Juniors. We want everyone to have a great experience, so we will not be sending our rookies and juniors out into “Victory At Sea” conditions. Then the experienced competitors that made it through the preliminary rounds on Saturday will surf in the final heats later on Sunday.

DG: What’s new this year that we haven’t seen in prior competitions?

HN: The “first comp” for all first-time contest competitors.  This year we have two new events that we are introducing. Last year we had the first SUP Squatch contest ever held. Well this year we have self designated our event as the “SUP Squatch World Championships!” No one else is doing it, so why not us, right?!

DG: What do competitions like these do to attract more people to try standup paddling?

HN: We are really psyched about the First Comp Heats. A lot of people tend to get nervous in these surf competitions, especially their first time. So, we are offering our less experienced competitors the chance to compete on a more level, laid back playing field against less experienced riders. This is the perfect opportunity for SUP Surfers to “get their feet wet” in a competitive, but fun, setting.

Click here for more information on the competition or to register.