The 2006 WCT season kicks off in Australia next week. Kelly Slater's bid for an 8th World Title starts then. In interviews, he has stated that he will look at his results from the first contest to decide if he continues to complete the tour. Number 7 is a magical number for World Championships. Historical names such as Dale Earnhardt, Richard Petty, Michael Schumacher, and Lance Armstrong all have that number 7 associated with them. Kelly Slater is now etched in the history books and hopefully passes that number and captures number 8!

Lance Armstrong retired after winning his 7th Tour de France and there was speculation that Slater may follow suit. However, he is in the line up for the Gold Coast contest that starts next Tuesday.

Will Slater Drink from the Cup of number 8?

There are also ten newcomers for the ASP WCT. I pulled this from the ASP site:

“The 10 new faces include, Adriana de Souza (BRA), Bobby Martinez (USA), Adrian Buchan (AUS), Shaun Cansdell (AUS), Pedro Henrique (BRA), Roy Powers (HAW), Pancho Sullivan (HAW), David Weare (ZAF), Mikael Picon (FRA) and Jarrad Howse (AUS).”

Contest will be broadcast live on the internet. You can find the link from the ASP main page:
ASP World Tour Main Index

Olympics

The Torino 2006 Olympics is coming to an end with closing ceremonies being held on Sunday.

The Snowboarders turned out to be the most entertaining of the Olympic games. I personally feel that snowboarding has saved the Olympics and has brought back an element of exuberance in sports. In many of the other sports the athletes seem uptight and are very rigid. Whereas, the snowboarders were laid-back, humorous, and charming.

Who can’t pull for the Flying Tomato, aka Shaun White, or the agony of self-defeat for Lindsey Jacobellis when she grandstanded and lost the gold.

...but, she won the silver!

Snowboarding is very similar to surfing and the players have a surfer-like attitude. They go out and have fun and let the chips fall where they may. Snowboarders have defined, at least for me, the true epitome of what a sport should be. Sport is for fun, not for kill-the-competition blood sport. Surfing is very similar in this regard.

Snowboarding is surfing...on frozen water!

Overall I think NBC did an adequate job on covering the Olympics. I just hope I can make the next Olympics in 2010 in Vancouver. The 2002 Utah Olympics was very fun to attend and watching the Torino games has me pumped up to start planning for a Canadian trip. See ya’ll there!

We Are Water Happenings

A couple of new articles have been published onWeAreH2O.Com. An artificial reef in Cocoa Beach study and B.K.William with a humorous look on surfing Murphy's Laws.

Artificial Surfing Reef for Cocoa Beach

How Cliche' by BKWilliam

Look for more articles next week and thanks for checking out We Are Water...WeAreH2O.Com.

Gone Surfing...

Dave Reid

Sales@WeAreH2O.Com