The Fiji Surfing Association is looking at making the Powerade Junior Pro bigger and better next year after last weekend’s success.

Fiji Surfing head coach Ian Portingale told SUNsports yesterday that he was pleased with the three-day competition which attracted over 100 surfers both locally and abroad.

“We will be having talks with Coca-Cola next week to see if we can set a date for the competition next year,” Portingale said.

“The whole idea is to obviously try and make it even bigger and better next year because it is good for our development as well.

“The participants were impressed with the organisation of the event and they were happy and want to come back next year if the competition goes through.”

With the Junior Pro being the first of its kind in the country, Portingale says, it has been a boost for local surfers to take the sport seriously and have the urge to compete overseas.

“Probably one of the things that our surfers have taken away from the competition is that they now aspire to compete at an international level.

“Now that our surfers have had a taste of what it is like to compete in tough competition with overseas surfer, they know the standard they need to be at in order to do so.

“It was good to see the camaraderie between local surfers and the ones from abroad.

“They would talk to our surfers and tell them what kind of intense training they would undergo and that gave an insight for our surfers on what they need to do. So the event not only gave our surfers some good competition but it has motivated them to work harder.”

The next surfing event is in October, which is the Rip Curl Micro Grommet Series. This will be for the Under-10, U12 and U14 surfers.

Edited by Leone Cabenatabua

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