The Free Surf vs Contest Debate

What the tension between free surfing and competitive surfing reveals about the surf culture

The Debate

The free surf versus contest debate -- the ongoing tension within the surfing community between the surfing that is practised for its own enjoyment and the surfing that is evaluated by competitive judges whose scoring criteria determine the competitive hierarchy -- is the accountability journalism of what surfing is for and what the competitive dimension contributes to or detracts from the culture.

The Two Positions

The two positions: the contest surfer argues that the competitive context produces the specific performance pressure that advances the level of the sport and provides the economic infrastructure that supports the professional development of the best surfers. The free surf advocate argues that the competitive context produces the specific narrowing of surfing expression that the judging criteria impose and that the surfing that is most interesting is often the surfing that the judging criteria least reward.

Surf LA Coverage

Surfing LA covers the free surf versus contest debate because the accountability journalism of the surf culture requires examining the tension between the competitive and the expressive dimensions that the culture has always contained.

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