LOS ANGELES, Calif., USA (September 20, 2023) - Today, the World Surf League (WSL) announced the schedule for the 2024 Championship Tour (CT). The calendar will continue to showcase a combined women's and men's schedule featuring nine regular-season events, a Mid-season Cut after CT Stop No. 5, and the fourth-annual WSL Finals. 2024 will also see Fiji return to the schedule for the first time since 2017 as the final stop of the regular season. Next year, surfing will also make its second appearance in the Olympic Games at Paris 2024.
2024 WSL Championship Tour Schedule:
- Banzai Pipeline, Hawaii, USA: January 29 - February 10
- Sunset Beach, Hawaii, USA: February 12 - 23
- Peniche, Portugal: March 6 - 16
- Bells Beach, Victoria, Australia: March 26 - April 5
- Margaret River, Western Australia, Australia: April 11 - 21
Mid-season Cut: 36-man and 18-woman fields reduced to 24-man and 12-woman fields.
- Teahupo'o, Tahiti, French Polynesia: May 22 - 31
- Punta Roca, El Salvador: June 6 - 15
- Saquarema, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: June 22 - 30
2024 Paris Olympic Games: July 26 - August 11 (Surfing scheduled between July 27 - August 5)
Cloudbreak, Fiji: August 20 - 29
WSL Final 5 determined to battle for the men's and women's World Titles.
WSL Finals (Lower Trestles, San Clemente, Calif., USA): September 6 - 14
The 2024 CT will include nine regular-season events in seven countries, starting in January at Pipeline, Hawaii. The Mid-season Cut will come into action following Stop No. 5 in Margaret River, Australia. Surfers who make the Cut will compete in Tahiti, El Salvador, and Brazil before a break for the Olympic Games Paris 2024.
The final event of the regular season will see the world's best surfers return to the iconic Cloudbreak in Fiji and battle for a place in the WSL Final 5. Cloudbreak is a world-renowned reef pass located offshore the island of Tavarua in Fiji. It is one of the most awe-inspiring left-hand barrels and can hold waves anywhere from two-to-20 feet. Due to its fast and powerful nature, it is known as a highly advanced and heavy wave.
For 2024, the WSL Finals will return to Lower Trestles in San Clemente, California, where the men's and women's Top 5 surfers will face off for the World Titles in the one-day, winner-take-all format. The waiting period will run from September 6 to 14, 2024, which is the ideal time of year for favorable Southern Hemisphere swells at one of the most high-performance waves in the world.
Held earlier this month on September 9, the WSL Finals shattered the record for the most-watched day of professional surfing in WSL history. With 10.7 million video views on the single day, the WSL surpassed the 2022 viewership numbers by 29%. The competition was also distributed via the WSL's linear broadcast partners, whose audiences elevated the viewership even further. For example, viewership on Globo/SporTV, the WSL's broadcast partner in Brazil, totaled over one million viewers, an increase of 16% from 2022. In the lead-up to the competition, the WSL delivered 25 million video-on-demand views, marking a 58% increase from the previous year. Carrying the success of the 2023 CT finale, the WSL will continue this momentum into the 2024 season, where the world's best surfers will compete on the world's best waves.
With the Olympic Games Paris 2024, a break has been added to the schedule in July to allow time for qualified athletes to travel to Tahiti ahead of the Games, where the line-up will be closed for Olympic athletes to practice. With this break, the Tour will not host an event in J-Bay or Surf Ranch this season. The CT event in Tahiti has been moved earlier to May to accommodate the Olympics and will be the last opportunity to watch the world's best surfers in competition at Teahupo'o ahead of the Games.
"2024 is set to be a big year for surfing, and our schedule is designed to support that," said Jessi Miley-Dyer, WSL Chief of Sport. "I'm stoked that we're bringing Fiji back. It's such an iconic wave, and it's the perfect place to test our surfers as they battle to secure their place in the WSL Final 5. We're also really happy to confirm that the WSL Finals will return to Lower Trestles next season. We've hosted three exciting WSL Finals at this high-performance wave, which has proved to be an incredible showcase for the WSL Final 5 to crown our World Champions. The Olympic Games represents one of the biggest stages in the world, and we want our surfers to have the opportunity to perform at their best, which is why we've instituted the scheduled break and updated CT dates in 2024."
After a thrilling conclusion to the 2023 CT season that saw Caroline Marks (USA) and Filipe Toledo (BRA) claim the World Titles and 18 surfers qualified for Paris 2024, the focus shifts to those surfers fighting for a place on the CT next season via the WSL Challenger Series. The next event is the EDP Vissla Pro Ericeira Presented by Estrella Galicia, which holds a competition window from October 1 to 8, 2023. The final event of the Challenger Series will be the Corona Saquarema Pro Presented by Banco do Brasil, which holds a competition window from October 14 to 21, 2023.
For more information, please visit WorldSurfLeague.com.