World Champ Stats

There has been some golden eras in the quest to be World Number One… Like from ‘78 - ‘82 with Rabbit, Cheyne Horan and Mark Richards fighting it out for World Titles. And then the period straight after that with the two Toms, Curren and Carroll, from ‘83 - ‘86. Then there was ‘87 - ‘93 with Hardman winning 2 and runner up in 2, Elkerton runner up 3 times, and Ho with a win and runner up. Then it was Slater who dominated through the mid 90s for half a decade. Then there is the latest golden era from 02 - 06 between Andy, Kelly and Parko. These three guys filled all the 1st and 2nd positions between them for 5 seasons.

The ASP have awarded 33 world champions since they started this fabulous tour back in 1976. 13 Australian Titles.. 13 USA Mainland Titles.. 5 Hawaiians Titles.. 1 South African Title and 1 British Title.
You can look at it another way, there has been 8 different Australian World Champions.. 3 Mainland USA Champions.. 3 Hawaiian World Champions.. 1 South African World Champion and 1 British World Champion.
Australians won 10 of the first 13 titles from 1976 to 1988, but the Americans have won 15 of the last 17 titles. That’s if you consider the Hawaiians as Americans…

Only 16 different surfers have won the title with 6 surfers winning it multiple times.
28 of the 33 titles awarded have been won by surfers who finished inside the top 10 the previous year.
Only once a runner-up has won the world title the following year. (Wayne Rabbit Bartholomew in 1978).
7 Times a surfer has won from 3rd position the previous year .. 3 times from 4th position .. 3 Times from 6th position .. 2 Times from 7th position .. 2 Times from 10th position.
3 Times a World Champion has been a runner up the year after being champion.
Only 3 times a surfer has come from outside of the top 10 the previous year to win a world title.
(Curren came from 55th in 1989 to be champion in 1990)
(Slater came from 43rd in 1991 to be champion in 1992)
(Derek Ho came from 30th in 1992 to be champion in 1993)
With the current ASP Qualifying Series/World Tour system, these three surfers above would not have had the opportunity to be World Champion with only the top 27 qualifying in the modern era.

In the inaugural year of the tour… Townend won the tour without winning an event, both Tomson and Cairns won 2 events each in that first season.
C.J is the only other World Champion (01) to not win an event in the year of his victory.
Damien Hardman is the record holder for most event wins in a season with 7 in 1988. He shares that record with Curren in 90 and Slater in 96. Both Curren and Slater won the world title in those years, but Hardman placed 2nd and lost the world title to Barton Lynch, who only won 2 events in that season… Both Lynch and Hardman surfed in 23 of the 24 events held that season. Looking at Lynch’s numbers for that season as well as having 2 wins, he had 3 x 2nd .. 10 x 3rd .. 6 x 5th (21 keepers)

In 1993 Hawaii won the World Title for the first time with Derek Ho getting the title over Elko by just 240 points. Derek that season collected just over $32k on his way to the title, this was $84.5k less than Potter, who won the title 4 years earlier in 1989. Slater won the 1998 title with $58K, the year before in 97, he won the title and earnt $208K.

The closest world Title race was in 1998 when Kelly won his 6th title, the year he went into retirement. Kelly defeated Mick Campbell by just 38 points, who beat Willsy by 10 points with three surfers finishing within 48 points of the number one position. In 1996 and 1997 in the middle of Slater’s golden run, he won back to back titles by the same margin 1634 points, he beat Beschen in 96 and Occy in 97…
The three closest title challenges in history are all Slater Years. 2005 he won by 102 points .. 1995 - 80 points and 1998 - 38 points.

8 Titles have been won by Goofy Footers, and 25 Titles have been won by Natural Footers. There is a time that I call the “Golden Goofy Era” from 1983 to 1993 when right foot forward surfers won 6 of the 11 titles with Carroll (2).. Hardman (2).. Lynch and Ho all winning titles and the same 4 surfers also placing 2nd five times between them in the title races of those years.

PRIZEMONEY

On the 2009 Dream Tour there are 3 surfers who have made over one Million Dollars in career prize money… And there are ten surfers who have pocketed over 500k in career prize money. This years leading Rookie has earnt the least career prize money with $110k. (Becalso 23rd)

THE CURRENT RATINGS LEADER

Joel Parkinson is on a roll. © Getty Images

Joel Parkinson has a handy lead in the race for this years title. If he continues on to be the World Champion he will be the 17 surfer to win a World Title .. He will be the 9th Australian .. He will be the 4th to win it from the 4th position the previous year .. And at the half way mark of the season he has $140.3K in prize money for the season, on target to beat Slater’s record of $260.1K last season. And if the natural footer wins it will be the 8th year in a row that the Goofy Footed surfers have missed out. Not since the two Goofy’s C.J and Occy placed 1st and 2nd in 2001 has the right foot forward surfers placed in the top 2… This year, at the half way mark of the season there are 3 Goofy Footers in the top 6 positions.

WORLD CHAMPION STATS

Good Luck to all @ Trestles in Event 6 of 10 in 2009. Aloha, Mike Newman

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