Having been lead to the comments by Ripper I have to say that I'm a bit surprised by the lack of understanding of the people that have made them.

"You can't put an event on at a location to suit a sponsor, it's got to be where the best conditions are" - erm, wrong. And whilst the continually touted "Classic Wave Tour" is trying, it's still the sailors funding it and not sponsors so it's not a pro event.

Is there really that little understanding of how the commercial world works and the need to generate coverage and cash to get a windsurf tour that may hold some comparison to the much quoted WSP tour? Apparently so!

that's the thing. the wave classic tour isn't a realistic long term proposition. Any tour can be created if you want to put people out and lose money. To make something sustainable is much harder. I wonder, if the Wave Classic guys had put all their energies in to helping the PWA make this stop a Wave Tour stop, we might have had another event or two on the calendar. Also, it is all about sponsors, without them you have no prize fund, subsidised hotels, nothing.

The comment on there that compared it to F1 really made me laugh! There's a poster that obviously hasn't followed an of that ridiculous circus for some time, otherwise they'd know about Donington, the Singapore/UAE night race farces, the joke of a circuit at Valencia (and Monaco!) etc. Unfortunately whether we like or not it all comes down to dosh and a willingness for sponsors to get involved.

does anyone have any idea how many people it takes to 'run' the PWA? Are there 5? 10? 50?
Who do they have actively chasing sponsorship?

I think one of the biggest problems is that no one has any idea who really runs the pwa or who is involved. If the PWA had more of a presence in mags, maybe that would help give an understanding. If people have no understanding, then they'll always question it or hammer it if they aren't seeing the 'dream' tour.

I haven't seen an interview with Rich Page for ages. That'd help I reckon, to hear his side more. He is still the boss I guess.

"I think one of the biggest problems is that no one has any idea who really runs the pwa or who is involved"

Well I've no idea what's involved in the day-to-day running, but in terms of who runs the organisation, it looks like

www.pwaworldtour.com/index.php?id=19

Unless they're just 'figureheads' (which I'm not suggesting they are).