After a two-year hiatus, the Four Seasons Maldives Surfing Champions Trophy returns this month with the sport’s icons and a local legend among an exciting field of competitors.
The resort will be hosting its 10th year of the invitation-only competition from 22 to 29 August at the Kuda Huraa island’s world-class reef breaks. The stellar line-up includes Rob Machado, Shane Dorian, Ross Williams and Taylor Knox along with Maldives surfing champion Hussain Areef, known as Iboo, who will represent the country against some of his heroes.
“It means a lot to be competing in the Surfing Champions Trophy again this year,” said Iboo. “It’s like a dream come true, surfing my home breaks with these legends. I am very excited to surf against Rob Machado in particular; he has always been my favourite surfer and I learned so much from watching him, Shane Dorian, Taylor Knox and others in the Momentum movies and Loose Change. It’s pretty incredible to go from seeing them on the screen and in magazines to lining up alongside them; I feel very lucky and thankful to have this opportunity.”
The 45-year-old is often referred to as “the forefather of surfing in the Maldives.”
Machado, Dorian, Williams and Knox are part of a celebrated crew in surfing history whose story was told in the feature-length HBO film The Momentum Generation. Known as one of the most iconic power surfers of all time, Knox was the winner of the Surfing Champions Trophy (SCT) in 2013 and runner-up in 2014.
The surfers will compete for a US$25,000 prize in heats across three different disciplines: single-fin, twin-fin and the more conventional triple-fin thruster. Rather than 30-minute heats, each surfer’s heat time will be based on their age, according to Four Seasons.
“Don’t be fooled by the age of our crew,” said Rob Machado. “We’ll be more fired up than ever, competing against guys from our own generation!”
