Sunny Garcia

The big show is about ready to begin — the Hurley U.S. Open of Surfing is set to kick off Saturday on the south side of the Huntington Beach Pier. The event concludes July 26. This also marks 50 years of competitive surfing at the pier, which started in 1959 with the West Coast Surfing Championships, which lasted until 1963 with legendary winners like Jack Haley and Linda Benson. In 1964, it changed to the United States Surfing Championships, which graced the pier until 1973.

A global record of $100,000 will be offered to the first-place winner in the men’s six-star World Qualifying Series event of the Hurley U.S. Open of Surfing, which kicks off this Saturday. The competitions are expected to draw up to half a million spectators and 500 competitors from all over to celebrate 50 years of competitive surfing at the pier, and will run from Saturday to July 25. The week is open to the public free of charge. The additional cash, up $80,000 from $20,000 last year, might be an incentive for those who have already earned enough points for the Assn.

We're not too far away from the start of the Assn. of Surfing Professional's big show, the World Championship Tour. The first event is just a couple weeks away with the Quicksilver Pro slated for Feb. 27 through March 11 at Snapper Rocks Australia. There are some nice point breaks there that work on a swell. Last year, Kelly Slater started his roll with a win at this event. Then it's off to Bells Beach for the Rip Curl Pro, which usually features bigger waves and cold water, too. Bells is one of the longest-running surf contests, going back to 1973.

The Huntington Beach Surf Series started its first event of the year with some pretty epic 3- to 6-foot surf, setting up some big ripping down at the Huntington Pier. The weather was pretty nice, too, with some overcast mornings giving way to sunny skies. Not only did former Assn. of Surfing Professionals championship tour ripper and current contest director Jeff Deffenbaugh score some great surf, but the ante was upped this year with computer scoring and $40 for heat winners in the pro-am division.

Straight from the Figster in the announcer's booth, this years' Honda U.S. Open of Surfing presented by O'Neill has been going big time. The weather has been kinda tropical, with partly cloudy skies, but sunshine too, with air temps in the mid-70s. Definitely on the humid side, with light variable winds, which brought down a good-sized crowd for the event's first weekend. The water has been unbelievable, at 70 degrees with a lot of the competitors trunking it. The waves were small last weekend, but with pretty decent shape.