Thurso East : photo O'Neill / Al Mackinnon

The O'Neill Highland Open

ASP 5 Star WQS Mens Event
Thurso, Scotland
25 April - 2 May 2006

O’Neill Europe Adds The Highland Open to the 2006 WQS Calendar

Thurso East to host the first ever WQS event in Scotland 

Check it out:  www.oneilleurope.com/highlandopen

Surfersvillage Global Surf News, 4 April, 2006 : - - O’Neill Europe are taking the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP), World Qualifying Series (WQS) on the high road to Scotland this April for the 5-star O’Neill Highland Open. Between the 25th April – 2nd May 2006, 168 of the world’s top surfers will make WQS history as they march towards mainland Scotland’s northernmost coast to compete in this landmark event.

The host wave for the Highland Open is the fabled Thurso East. Lying at 59° degrees north, Thurso will be the most Northern wave spot on the planet to host a WQS event. Likened by some to Nias in Sumatra, Thurso East is one of the most consistent spots in the British Isles, renowned for dishing up long winding right-hand tubes that spin off the flat, kelp covered reef.

But scoring Scotland’s prize wave comes at a cost; water temperatures are far from tropical, barely rising above a bone-chilling 8 - 10°C. Combine with this huge sea lions, peaty-brown waters and a beautifully rugged backdrop; the Highland Open is set to be one of the most unique stops ever on the WQS tour.

If Thurso fails to turn it on for the event, the contest organizers have the option to go mobile and travel the short distance to alternate swell magnets. Brims Ness, which means ‘Surf Point’ in Nordic, is just one option that is renowned for dishing up overhead waves when Thurso is flat.

The inaugural Highland Open isn’t for the faint hearted and will test the WQS soldiers’ strength and resolve to rise through the ranks. But with 2000 WQS tour points awaiting the eventual winner as well as the lions share of the 100,000$US prize purse it’s game on for this special stop on the world tour.

Sam Lamiroy, Thurso : photo Roger Sharp/O'Neill Europe

O’Neill Europe began started hosting WQS events in off-the-beaten track locations back in 2000 when they staged the first ever professional surfing contest in Nias, Sumatra with the ‘Deep Jungle Open’. A year on, in 2001, O’Neill introduced professional surfing to the Island paradise of the Maldives in the Indian Ocean and enjoyed five successive years of perfect, tropical waves at the ‘Deep Blue Open’.

The Highland Open is simply another chapter in O’Neill’s unwavering commitment to providing perfect and diverse locations for the world’s best surfers to prove their worth.

Previous reports:
# 1 : O'Neill announces The Mission launch for South Pacific 
# 2 : Coming soon
# 3 : Coming soon
# 4 : Coming soon  

www.oneilleurope.com
www.oneilleurope.com/highlandopen

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For all further information on the O'Neill Highland Open ’06, please contact:

O’Neill European Headquarters
P: +31 71 56 00 800
Norbert Pollemans,
Danielle Jungerius (PR)
Julian Howkins (Event Press Officer)
press@oneilleurope.com

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