NumbersGame

Friday Staff Meeting Minutes: 4-13-01 Good Friday

No staff meeting on Good Friday. The Easter season heralds the coming of summer to the secular world north of the equator, a rebirth, new life after the death of winter.

Of course, modern technology mutes the effects of winter these days. Surfers obsessed with riding insanely big waves now think less of the tropics and more to the brutally cold Pacific waves in California waters. Rather than hunker a bit, rather than slow down for a season, the fevered pitch picks up during the West Coast winter now.

Easter. E-A-S-T-E-R. I don't even know where that word comes from. It's a bizarre looking word...worth looking into, except there are 20 million activities and distractions to rush off to. But soon...

Anyway, since I have free reign on any subject at all with zero chance of Monday-morning consequences, I'd like to offer up a statistic for your examination. According to a Biz News blurb on the TRANSWORLDSURF website, surfing ranks seventh in participation growth among all sports in America.

Snowboarding, skateboarding, wakeboarding, snowmobiling, gymnastics, and Artificial Wall climbing all ranked ahead of surfing, thank God, but fortunately we remain ahead of Elliptical motion trainers.

The mind-blaster here is this: according to the American Sports Data Superstudy of Sports Participation, 25.6% more people went surfing in the year 2000 than in 1999!

That's a 25% increase in the number of people surfing...in just one year!

This has to be the most significant population increase since "Gidget", and maybe ever. It would go a long way towards explaining the sudden "beyond max" crowds at nothing breaks, and more than a few of those classified ads that read something like this:

"Surfboard for sale. Good cond. Leash and bag included. Wetsuit, men's ML. All or part. Call after 5 p.m."

Everybody is looking for a miracle, I guess...

Webmaster2