Bobby Martinez speaks out about ASP’s decision to deactivate mid-year cut-off
The American surfer Bobby Martinez believes that he was right all along to oppose the mid-year cut-off introduced by the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) in 2010 and it was because of him that the controversial system has finally been deactivated.
Talking to a reporter from a leading sports network ESPN on Thursday, the 29-year-old Martinez said even though he was strongly criticised for voicing his opinion about the new system and its affect on the World Title series, the recent decision by ASP to deactivate the mid-year cut-off simply goes to prove that he was actually right all along.
“I actually think it’s funny how everyone looked at me like an idiot when I put the ASP on blast in New York, but now it just goes to show that I was right. And it took me to stand up and say something in order for this to take place -- otherwise it wouldn't have happened. Everything would've stayed the same unless I broke the ice and let it be known,” said Martinez.
The Santa Barbara-based surfer had remained sceptical and critical of the mid-year cut-off, along with the One World Ranking system, ever since its inception in 2010. He argued that the new ranking system made an extremely unfair comparison between the surfers competing against the best in World Tour and the ones going against a relatively easy competition in lower level series.
The mid-year cut-off brought the top qualifying surfers into the elite World Tour, while dropping the surfers who were failing to make a decent impact.
Grabbing an opportunity at the Quiksilver Pro New York in September, Martinez lambasted the ASP on live webcast. Right after his expletive-laden interview, the American surfer announced his plans to retire from professional surfing.
Other World Tour surfers begin to strongly protest against the new structure, calling the mid-year cut-off a system designed in a way that it would bring short-term success, but would prove to be a bane for the sport in the longer run.
On Tuesday, December 27, the ASP made an announcement that the mid-year rotation will be deactivated for the 2012 World Title series, with the 32 surfers announced at the beginning to stay on tour until the end.
Even though ASP cited scheduling uncertainties as the reason for deactivating mid-year cut-off during the next season, Martinez believes otherwise. According to him, the surfers would have boycotted the ASP if mid-season rotation had not been deactivated.
Even though the issue that pushed Martinez away from professional surfing has been resolved, he does not plan on competing at an ASP event anytime soon.
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