"As another year starts on the ASP Women's World Championship Tour it is incredibly hard not to sound like a broken down record about this year's tour being the biggest and best ever for surfing performance and competition. It seems it is said at the start of every new year. It is encouraging, however, that I do find I am repeating this thought. It is testament to the continuous progression and growth of women's surfing. If I wasn't repeating myself, we should all be concerned about where the sport would be going.

2009 seems to be the year of the grommet rookie attack. Five of the Top 17 are under 20 years old and they are all WCT rookies. Whilst World Champ Steph Gilmore at 22 might have snuck in and grabbed a couple of world titles before the rest of the new school actually got out of school, she may find things shifting pretty fast even for her. It seems Steph was the tip of a pretty hefty "take no prisoners approach to surfing" iceberg. Not only that, there are previous World Champions on tour in Sofia and Chelsea, not to mention loose cannon performers like Melanie and Silvana.

What I firmly believe about this year, is that whoever ends up with a world title, will earn it from a pretty hefty drawn out and down-to-the-wire battle. There will be no walkover results with this new group on board." --Prue Jeffries

Special Note:
I would like to thank Prue Jeffries for writing down her thoughts about the ASP Women's World Tour again this year. Prue is an avid supporter of women's professional surfing and also generously gives of her time to support grassroots projects like JettyGirl. Thank you Prue :)   --Chris Grant