British success - yes, there's quite a bit of it about

The ISA World Masters Surfing Championships in Puerto Rico are now underway, with British hopes high thanks to a solid contingent including the likes of Jed Stone, Gary Rogers, Daz Wright and Roger Knight. A total of 12 countries have sent competitors to the event, which Richard Lucke, the President of the Surf Federation of Puerto Rico, declared to be "the most important in the world." That might be pushing it a little but should the British team do well their success will crown a fine series of recent British performances in the water. Just last week, at the 2007 Kneeboard World Championships in Santa Cruz, California, Jody Winter from Newquay took to the podium to claim the Ladies World Championship, while Polzeath's Richard Smith took the Pro Junior World title. In surfing, last year Reubyn Ash bagged the European Junior title and the British team brought home a silver medal thanks to Ben Skinner in the ISA World Surfing Games. Karen Walton, the National Director of the British Surfing Association, sums up the mood of optimism and good vibes in the contemporary British surfing scene: “We are so proud of what the team and each of the individuals have achieved in the Kneeboard World Championships. As a British surf team attending a World Championships event, they have set new standards and have gone from strength to strength. Put together with last year's perfomances,  no-one can deny that British surfing is making an extremely strong mark on the international scene."