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Speaker 1: The premier yere surfing event in the world is headed

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Speaker 1: to New Zealand. The fourth stop in this year's World

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Speaker 1: Surf League is going to be held in Raglan. It's

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Speaker 1: happening in May. It's going to feature more than fifty

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Speaker 1: of the world's best surfers and Ben Kennings, as Chief

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Speaker 1: executive of Surfing New Zealand, he's with us this evening.

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Speaker 1: Get a Ben, just how big is this?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, good evening, Jack huge for surfing in New Zealand.

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Speaker 2: It's obviously the biggest event that's ever come to our

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Speaker 2: shores and we can't wait to host those best surfers

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Speaker 2: in the world. It's going to be pretty spectacular viewing.

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Speaker 1: So how many people are we expecting to attend and

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Speaker 1: to bring into the country for this.

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Speaker 2: We look so in terms of athletes, it's the top

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Speaker 2: thirty six males, in the top twenty four females. And

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Speaker 2: then as I understand it with the World Surf League,

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Speaker 2: I think there's eighty staff that are part of the

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Speaker 2: event management team. And then you've got all the visitors

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Speaker 2: that are going to come and hopefully enjoy some of

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Speaker 2: our amazing waves that we have an offer.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, what makes Raglan the right place for this.

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Speaker 2: Well. Ragland's our best break in New Zealand. I guess

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Speaker 2: everyone likes to think their own home break is good,

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Speaker 2: but Ragland has three amazing point breaks. They break around

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Speaker 2: a rocky outcrop around Mount Kadioi, and as they peel

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Speaker 2: around that mountain, the waves just get cleaner and cleaner

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Speaker 2: as they come in. So often when the rest of

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Speaker 2: the West Coast is blown out or southwesterly wind comes through,

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Speaker 2: it's a bit unruly, but Ragland can still be really

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Speaker 2: nice because of that mountain. So very fortunate to have

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Speaker 2: that break here.

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Speaker 1: So is the government chipping in a bit for this?

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Speaker 2: Absolutely? So. The WSL, with the World Surf League and

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Speaker 2: the government have worked together to make this event possible,

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Speaker 2: and they've been working pretty hard on different options throughout

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Speaker 2: the last few months and they ended up on this

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Speaker 2: World Tour event, which is awesome. Right.

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Speaker 1: How much are they putting in.

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Speaker 2: That's a question for the WSL on Probably not at

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Speaker 2: that level to be bear jack, but look substantial amount

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Speaker 2: of money. I know that the World Surf League create

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Speaker 2: their own broadcasts. They have a million dollars of prize

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Speaker 2: money at every event, and then you've got a whole

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Speaker 2: event build, so you're not sort of it's not a

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Speaker 2: latch key thing where you go into a stadium and

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Speaker 2: everything's there. You've actually got to build a whole event

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Speaker 2: site and you know, and cater to all the people

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Speaker 2: that are going to come and watch those best surfers

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Speaker 2: in the world.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, right now. I think we were last going to

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Speaker 1: have a major serving event back in twenty twenty at PIHA.

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Speaker 1: Is one of the upsides of holding it at Ragland

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Speaker 1: that those breaks are really consistent that you don't have

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Speaker 1: to wait for windows in the weather or anything like that.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. So that event at Peh was the second tier,

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Speaker 2: so that was a Challenger series. This one's the world too,

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Speaker 2: so that's the next one up. Yeah, Ragland does have

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Speaker 2: more favorable conditions. That's plain and simple. Like I say,

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Speaker 2: it's the best break in the world. And from talking

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Speaker 2: to the WSL over the last few weeks, if they

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Speaker 2: were going to come back to New Zealand with a

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Speaker 2: World Tour event, it was going to be Ragland because

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Speaker 2: that's synonymous around the world worth New Zealand. You know,

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Speaker 2: you talk to anyone around the world as a surfer

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Speaker 2: and they'll go oh Raglan is the place to be.

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Speaker 1: No, it's fantastic, really exciting stuff. Looking forward to it.

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Speaker 1: Thanks Ben. That has Ben Kennings, the chief executive of

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Speaker 1: Surfing New Zealand. For more from Heather Duplessy Allen Drive,

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