On May 20th, 2005 the Big Wave Registry was created in the Cape Town area of South Africa with the advent of the deep winter swells as the environmental and community conflicts arising from tow surfing in the Table Mountain National Marine Preserve zones heated up.

The local government allocated a governing body called the Tow Surfing South Africa (TSSA) Association to be created with the responsibility to manage the modern sport of tow surfing within the marine preserve.

South Africa in recent years has stepped up to preserve natural resources in this extremely unique botanical and oceanic zone of the world, where only certain species of plant life and marine life exist. Tow surfing has been reduced to a few spots, with 4 access points for launching/loading and retrieving of Personal Watercraft.

Ross Lindsay headed up meetings locally to get the information out to athletes both nationally and internationally who were on standby for the Red Bull Big Wave Africa paddle surfing contest, the water safety team, and a group of Quiksilver athletes filming a movie in the area.

There was only a one day notice for Ross to complete and organize the program outline for presentation. It wasn't exactly well recieved at first with some tow surfers projecting that the local Cape Town surfing crew from Kommetjie was trying to control the sport, which was not true, the government was controlling, reducing and minimizing the sport, and without the participation of Ross and others, a complete PWC ban would have been enacted in the entire preserve.

The future is here, it is a wake up call for other world locations in due respect to community concerns, government intervention and the fact that tow surfers must take responsiblity for the sport if they wish to further enjoy the privilige of boating in nature's playground.

Step up and Be counted, or suffer closures. You can write to Ross for further information at: