ICTSI and Philippine Kiteboarding Association: Empowering the Filipino Kitesurfing Athletes on its 4th Kiteboarding Tour

Wazzup Pilipinas!

Philippine Kiteboarding Association (PKA), the country's premiere kitesurf organizing body, in partnership with International Container Terminal Services Inc.(ICTSI), Philippines' leading port management company, are thrilled to announce the 4th installment of its Kiteboarding competition this 2016-2017 season.

Over the past 4 years, the PKA has mounted more than 16 kitesurf competitions across the country, and their recent 2015-2016 season of the ICTSI Philippine Kiteboarding (PKA) Tour wrapped up with a resounding success, with more than 160 participants across 20 countries from Europe, America and Asia, have gathered to compete in some of the country’s top kitesurfing destinations.

The competition features three different fields of discipline, namely Race, Freestyle and Hangtime, and further sub-classified to Kids, Novice, Mens, Womens, and Masters class. And now that kiteboarding has been recently announced as one of the sports to be included in the 2018 Youth Olympic Games in Tokyo, the organizing body is hopeful that the next Olympic gold, may come from their ranks given the right support and funding.

Jay Ortiz, PKA President quipped "This year, the PKA is excited to announce that we will be mounting another adrenaline-filled kitesurfing event, bringing both local and international riders again to 4 kitesurfing locations in the country, an effort that will surely excite and invite more local and international racers."

The four key destinations for this year are Cuyo Island in Palawan (Nov. 24-26), Bantayan Island, Cebu (Jan 13-15, 2017), Boracay Island, Aklan (Feb. 3-5, 2017) and Cagbalete Island in Quezon (Mar. 3-5, 2017). 

 
"PKA is also aimed at building the next generation of Kiteboarding superstars by developing grassroots program for kids. Now that the sport is in the Youth Olympics in 2018, this competition will be a perfect staging ground in discovering fresh new talents. We firmly believe it's only a matter of time before we get to discover the next Onyok Velasco and Hidilyn Diaz from our ranks, or even bring us our first Olympic gold". Jay added.

Manny Cabili, Philippine Windsport President and one of the prime movers of Windsurfing and Kiteboarding events in the country, further added "This tour is likewise helping further build our tourism in the country, since we also help promote and feature some of the top kitesurfing destinations in our social media page which foreigners not only from Asia Pacific, but also from the US and Europe would love to visit. With more than 7,000 islands, Philippines has a lot of great kitesurfing spots to offer".

Aside from ICTSI, this momentous sporting event is made possible by Cabrinha, an international kitesurfing brand, its local distributor, Greenyard Boracay, Cobra Energy Drink, Brew Kettle Beer, and the local government units of the Municipality of Cuyo Island, Palawan under Mayor Andrew L. Ong, Municipality of Sta. Fe, Bantayan Island, Cebu under Mayor Jose B. Esgana, Boracay Island, Municipality of Malay, Aklan Province under Mayor Ciceron "Dodong" S. Cawaling and Cagbalete Island, Municipality of Mauban, Quezon Province under Mayor Fernando Q. Llamas

Follow the Philippine Kiteboarding Association on their Facebook account at https://www.facebook.com/pkatours