Today is like the day after Thanksgiving; what do we have for leftovers? Yesterday’s plate sure was full, and WOW, did John bag the Turkey!!! What a fucking show. Two full rounds of overlapping heats brought on 8 hours of surfing for you core lords. Pipeline finally looked a bit like Pipeline, and it was a fun watch. Here are the details.
ROUND OF 32
Finally, some waves. Much better than it has been. Some clean barrels made on the preshow. Let’s get it going.
HEAT 1 – Former World Champ versus a Rookie, who you got? Well, Ian Gentil slips past Italo to start the morning in his first ever CT man-on-man heat. The quiet kid from Maui said he got smoked by Italo in a Qualifying Series heat, so he was “looking forward to the opportunity to at least settle up the score.” Confidence is key.
HEAT 2 – Nat Young and Jordy Smith joined the previous heat in the lineup at the 20 minute mark. Keep in mind the overlapping heats from this point forward. Jordy’s first wave was under the priority of the first heat, the 3 other surfers presumably sitting on a different part of the reef – at least it looked this way on the webcast. An 8.5 for an uncomfortably deep Backdoor tube was awarded. Ian Gentil made a comment about getting his heat winning wave by sitting next to Jordy. Nat Young was out of sorts for this heat, handing Jordy a walk through.
HEAT 3 – Leonardo beat the brakes off of Griff. I’m talking about one of those lessons where you’ve already told your kid five separate times to stop saying that bad word, and he does it again, this time in front of important company, thinking it’s funny. The kind of whooping that is delivered once that child gets home and back in their room. That’s what went down in this heat. Broken watch and all.
HEAT 4 – There was a feeling of friendly fire spread throughout the day, this heat being the first instance. Jacko Baker’s first wave could have been a free yeti cooler; in other words a 10. He traveled much further than expected but could not find the exit on a crazy right hander. Fellow Aussie Callum Robson again showed that he is not afraid of any piece of moving water. He caught one wave I wanted to take note of, strictly due to the drama of the drop. Free falling, fins sliding, holding rail, helmet strapped tight to the noggin, he stuck the drop before finding some quick, convenient shade for a meager 3.27. Jacko would not find a wave until a few seconds before the buzzer, which ended up not being enough. Callum rolls.
HEAT 5 – Judges up to some stuff early this year. Ewing was absolutely robbed in this heat. With a minute and a half ticking on the clock, Ethan needed a 5.85 to take the win and was given a 5.50, with all 5 judges dropping a 5.5 even. Of all of the waves from today kept in the surfers scoreline, as in the two waves in each surfers heat total, from the whole day, not one other score was unanimous across all 5 judges. That’s one out of 96 scores where all judges agreed. I won’t say that’s weird, but I think that’s weird. You be the judge. Liam O’Brien beats his friend and last year’s number 4 in World Ethan Ewing.
HEAT 6 – The third straight heat of friend against friend, countryman against countryman. Barron Mamiya and Seth Moniz traded off Backdoor barrels. Seth just happened to pick the bigger, better looking waves and moves on through. Felt like a slower heat.
HEAT 7 – One of my favorite heats of the day, and it had nothing to do with surfing. Just after Caio Ibelli’s best wave of the heat, a 7 point ride for logging some deep tube time and finding an exit on a closeout, he was docked for an interference. His second scoring wave would not count. He was paddling back out when he received the news of the interference, throwing such a fit in the water he almost caused himself another one had Sammy Pupo not conveniently down carved right before running Caio over. Upon replay, it seems something happened when both Caio and Zeke Lau were bobbing over a wave out the back. Laura Enever said they touched in the water, which is not allowed. It did not look like either surfer was even looking at the opportunity to get in. Apparently “he wasn’t looking for the wave, he was intentionally trying to put me interference” said Caio in his victorious post-heat interview. That’s right, Caio beat Zeke by virtue of one scoring 7 point ride out at Pipe. A true laughing matter. I can’t imagine the fury boiling in those Hawaiian veins of Zeke Lau. Definitely worth a rewatch. And if not, just catch Caio’s post-heat interview.
HEAT 8 – Ryan Callinan got off to a quick start and had some rhythm out there, while it seemed the opposite for Sammy Pupo. The young Brazilian held first priority over everyone in the lineup when he let Filipe, in the following heat, snag his high score of a 6.83 underneath. Not a great showing for the younger Pupo brother.
HEAT 9 – Carlos Munoz had a shocker. It was frustrating to watch because Filipe deserved to lose this heat. Last year’s world champ caught 6 waves, only one logging over a 1 point ride. Carlos could have made it happen, and we all would have liked to see a bit more from the Costa Rican.
HEAT 10 – Sleeper heat. 9 waves ridden, one over a 3 point ride. Yago creeps past last year’s event champion Slater. The start of the end..
HEAT 11 – Rio Waida surfed a really impressive heat. On his first look at a wave he took an absolute digger. Wipeout of the event nominee. His next wave, a 7 for a solid Pipe bomb, he looked like he was holding on for dear life, showing relief as he pulled out and over the shoulder. His second scoring wave he snuck under priority of Connor O’Leary, sending the goofy footed Australian home with a bitter taste.
HEAT 12 – Joao got such an early start that we didn’t even see his 8.67 until they showed the replay. Must have been just off the horn. When this happens – an early significant keeper score – it sets a daunting task on the opponent. You figure if anyone would not be bothered by that, it would be the ice cold Kanoa. But, Igarashi was down by a 12 point combo not even 10 minutes into the heat. Joao seemed to cruise through last year’s number 5.
HEAT 13 – JackRobbo scorched Michael Rodrigues. Another schooling similar to that of Leo over Griffin. The most notable thing in this heat for me was Jack getting spit out of a left bowl and not kicking out, instead opting for a backside rotation attempt in which he almost landed right on Medina’s head paddling back out. The proposed rivalry between Medina and John is going to take the backseat to Jack and Gabby, at least in Jack’s mind.
HEAT 14 – Medina and Jack were in separate heats, but they were competing. Feeding off the fuel of Robbo, Medina came out firing and didn’t look back. He beat Jake Marshall with the highest wave of the event to the point – a 9.33 for a crazy stretched out Backdoor racer – backed up with a 6 and some change. This would set up a cracker of a matchup for the next round.
HEAT 15 – Yet another lesson was taught in this matchup. John cruised past Kolohe Andino, the Californian unable to muster anything over a 2.
HEAT 16 – Miguel Pupo showed his experience and put the rookie Maxime in a tough spot early, nabbing back-to-back 4+ rides to start the heat. He looked really comfortable out there and had Maxime in a combo situation before they even took over as the priority heat. Huscenot did really well to battle back late with under 10 minutes on the clock, but ultimately came up short in a closely contested heat. Waves look really fun.
ROUND OF 16
It’s not cranking Pipeline, but it’s much better than what we’ve seen so far. Keep it rolling.
HEAT 1 – Not even 10 minutes into the buzzer Jordy already had two 6’s under his belt. The rookie Ian Gentil didn’t pick the waves to win this heat, Jordy moves on to his 5th QF out at Pipe.
HEAT 2 – Really slow heat here, but Leo’s form from the last round clearly carried over. Not as much of a smoke show as earlier, the hard charging Italian Stallion still sent Callum Robson packing quite handily. His barrel to backhand hook combo was working like a charm. Callum looked lost out there.
HEAT 3 – Another lethargic one. Only 7 waves ridden total, Liam O’Brien takes a surprise victory over local Seth Moniz. The winds are huffing offshore and looks like it made conditions a bit difficult to read. Seth sat with priority for the last 10 minutes + and couldn’t find a wave he wanted to take off on needing just a 4.03.
HEAT 4 – Feeling lully through this point. Caio and R.Cal snuck around on a couple of seemingly inconsequential insiders until their heat took over priority. Turns out, those insiders actually played a role in the outcome of the heat, as each surfer kept one of these 3’s in the score line. Caio ended up picking a better Backdoor wave than Callinan did at Pipe, by a little over a full point, so he took the heat. The underrated Brazilian continues his impressive dominance at the Banzai.
HEAT 5 – I was so sure Yago was going to take this one. All the way up until Filipe caught his first wave of the heat, down near the 16:30 mark. Though he didn’t make this wave, it was clear he knew what he was waiting for and was this close to completing it. Looking back at the heat analyzer, it’s clear that he and Yago switched roles through the heat. When their heat was under priority, Yago roamed the lineup snagging insiders all around. Filipe waited and waited, caught that wave he almost made, lost priority and then began roaming. His little insiders just happened to be better than Yago’s.
HEAT 6 – Joao was probably a heavy favorite over Rio. The young Indonesian rookie had his opportunity, but he was a bit too far out on the shoulder for a Pipe left, only scoring a 2.97 on a wave that looked like it could have had a 5 or so on it – see Jack Robbo’s 5.33 in the next heat for comparison. Chianca advances on a couple of mediocre scores.
HEAT 7 – The seeds of a budding rivalry were planted last year in G-Land, though it’s unclear if this is a one way street. It is very evident that Jack Robinson is always gunning after Medina. The 3 time World Champ is so ice cold though, I don’t know how he feels about this gungho Aussie. Medina wins this heat if he sticks that massive air reverse on his 6.73, and the judges couldn’t have done anything other than throw a 10 at it. Bit of a disappointment to see him fall. Robinson evens the head to head matchup with Gabby at 2 wins a piece.
HEAT 8 – Last heat of the day, and we’ve got 5 World Titles, a future perennial Title Threat, and Miggy Pupo in the water. On the wave directly behind Medina’s near 10, Miguel took an absolute dig. One of the wipeouts of the event. John was waiting for something in particular. And if you don’t know what it was, see here. Really not sure how you don’t give this a 10. I was thinking about if Medina’s wave played into it at all. Medina showed the potential of a pretty big barrel, straight into a big ass air. John’s was just a wild, WILD barrel. Just that though. So it stayed just short at 9.93. Miguel got a nice consolation barrel at Backdoor for a low 7 on his way out. But then came John’s other 9. And I was thinking about how if not for his own last wave, AND Medina’s wave, this would have been a 10 as well. This was a pretty sick bowl, into a pretty sick air, but it wasn’t maxed out on either end. Leaving it just THAT short – 9.40. What an end to the day though.
QUARTERFINALS – UPCOMING
HEAT 1 – Jordy Smith vs. Leonardo Fioravanti
HEAT 2 – Liam O’Brien vs. Caio Ibelli
HEAT 3 – Filipe Toledo vs. Joao Chianca
HEAT 4 – Jack Robinson vs. John Florence
Looks like it’s supposed to be Finals Day for leftovers today. I browsed the Surfline camera, as I guess is the new trend to do so before the contest is given an official call, and it looks rough. Wind blown and small. Filipe is licking his chops. Could be a rough watch, I’ll be tuned in anyways. Let’s get a champion on the board.
Cheers,
hwilsin
One reply on “LEFTOVERS”
[…] got for now. I mean it wasn’t an outstanding Finals Day by any means. All the action happened the other day. Hope your fantasy team fared better than mine (thanks Griff). I am creating this weird stat page […]