Pipe

Parko in the water at the moment hoping to get through and closer to a world championship. He is up against Pipe local Kalani Chapman.

In the first three heats of round three all the highest seeded pros have lost, including John Florence and Julian Wilson. Slater takes on Billy Kemper in heat nine, while Taj has Yadin in heat 10 and Mick Fanning has the hard task of Shane Dorian in the last heat of the round.

Conditions are pretty good but a bit smaller than yesterday. There is some wind messing the lefts a little.

Pipe Masters

The Billabong Pipe Masters is on with round one in good conditions. Plenty of big sneaker sets landing on the competitors heads.

The double heat format is being used which gives plenty of action. The current rumour is that the swell will hang around and the event will run three days straight.

Parko and Slater don't surf in round one or two. From the WA point of view Taj misses rounds one and two while Yadin has won his heat. He'll meet Matt Wilkinson in round two.

The action is online and on FuelTV but you have to press the red button to get away from the UFC.

Taj wins

Taj Burrow as won the Coldwater Classic, beating Matt Wilkinson in the final. It's Taj's second win for the season.

Parko made the quarters and Slater round five which means it will all be decided at Pipe. Fanning has a slim chance but would need both of the others to drop out early and while he keeps going. My quick calculations have Slater currently leading on 48450, Parko 44700 and Fanning 38450. To guarantee win number 12 Slater would need to win one more heat than Parko. Parko would need to get at least ninth if he was to go out in the same round.

Lets hope for waves at Pipe.

Finals day

Pretty clean conditions for the final day of the Rip Curl Pro Portugal.

Mick Fanning was taken down in round five, giving him a ninth and 2250 more points than Slater in this event. Parko met John John in the quarters and won. This gives JJ a fifth and 3450 points over Slater and 1200 over Fanning.

Parko will meet Gabriel Medina in the semis, with the other between Julian Wilson and the winner of the quarter in the water at the moment.

At this stage the Mick's ninth is a keeper, John John will have nothing lower than a fifth. Regardless of what happens from now on Parko will have nothing lower than a third.

My literally back of the envelope calculations tell me that Parko would have to win to overtake Kelly after dropping the worst two events to this stage.

Kelly Slater - 45 400
Parko - 3rd 43 500, 2nd 45 000, 1st 47 000
Fanning - 43 500
John Florence - 38 600

Kelly's two bad events (really three) only drop his raw total by a small amount compared to the others (especially Parko) who drop big points. His four finals and three wins are keeping him in the race against the consistent but not winning Parko. Looks like it might go down at Pipeline, hopefully in some decent waves.

Judge for yourself

Does claiming pay ?




Chopes is such a one dimensional wave that judging is so difficult. Every pit that someone makes is basically the same so winning is more pot luck that really beating someone. I don't think Fanning's waves were better or worse than Parko's but I much prefer Parko's smooth style to Mick's poo stance.
Chopes is a world class wave on it's day but is it a world class competition wave ? Especially when we move on to two more barrel riding contests before years end, Supertubos is Portugal and the real left hand tube riding test Pipeline.

Taj wins

Taj Burrow has won the Reef Pro in very un-Hawaiian waves. This obviously gives him the lead in the Triple Crown.

The waiting period for the next event at Sunset starts tomorrow. Taj has done well here in the past as he has at Pipe so he must have a good shot at the crown.

Pipe Masters is over

The Pipe Masters and the ASP Championship Tour for 2010 is over. Jeremy Flores won in small (by Hawaiian standards anyway) and inconsistent Backdoor.

Flores beat a red hot Slater in the semis by point something as both got a nine and a seven.

Parko won the Triple Crown for the third time despite losing in the mid event rounds. Taj made yet another finals round before going down to Flores.

The 2011 season sees the full implementation of the new world ranking and the change over of surfers a couple of times during the year. It will be interesting to see who can keep their spots for the whole year and which gumbbies will find themselves yo yoing between the two tours. It is likely that the top surfers will do more prime events making it harder for Braziliians to use their butt wiggling styles in their local QS events to make the dream tour.

Interestingly it appears that lots of pros are rushing to the airport to leave the islands. Not that long ago everyone stayed well into January with February still crowded and turning it on. Maybe Hawaii isn't big enough anymore.

Hard

It's hard to find the energy to blog about surfing when it is so flat. Today the harbour buoy was reading a massive 12 centimetres, that not even half a primary school ruler!

The Pipe Master has started. They run this weird double heat format with two heats in the water at once. On one hand it is good because heaps of waves get ridden but it can be a confusing.

The top half of the 'CT surf in the next round. Even though Slater has already one the world title there is still plenty of interest as people scramble to make next years tour.

The waves were ok today. No real Pipe bombs, more Backdoor rights. The rip and the wind made it difficult but there were still plenty of decent waves.

Fuel TV are broadcasting live or you can catch a webcast via either the Triple Crown, Billabong or ASP website or on you IPhone or IPad using the ASP or Vans apps. I set my iPad up next to my work computer and watched a few heats this morning.

Round two is over

The Pipe Masters run the rest of round two last night and hopefully tonight the higher seeds, especially Parko and Mick, will surf for the first time in round three. Both are up against Hawaiian wildcards. Mick will surf against Torey Meister who only made the contest when Sunny Garcia turned up late for his round one heat. If Torey wins this heat he will challenge for the Triple Crown, which Parko has a grip on. Parko takes on Gavin Gillette in the second last heat. Gillette flogged Mick Campbell in round two.

Taj has a horror draw coming up against Bruce Irons. Bruce pulled into one of the biggest and deepest Backdoor pits on day one. His brother Andy was all over Backdoor today, riding deeper and longer than anyone else and having a round two score of 18.40 out of 20. One wave where he stalled through a long barrel and then came out for a power figure 8 cutback re-entry was topped off with a little 360 in the foam. Worth watching on the heat on demand.

Fuel TV are showing the contest live for those with Foxel and it is webcast. With the dual heat format and hopefully good waves, it will be good viewing

BILLABONG PIPE MASTERS ROUND 3 MATCH-UPS:
Heat 1: Adrian Buchan (AUS) vs. Dean Morrison (AUS)
Heat 2: Mick Fanning (AUS) vs. Torrey Meister (HAW)
Heat 3: Damien Hobgood (USA) vs. Andy Irons (HAW)
Heat 4: Bobby Martinez (USA) vs. John John Florence (HAW)
Heat 5: Adriano de Souza (BRA) vs. Flynn Novak (HAW)
Heat 6: Tom Whitaker (AUS) vs. Michael Picon (FRA)
Heat 7: Fredrick Patacchia (HAW) vs. Chris Ward (USA)
Heat 8: Kelly Slater (USA) vs. Hank Gaskell (HAW)
Heat 9: Bede Durbidge (AUS) vs. Liam McNamara (HAW)
Heat 10: Kieren Perrow (AUS) vs. Roy Powers (HAW)
Heat 11: Taj Burrow (AUS) vs. Bruce Irons (HAW)
Heat 12: Jordy Smith (ZAF) vs. Dayyan Neve (AUS)
Heat 13: Taylor Knox (USA) vs. Phillip MacDonald (AUS)
Heat 14: C.J. Hobgood (USA) vs. Shane Dorian (HAW)
Heat 15: Joel Parkinson (AUS) vs. Gavin Gillette (HAW)
Heat 16: Dane Reynolds (USA) vs. Kekoa Bacalso (HAW)

Pipeline Masters has started

The Billabong Pipeline Masters has started in some great looking waves. Pipeline is breaking both ways at 6 - 8 foot and offshore. Its sunny and blue and looks like classic Hawaii.

They are running the dual heat, basically two seperate two man heat running at the same time, which means there are plenty of waves being ridden. Scores are consistently in the high sevens and early eights and the high seeds don't surf till round three.

The webcast is top quality as you expect from a WCT event and worth watching.

Fanning wins Search

Mick Fanning has beaten Bede Durbridge in the final of the Search in Portugal. Fanning only had to surf once after Owen Wright pulled out of the semi due to a burst ear drum sustained the day before.

Durbridge took out Parko in the other semi. Parko was not happy after his loss however on adjusted points Mick will still need finish higher at Pipe to win the World Title. Bede's loss means that he is out of the running leaving on the two Coolie Kids.

The WLT is into round 2 at the Maldives. The webcast is on and the waves look fun. Last years world champ Bonga Perkins is out but current tour leader Harley Ingelby is easily through to the next round.

Round Two is go

Round two has started in decent waves. Unlike round one only one lower ranked surfer has been successful in a heat and that was one of those where both were pretty evenly matched.

Parko is in the water and leading his heat. If he wins then the title race goes to Pipe regardless. The next heat could be a killer with Aussie wildcard Owen Wright up against Kelly Slater. Dane Reynolds is in the heat after and Taj following that.

The conditions first up were clean, glassy and offshore with clean barrels on the lefts. The wind has swung a little and the tide is starting to affect it. Every other day has been split halfway through but this is another beach, so who knows what they will do ?

Portugal Sucks

The first 8 heats of round one of the Search are done with the wildcards doing well in poor surf. It was pretty much the most boring surfing of the European leg, which is saying something as there hadn't been much to write home about.

Three of the heats were won with two waves totals under 10 and 15 was the best. Generally anything under 12 means your been given a whipping.

With the bottom half of the 'CT trying to re-qualify but only getting one chance there are a couple of guys who may be wishing they backed up on the WQS. Nathaniel Curran and Portuguese German Marlon Lipke both finally won heats but need huge results here and at Pipe if they are to avoid heading back to the "grind".

Parko must be worried. His mentor Luke Egan finally admitted that the ankle injury he sustained in Bali was still troubling him and that he re-injured it on his first wave at Munduka. The junky small waves just seem to make it an issues whereas if it was bigger and he could set a line rather than wiggle he might have been able to compensate. He would have been hoping for some size at Supertubos but may be forced into a mush fight.

Fanning can win the title here if Parko goes out early and a few other things happen. If things fall his way he doesn't even need to win. Hopefully he won't and it will go down to a duel at Pipe. CJ Hopgood can't be counted out and has yet to get lower than ninth. Technically everyone in the top ten can still win it all but in reality it is probably only the top three with Artiz the outsider.