And you probably didn’t even get a chance to change your team on Fantasy Surfer……
While the surf world has barely recovered from the bloodshed at Trestles, where former world tour fixture Rob Machado came in as a wildcard and ousted frontrunners, Joel Parkinson and Taj Burrow, the World Tour has moved on to France. Wednesday saw the completion of all of round one, along with the first four heats of round two. Dane Reynolds and Adriano de Souza were the biggest news of the day, with Dane dominating his heats and the scoreboards and Adriano falling to a macking Phil MacDonald.
Dane took home the highest heat total of the day in his heat with a 17.33 out of 20. He fought off a charging Nathaniel Curran, whose own heat score would have won all but one other first round heat. Jay Thompson was apparently also there for the heat, but his presence was barely felt. Dane continued to deliver the action and excitement that brought him into the final at Trestles, taking a free-surf approach to his heats and seemingly throwing caution to the wind with multiple huge maneuvers and ridiculous air attempts.
Adriano de Souza is the first big exit of the event. He was edged out by the frothing Tahitian Michel Bourez by mere fractions of a point in his first round heat, then went down in a high scoring, high action round two heat to Phil Macca, who was absolutely on fire.
Mick Fanning, CJ Hobgood and Bede Durbidge were sent to the loser’s round, but all three won their round two heats and will live to surf another day. Bobby Martinez will fight for his round two survival when competition resumes. All of the other tour frontrunners already won their round one heats, moving straight into round three.
Julian Wilson brought heaps of excitement to round one when the young Aussie wildcard manhandled his fellow Aussies, Bede Durbidge and Dean Morrison. Julian put on a little air show to beat both compatriots by a solid margin.
The energy guys like Dane and wildcards like Julian bring to events makes you wonder why more of the guys on tour aren’t taking that same devil may care approach to their heats. It seems Dane is finally figuring out how to make it work, and he and the wildcards will continue to raise the bar. This excitement is more of what the tour needs… not a new heat format.
Things are just heating up down in France. Be sure to check out the event website for a complete recap, photos, videos on demand and heatsheets. And remember to check back for the morning call to catch the continuation of round two.
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