What Happened To LOB’s Leg?

Freesurfing the day before the Pipe event started, Australian rookie Liam O’Brien pulled into a tube at Pipe, and hit a bit of backwash that caused his board to flip and his leg to break. 

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According to LOB:

“It’s pretty devastating to not be able to surf given how good it’s been, but things could definitely be worse. I pulled into a little Pipe tube in the morning freesurf and I’m pretty sure a backwash flipped my back foot causing me to flex my toes back toward my calf muscle. I ended up breaking my fibula and sustaining a deltoid and syndesmosis injury. Got a plate, screws and a tightrope put in. Full rehabilitation is probably 4 months roughly.”

With four months to recover, LOB will be missing all the events before the mid-season cutoff, thus precluding him from qualifying the latter half of the tour. The only chance LOB has to make the tour next year is if the WSL issues him one of two wildcards. However, with Gabby taking a year off and Yago Dora, Ryan Callinan, and Carlos Muñoz also injured, it’s going to be hotly contested for the spots next season. 

Having won three world titles, Gabby has presumably already secured one of those spots on the basis of merit, meaning it’s most likely going to be a shitfight for the second WC.

“I haven’t even spoken to them (the WSL) about it yet. I presume they’ll be hotly contested with all of the injuries already this year,” says LOB. 

We are awaiting a response from the WSL regarding who is most likely to take the WC CT spots at Sunset, whether that will be Matt McGill, Jordy Lawler, or someone else. 

More to come on this.