Is The Quik Pro Being Rushed By The Commonwealth Games?

Last night, on sundown, Snapper was semi cracking. The banks have reportedly been shocking since Gita, but thanks to incessant overnight dredging it appeared the sand situation was on the mend.

A stacked lineup littered with heavy weights and everyone in between, the currently prevailing SSE swell peaked and a few lucky ones managed to sneak a few tubes behind the rock. 

With an honourable mention going to Parker Coffin who slotted himself into what our beer filled eyes are claiming to be “wave of the day”… although we filmed him from the surf club overlooking Snapper and tagged him as Nick Vasicek on our IG story. Parker replied, “boys, that was me!” followed by a heart. It was cute. 

After a sunrise interstate run back to the apartment, I woke Morgan from his nude slumber and dragged our hungover selves out into the Snapper keyhole. We didn’t get any waves, literally “went for a paddle”, but we witnessed Jordy drive his fresh JS (he’s left CI behind) through the two best barrels that morning.

Among that we realised that the Snapper sweep, southerly winds and alcohol aching limbs are not the ideal combination; also coming to terms with the fact we’re not good enough to take off behind the rock, nor link more than one turn. 

We therefore called it quits, relegated ourselves to the sand, hammered a coffee and prepped to watch those a bit more apt. 

I won’t bore with you with surfing details – because you have the heat analyzer for that one. Instead, here’s a bunch of my subjective experiences, all of which are naive and anything but comprehensive. But if you wanted an objective account, the WSL pushed out a press release a few hours ago. 

A few nosepick spins were more than enough to silence the reigning champ, John John.

Photography

Cestari/WSL

Griff, John and Mikey

This is was the match up people were talking about since the heat draw dropped. Mikey’s been a Quik Pro regular since his Round One tear back in 2016, Griff appears unstoppable and putting John John into anything amps up mine and any surf fanatics synapses. 

Griff went on an absolute tear, but this wasn’t a surprise, what was surprising however was John’s surfing. He didn’t look like himself. His stance was lethargic and his turns lacked the usual ferocity. 

But then again, at least he managed to scrape in more points than Mikey, who struggled for a heat total of 2.00. 

All the backhand snaps in the world couldn’t overcome your score slashed in half.

Photography

Cestari/WSL

Gabby’s drop in

Obviously, Gabriel Medina surfs well, but in addition to being a good surfer, his heat strategies are cemented: down-the-line drop ins, strategic blocks and shoulder jostling paddles, the dude has it all sorted. It appears Gabby threw all of this out the window in his Round 1 heat when he decided how deep you are doesn’t matter and proceeded to give Leo a proper Brazillian waxing. 

Gabs tore the wave apart, of course it didn’t count, and he squandered his hopes of hopping over a possible 17th place by jumping directly to Round 3. 

A snapshot of Toledo’s tutorial in mid-heat twirly birds.

Photography

Sloane/WSL

Flipping Filipe

Watching clips is one thing, but seeing him throttle down the point standing on the sand is completely different. He’s fucking ridiculous. If Snapper was 3-foot and rippable past Little Marley I’d expect big things from Filipe; contrarily Snapper was odd, junky and falling off the sand-bank and mutating into a barely surfable burger after a 100 metres. Yet, somehow Filipe managed to bring in an 8 and a 7 and consequently earning the highest heat total of the day.  

I cannot imagine him losing, yet I can imagine myself asking for a selfie on the shore tomorrow. 

It seems unlikely, but I would kill for a Fanning Snapper Rocks victory.

Photography

Sloane/WSL

Kelly mania 

Everyone, including myself, are Kelly mad and since his whereabouts weren’t solidified at the time, the point was amass with heads and smartphone glued hands. Mick rocked off, Jesse was already well acquainted out the back, but much to everyones dismay there was no GOAT in sight. 

Whilst I was fairly certain he wouldn’t be arriving on time, my grom heart broke a little when Heat 12 turned into a two man show. Watching Mick from the keyhole was quite delightful, though. 

Commonwealth Games push

You wouldn’t describe the waves as “bad” today, but you certainly wouldn’t claim they were all-time. I’m not surprised that the competition ran, but I was surprised when I overheard a conversation implying the event will be wrapped by Thursday at the latest. 

The comps are now shorter due to an altered Round 4 approach; the surfer who comes last in Round 4 is now eliminated, as opposed to a non-elimination heat. But this isn’t the sole reason for a premature completion. 

The rumour is the WSL is being forced to pack down this contest in the shortest period possible, as to not interfere with the Commonwealth Games schedule; despite the glorified athletics carnival that is the Games not starting until April. A push which we’re going to investigate further.

Firstly, the surf will be worse Monday and Tuesday, prior to a potential larger swell arriving on Wednesday courtesy of an ex-tropical cyclone.  

Secondly, I want to stay here longer, so the more lay days the longer I am lucky enough to surf overcrowded, yet mesmerising point breaks whilst getting paid to churn out sub-par stories such as this one here.

Overall, it’s a weird vibe – where ‘weird’ should be interpreted in the most positive of frames – but I fucking love it. 

Honestly, the viewing from the webcast is better and once you’ve endured a few heats of the beach commentary you’ll never complain about Turpel’s pipes again, but there’s an aspect of vibrancy you just don’t get when you’re pumping beers on a couch or skipping between browsers in your class. 

Being on the sand for a comp is incredible, not to mention sinking a schooner or two atop the Snapper Surf Club.

There is however one overshadowing downside, taking off on a wave knowing that you’re inevitably (and deservingly) going to be dropped in on within the next 10 seconds. 

For the statisticians and those too lazy to click over to the WSL, here’s today’s scores:

Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast Round 1 Results:
Heat 1: Owen Wright (AUS) 9.90, Caio Ibelli (BRA) 5.20, Ezekiel Lau (HAW) 4.57
Heat 2: Michel Bourez (PYF) 13.17, Michael Rodrigues (BRA) 11.26, Matt Wilkinson (AUS) 10.67
Heat 3: Jordy Smith (ZAF) 11.66, Conner Coffin (USA) 10.10, Patrick Gudauskas (USA) 7.64
Heat 4: Julian Wilson (AUS) 12.60, Joan Duru (FRA) 11.30, Ian Gouveia (BRA) 7.27
Heat 5:  Italo Ferreira (BRA) 14.26, Leonardo Fioravanti (ITA) 8.44, Gabriel Medina (BRA) 6.05
Heat 6: Griffin Colapinto (USA) 12.50, John John Florence (HAW) 7.50, Mikey Wright (AUS) 2.00
Heat 7: Kolohe Andino (USA) 9.63, Keanu Asing (HAW) 7.83, Kanoa Igarashi (USA) 5.60
Heat 8: Adrian Buchan (AUS) 10.30, Adriano de Souza (BRA) 8.67, Willian Cardoso (BRA) 8.07
Heat 9: Jeremy Flores (FRA) 12.24, Joel Parkinson (AUS) 9.94, Yago Dora (BRA) 6.86
Heat 10: Filipe Toledo (BRA) 15.56, Frederico Morais (PRT) 9.00, Tomas Hermes (BRA) 5.50
Heat 11: Connor O’Leary (AUS) 13.16, Wade Carmichael (AUS) 7.63, Sebastian Zietz (HAW) 7.46
Heat 12: Mick Fanning (AUS) 11.60, Jesse Mendes (BRA) 9.80, Kelly Slater (USA) 0.00

Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast Round 2 Matchups:
Heat 1: John John Florence (HAW) vs. Mikey Wright (AUS)
Heat 2: Gabriel Medina (BRA) vs. Leonardo Fioravanti (ITA)
Heat 3: Matt Wilkinson (AUS) vs. Ian Gouveia (BRA)
Heat 4: Adriano de Souza (BRA) vs. Patrick Gudauskas (USA)
Heat 5: Joel Parkinson (AUS) vs. Michael Rodrigues (BRA)
Heat 6: Sebastian Zietz (HAW) vs. Ezekiel Lau (HAW)
Heat 7: Kelly Slater (USA) vs. Keanu Asing (HAW)
Heat 8: Frederico Morais (PRT) vs. Willian Cardoso (BRA)
Heat 9: Kanoa Igarashi (JPN) vs. Yago Dora (BRA)
Heat 10: Caio Ibelli (BRA) vs. Tomas Hermes (BRA)
Heat 11: Conner Coffin (USA) vs. Wade Carmichael (AUS)
Heat 12: Joan Duru (FRA) vs. Jesse Mendes (BRA)

Roxy Pro Gold Coast Round 1 Results:
Heat 1: Johanne Defay (FRA) 12.53, Lakey Peterson (USA) 11.50, Caroline Marks (USA) 9.70
Heat 2: Carissa Moore (HAW) 16.16, Tatiana Weston-Webb (HAW) 10.50, Keely Andrew (AUS) 9.87
Heat 3: Tyler Wright (AUS) 10.17, Malia Manuel (HAW) 8.60, Bianca Buitendag (ZAF) 7.90
Heat 4: Macy Callaghan (AUS) 11.84, Stephanie Gilmore (AUS) 6.50, Bronte Macaulay (AUS) 1.27
Heat 5: Sally Fitzgibbons (AUS) 12.77, Paige Hareb (NZL) 8.93, Silvana Lima (BRA) 3.63
Heat 6: Nikki Van Dijk (AUS), Sage Erickson (USA), Coco Ho (HAW)

Roxy Pro Gold Coast Round 2 Matchups:
Heat 1:Tatiana Weston-Webb (HAW) vs. Malia Manuel (HAW)
Heat 2: Sage Erickson (USA) vs. Caroline Marks (USA)
Heat 3: Stephanie Gilmore (AUS) vs. Bianca Buitendag (ZAF)
Heat 4: Lakey Peterson (USA) vs. Paige Hareb (NZL)
Heat 5: Nikki Van Dijk (AUS) vs. Keely Andrew (AUS)
Heat 6: Silvana Lima (BRA) vs. Bronte Macaulay (AUS)