Mikey Wright Just Beat John John Florence

John Florence just lost the yellow jersey. 

The Quik wildcard, Mikey Wright is now a regular appearance on the tour’s first stop and he’s managed upsets before, but none of this magnitude. 

There’s no scarcity of waves rolling through, but today’s inaugural heat was slow with Mr Backparty and Golden Locks holding still for the sets. Neither of them were interested in the smaller insiders typically reserved for Snapper peasants. 

John took the first and worse wave of the opening exchange, throwing a little larry and followed by multiple wraps for a 5.83. Mikey held still. He grabbed the second wave of the set (a bigger wave), gave it a couple whacks and scored two points higher than JJF with a 7.83. 

It took more than 10 minutes for the boys to wrangle another set and again Mikey won the exchange. He pulled into an outside barrel and proceeded to blow the back out of it all the way through to Rainbow for a 7.27 – solidifying his win. John took a smaller wave, managed to manufacture a barrel, but it didn’t present much scoring potential down the line. 

With less than five minutes left on the clock John needed a 9.27 and the only excitement was a few groms getting washed off the rocks. Mikey rode two waves and that was all he needed to place himself in Round 3 and pull the golden singlet from John’s back. 

And if you were curious, Mikey took down Mr Florence riding a JS Monsta 8 (6’0″ x 19″ x 2 7/16″ x 28.5L)