Official: Bruce Irons is the Pipe wildcard

There’s been a hell of a lot of chatter on getting Bruce into the Pipe Masters as a wildcard, and the wish has been granted; he will be competing. Stab reported this yesterday, but today the WSL has confirmed. You can thank Freddy P and Matt Banting for that, or Kieren Perrow; Instagram didn’t have much to do with it. The outcome however, was the one desired by #Bruce4PipeMastersWildcard. Needless to say; it’s going be goddamn brilliant to have Bruce out at pipe for the competition.

“I’m so honored to be given the opportunity to compete in the Pipe Masters in memory of my brother,” Bruce told the WSL. “I reached out to Kieren a couple of weeks ago and asked if it would be a possibility and he’s been completely open with me through this whole process. I understand that the opportunity is coming to me due to someone withdrawing, which is never what you hope for, but I’m really pumped to surf Pipe with the world’s best. Really looking forward to the event and I hope the waves fire.”

“Bruce and I have been talking about a possible opportunity and it’s great to see him charging Pipe again this season,” Mr Perrow said on the matter. “He’s always been a standout at Pipeline and remains amongst the world’s best surfers when conditions get critical out there. With the withdrawals of Frederick Patacchia and Matt Banting, the WSL is in a position to allocate one of the replacement spots to Bruce and we feel like he’s certainly a worthy candidate given the form he’s in. Looking forward to a great event.”

The waiting period for the Pipe Masters commences on December 8th, with the title race running as close as can be; watch this space. It might get messy.