Jordy loses in round three; John John Florence soars into quarter finals.
Round two is the surf writer’s horror show. I could have kicked Trav ‘The Angry Inch’ Logie in the nuts last night when he ran the contest into round two but that feeling turned to deep gratitude when the contest kicked off again today 8.30am CEST, which is a terrible timezone for viewers either side of the Pacific.
Hence, Chas rings Derek. Skypes? Does anyone still Skype? Snapchat?
Hey Derek, France timezone sucks, get Shearer to cover it.
I’m the contract toilet cleaner of contest coverage. I get called in to clean up the messes no-one wants to deal with. Chas and Derek can sleep soundly at night knowing that in the morning, there might be a little mess to mop up but at least the dunny won’t be overflowing with unflushable turds.
Which is not to say France today was an unflushable turd. More a series of bloodless coups as the swell couldn’t quite find accommodation on the La Graviere sandbars and surfers schlepped around under delicate sunshine in curvaceous but soul destroying closeouts. Kind of the opposite to what French stud Andre Breton aimed for in his second Surrealist Manifesto: an attempt to liberate the imagination by the “long, immense, reasoned derangement of the senses”.
This was more a long, immense period of semi-sedation waiting for something to happen, knowing it would eventually but not knowing when and in the meantime having to settle for long stretches of mediocrity.
Italo got marooned in the lineup, going down to J-Flo with a super weird ending.
Owen pipped Stu K on the strength of one wave and Kolohe downed Bede.
It took the inscrutable talent of Miguel Pupo to finally crack the day open after lighting up two nugs in two minutes comboing Adriano. Inscrutable to me that he is not Top 10 surfer every year.
I carry the burden of a secret dread of a Jordy world Title. I don’t know why. Examining my heart of hearts I think it’s because he surfs worse now than when he came on tour with promises of an unfulfilled rivalry with Dane Reynolds.
And he’s never mastered heavy water, or even appeared to care. But I’d got my head around it based on performances in the post-heat pressers. The parables of Jordy Smith. The loaves of bread etc etc. No need to now. Marc Lacomare sent him packing with two solid tube-rides and Jordy’s world title goose is cooked.
You seen the YouTube clip of the German CoastGuard intern on his first day on the job? Check it here. Left alone with all the radar in the emergency room he gets the mayday call from a sinking ship.
“Mayday, mayday, can you hear us. We are sinking!”
“Hello, this is the German CoastGuard.”
“We are sinking!”
“What… are you sinking about?”
Somehow this cockamamie communication mix-up reminds of pro surfing, no?
With the top six let loose in Indonesian surf we might finally see the performances and the progression we only see as exception becoming the rule. Top six at time of writing is Jordy, JJF, Julian, Wilko, Owen, Adriano. Make it top eight and we get Filipe and Medina. Tell me that prospect doesn’t tantalise as a spectator.
What is pro surfing – Sophie, Joe, Dirk Z- thinking about? We know of one prong of the strategy, the wavepool, and that has commanded the attention of the surf world and rightly so.
The other prong of the strategy, the yang to that yin, being the Superbowl title showdown in the Mentawais has flown under the radar. That is red meat to the base.That prospect does excite the jaded freelancer. A turd I would gladly polish. With the top six let loose in Indonesian surf with an appropriate format we might finally see the performances and the progression we only see as exception becoming the rule. Top six at time of writing (Pre France-adjusted) is Jordy, JJF, Julian, Wilko, Owen, Adriano. Make it top eight and we get Filipe and Medina. Tell me that prospect doesn’t tantalise as a spectator. That it wouldn’t finally and irrevocably flush away the memory of a thousand unflushable round two turds and closeout contests.
Kelly gets the wildcard. That is only fair.
I am a warrior for pro surfing justice. I want a return on my spectating investment. I want the high, the refined and the metaphysical to triumph over the coarse and the corporeal. If that makes me an enemy of the people, then so be it.
John Florence and Ethan Ewing got a fresh clock after sitting motionless in a glassy ocean for 20 minutes. Counter-revolutionary forces in the judging panel refused a 10-point ride after John greased a buttery landing following a yuuuuggge backside rotation. Not, as Ronnie claimed, as good as Italo’s Gold Coast effort but easily the best controlled high air in 2017. A sign that John will not dish up conservative surfing in the home straight to the title. The second air was a flat spin Hail Mary and over-scored. But no harm no foul. It mattered not.
Nothing against snowflakes but I am a warrior for pro surfing justice. I want a return on my spectating investment. I want the high, the refined and the metaphysical to triumph over the coarse and the corporeal. If that makes me an enemy of the people, then so be it.
Fanning and Parkinson turned up the dial on classic QLD power surfing. More delight than derangement of the senses.
We’re into round four on a slowly dropping swell and gorgeous afternoon light. I meant to go up, up and away but I drank a big bowl of Kava and went…sideways… and fell into a K hole. Second day in a row France puts me on the canvas. We’ll have to hammer this out below the line. Where the real work gets done.
No, I’m back after a thirty minute nap. Fanning, Parko and Florence in silky soft focus french beachbreaks. Styles, techniques, generations.
Whatever WSL is sinking, France must stay.
Quiksilver Pro France Round 3 Results:
Heat 1: Owen Wright (AUS) 13.50 def. Stuart Kennedy (AUS) 8.60
Heat 2: Kolohe Andino (USA) 11.80 def. Bede Durbidge (AUS) 11.23
Heat 3: Miguel Pupo (BRA) 16.30 def. Adriano de Souza (BRA) 10.17
Heat 4: Caio Ibelli (BRA) 14.33 def. Frederico Morais (PRT) 9.60
Heat 5: Sebastian Zietz (HAW) 14.33 def. Michel Bourez (PYF) 5.73
Heat 6: Marc Lacomare (FRA) 14.10 def. Jordy Smith (ZAF) 13.00
Heat 7: John John Florence (HAW) 19.16 def. Ethan Ewing (AUS) 14.50
Heat 8: Mick Fanning (AUS) 16.24 def. Jeremy Flores (FRA) 16.00
Heat 9: Joel Parkinson (AUS) 15.77 def. Ian Gouveia (BRA) 14.77
Heat 10: Gabriel Medina (BRA) 15.90 def. Leonardo Fioravanti (ITA) 8.53
Heat 11: Joan Duru (FRA) 12.63 def. Adrian Buchan (AUS) 12.27
Heat 12: Nat Young (USA) 14.73 def. Matt Wilkinson (AUS) 14.43
Quiksilver Pro France Round 4 Results:
Heat 1: Miguel Pupo (BRA) 14.80, Owen Wright (AUS) 12.33, Kolohe Andino (USA) 11.60
Heat 2: Marc Lacomare (FRA) 15.43, Caio Ibelli (BRA) 9.87, Sebastian Zietz (HAW) 9.07
Heat 3: John John Florence (HAW) 18.56, Mick Fanning (AUS) 17.03, Joel Parkinson (AUS) 11.37
Heat 4: Gabriel Medina (BRA) 14.43, Nat Young (USA) 11.33, Joan Duru (FRA) 8.67
Quiksilver Pro France Round 5 Match-Ups:
Heat 1: Owen Wright (AUS) vs. Sebastian Zietz (HAW)
Heat 2: Caio Ibelli (BRA) vs. Kolohe Andino (USA)
Heat 3: Mick Fanning (AUS) vs. Joan Duru (FRA)
Heat 4: Nat Young (USA) vs. Joel Parkinson (AUS)
Longtom stop being such a c@nt. We get it …. you dont like Jordy and love Aussies. Go drive a fcking bus off a cliff while clutching your VB.
Sell the People what they want is how the saying goes, I do believe. Good chance American (including Hawaii) viewership (live and recorded) makes up around 50% of total actual
fanning did an air
What’s Jordy’s safe word?
Well yes but it would be like, well let us take a leaf from shearer’s quote-a-thon method and invoke Samuel Beckett: “I can’t go on, I’ll go on.”
Contract toilet cleaner- stop it Longtom. You’re Winston Wolfe!
“Counter-revolutionary forces in the judging panel refused a 10-point ride after John greased a buttery landing following a yuuuuggge backside rotation.” You are spoiling us LT
I think the WSL judges read Porta’s interview on Beachgrit, and are now just totally confused
Because as Porta explained, it depends which surfer is doing the manoeuvre, and how each competitor has their own scoring scale
Oh would they please stop victimizing poor France! Have our people not been persecuted enough?!
thank fucken god.
is it me or did the wsl just change their website to make it worse than it already was?
A question for cricket aficionados. Is Jordy Smith the Shane Watson of surfing?
I’d say he’s more the ‘Glenn Maxwell’ of surfing. Moments of brilliance (usually outside the contest), totally overhyped and a whiny bitch when beaten.
Fair call. Was thinking along the lines of huge talent, cracks under presssure and fatal technical flaw.
How the fuck did Lacamore win that heat? Two ho-hum closeout barrels snuck out of beat like 5 well-surfed waves? I can get barreled in glassy hollow beachbreaks. I can’t string together multiple full-rail wraps at speed. I know we’re all supposed to bitch that Jordy gets overscored but that heat makes no damn sense.
Toobs must beat biltong high wraps.
I was thinking today about how many opportunities they miss to delve into local culture/history etc. It could be a proper tour of the world instead of “who could sink the most cans when you were competing, Pottz?” at every single stop.
What? You don’t think how many ‘skulldrags’ consumed after the Fiji contest is culture?
Is he Spanish now?
*joan joan
*Jean Jean?
Strung out on lasers and slash-back blazers?
France is a tour stop The People™ can relate to. Not otherworldly like the Pacific leg, not infectious like Brazil. A good, honest castle made of sand for the battlers.
Have claims made a come back or have I just not been paying attention?
Claims of note from Italo, Pupo and Duru.
It’s so For The People™ I hear that Thomas Piketty was watching from the Beach!
I heard he was looking over Richie Porta’s shoulder, helping to lower the gap between rich and poor.
Result= judges’ scoring unchanged, head judge now called RichPor.
I do think every media outlet is guilty of the French stereotypes. Is it possible for a story to be written, a video to be made, without strangled French phrases, Juliette Greco or Edith Piaf soundtracks and references to those damn white bread sticks?
Where is humor without stereotypes?
i dont know. i lived in france for awhile. every fucking person is walking around with a backpack full of baguettes and they play edith piaf and accordian music all the damn time in bars.
which jiu jitsu guy are you suppose to be?
Where in France? All I heard was Arabic and African-themed hip-hop. But, yeah, I concede. The bread sticks are popular.
Oh, just Paris.
As we both know, there’s Paris and there’s… Paris. Y’live in the Disneyland part or the grittier, dirtier, sexier 19th etc?
The not gritty 17th. Love me the 19th though. Good Sri Lankan, lovely canals.
I learned two important lessons while watching the broadcast-
1) lakey Peterson has been on tour for five years.
2) Laird revolutionized the sport of surfing.
Lakey will be world champ in 2018. You heard it here on Beach Grit.
Do you think we started something? With Filipe coaching Lakey?
Do you know that I was Lakeys first coach when she was 7 in Oz!!! Actual fact so forget Felipe!!
Are you saying Medina’s 6.93 was a little undercooked?
Nice Hedwig reference… great movie
Friday the 13th