Day three analysis, Corona Open Mexico, “Aussie pro surfing’s Darkest Day. A savage indictment on the Surfing Australia/HPC surfing industrial complex, tasked with translating Aussie taxpayer money into a pipeline of champions!”

And, honest question, is anyone in this event surfing as good as AI in 2006? Apart from Carissa in her division.

I am a gullible prick/sheeple. Swallowed the Carlos Casteneda Mexican shaman hoax holus bolus, ate up Kelly’s bold prediction of a twelfth title run via back to back wins in Mexico and Tahiti before storming home at Trestles.

When it comes to world views I’ll choose the most aesthetically pleasing and nothing seemed as good looking/absurd to me this time yesterday as a Kelly Title in 2021.

Three minutes to go against Italo and needing a 7.27, Kelly spikes an overhead wall with the classic karate snap, still the best top turn in the game, before blitzing a carving three-o.

Falls. Like Tahiti, like Australian Pro Surfing.

A very, very disappointing end.

Judges called Italo’s waves almost exactly a point better, wave for scoring wave, than Kelly’s.

Harsh, but true.

Kelly’s dream, our separate reality, crushed by a fire hydrant-sized bastion of Brazilian progressivism.

With Tahiti gone and the regular season done, so goes Owen Wright, Wade Carmichael, Ace, Jack Freestone, Connor O’leary, plus the previous New Chapterers of Mikey Wright, and Julian Wilson.

I think Ethan Ewing survives by the skin of his pepi.

That’s a wholesale slaughter, Aussie pro surfing’s Darkest Day. A savage indictment on the Surfing Australia/HPC surfing industrial complex, tasked with translating Aussie taxpayer money into a continuing pipeline of champions.

Will they be able to retrofit the non-industrialised Morgs into their organisation to claim success out of massive failure?

Ewing couldn’t find the extra gear to knock out Medina, despite every advantage under the sun, most pertinently a very brittle looking Medina.

This is not the Gabe we saw on Finals Day at Narrabeen. The make rate has slipped and with it confidence.

Which one went first is a chicken and egg argument.

Not only is the confidence low but the previous iron-clad heat strategy looks shot. He surfed scrappy insiders against Deivid Silva, let him go on the all the bombs and couldn’t claw back the deficit in wave quality.

That’s three major chokes in three events. Surf Ranch, Olympics and now Mexico. This is the shakiest front runner we’ve ever seen, to mangle a metaphor: swimming covered in tuna oil in shark infested waters.

Toledo’s brain fades this year likewise do not inspire confidence despite Trestles being his happiest of happy places. Italo looks the most solid of contenders but the soft rollers and long lulls of a typical southern-hemi day at Trestles conspire against the hyper-active Ferreira modus operandi.

Italo called his heat win against Kelly a “nice heat” and seemed suitably understated as the Goat seethed nearby, one more slow dimming light extinguished on the long slow fade out we are privileged to witness.

No Olympics has to burn, both personally for Kelly and for the sport itself.

An injured John John was a non-event, a fully fit Kelly would have been massive as far as the mainstream media goes. Huge, huge story. The fully fledged reco both Kelly and Elo crave. The antithesis of being pinned against the glass by a babbling Kaipo in front of a tiny audience of fellow gullible pricks and prickettes.

One Australian in the quarter final, which is about or just above the year average. Robbo looks good. Very repertoire heavy, like Mateus Herdy, and unlike Ethan Ewing. Not afraid to go above the lip first turn, which seems strange in 2021, fifteen years after AI did it in the final.

Honest question: is anyone in this event surfing as good as AI in 2006?

Apart from Carissa in her division.

Italo is smashing it repeatedly but each turn means less when you lose count of them. Leo, Herdy, Jack Robbo? No one looks completely in charge of their own destiny. Robbo looks closest with his so-called “peaceful warrior” demeanour, which he confirmed was an “energy you need to have” and was so esoteric that it was “too complicated to explain”.

Don’t hold back Jack, you are amongst your own people here.

We are psychedelic literate and understand how sideways shit can go in the tropics when you follow the lightning flash of plant-based inspiration.