Surf fans rub hands in giddy excitement after Maui’s Jackson Bunch locks down final WSL Championship Tour slot

"I can’t wait to go into Pipe wearing my name on my back."

It’s all set, ladies and gents. The 2025 World Surf League Championship Tour draw officially official with the final day of Saquarema squarely in the bag and can you feel the buzz? That growing hysteria? The excitement palpable in each corner of this earth except the Wright house where consternation reigns. Everywhere else, though, the thrill is real.

Of course you already know that the Pride of Canada, one Erin Brooks, has joined the big time on the women’s side of the draw. The men’s sees the first Maui-bred surfer to take a swing since Dustin Payne.

Not counting Imaikalani DeVault.

Jackson Bunch, who hails from Pāʻia on the Valley Isle’s north shore, scooted in at the buzzer after Frenchman Marco Mignot beat America’s Levi Slawson who I’m assuming would have been “him” had he won. Bunch had fallen out in the round of 64 citing two painful eye infections.

He and his friends celebrated in the warm Brazilian waters, at the end, the bright lights of Abu Dhabi no longer glittering dream but reality.

“I can’t believe it. I’m at a loss for words. It’s just incredible to be here with all of my friends […] I can’t wait to go into pipe wearing my name on my back,” the handsome fella declared.

Now the draw is set, how excited are you for the end of January to roll around? Our newly minted class of ’25 will take on the Banzai Pipeline, first, before being whisked more than halfway across the world to the aforementioned United Arab Emirates capital. After that, plentiful fossil fuels are burned to ferry the best surfers in the world to Europe then Central America then Australia then America then Brazil, South Africa, French Polynesia and finally Fiji. No telling if Bunch will be on tour, at the finish, but, for now, hope springs eternal.

Mabruk.