Welcome to the Tahiti pro. Be ready for a fun 12 days of waiting period with nothing on the forecast to live up to last year’s frenzy. Still Teahupoo is Teahupoo, a princess that needs to be respected on any given day. I won’t treat this event with a jaded “it would have been so much better in 10 ft waves” perspective, I’ll just cover the facts and let my hordes of followers (7 of yous now) know what I’m seeing heat after heat.

First, about the trials: shittiest conditions in 13 years so I won’t talk much about it. I’m having trouble finding footage anyway. I’ll just mention that Anthony Walsh is through to the main event alongside one of my favorite surfers, Alain Riou, who comes out of those trials victorious for the second time, 10 years after his first win. Bien joué Alain! Good luck to both of them, they are both incredible barrel riders.

About the J.O.B/Santos incident: a deep and sincere FUCK YOU to all of those bored-ass people that tried to blow it out of proportion or make it a racial thing just to have something to talk about on their social timelines. Two frustrated competitors fight in the water… NO.FUCKING.BIG.DEAL. Come on, I’m not trying to minimize things, but all of them ignorant fucks that got outraged or dared calling those two or three punches violence need to stick their spoiled heads out their spoiled ass and learn a thing or two about what true violence really is.

And fuck the ones who tried to use this incident to justify their bigotry against Brazilians or Hawaiians. No, Brazilians aren’t hustling more in the water than the average Australian or than any other surfing nations in the world. No, Hawaiians aren’t more violent than their mainland US counterparts or than any other surfing nation in the world. Also, to all Hawaiians who backed up their boy on the only fact that he is one of yours: your useless gang mentality is fucked up. And to all the Brazilians that felt disrespected by J.O.B’s actions: same thing, you weren’t on the receiving end of the punch yourself, your own pride wasn’t at stake here, nor was your country’s so chill the fuck out.

Now, with all that being said, I’ll be closely monitoring Santos’ season on the North Shore this winter as O’Brien’s apologies kind of seemed to have been forced upon him. Still, fuck all of those assholes who tried to make a big deal out of an incident that barely would have been mentioned if it would have happened in some other sports.

The surfing community is sometimes the only reason why surfing still remains a small sport: we are a bunch of brats that cannot deal with anything out of the ordinary like grown-ups.

Enough with the rant. Let’s see what was in store for us during this opening day of competition at the end of the road.

Round 1 – Heat 1

Nat Young/Bede Durbridge/Pat Gudauskas

Nat Young’s crazy air drop was insane, you have to watch it! He couldn’t stay in the mix for the win though. Tight game between Bede and Patrick. Bede caught the best wave and deserved to go through in my opinion. But I didn’t care that much about the result to be honest as I couldn’t completely focus on the surfing during this first heat… I spent the whole 35 minutes trying to re-adapt to Turpel’s extremely nasal surfysurfy talk (without any success) and getting over the fact that GT tried his absolute best to look like South Park’s Mr Slave. Have a look at him in his interviews and tell me how close he got to the pic below…

Good Job GT, you are outdoing yourself at every contest as a part of the ASP folklore.

Round 1 – Heat 2

Taj Burrow/Nathan Hedge/Matt Wilkinson

Hedgehog was tearing the clean Tahiti lefthanders apart like he was back home at North Narra. Great roundhouse cutback in particular. But he got none of the top 5 tubes of the heat, which is a handicap if you want to go through heats in Tahiti. Sorry for stating the obvious here… Taj got off to a good start. He was on the best two waves of the first half of the heat but then tried to back up his best score with turns instead of waiting for better waves. Wilko did wait and got rewarded: two best waves of the 35 minutes went his way late in the heat, with an 8.90 wave that was the absolute dream for the average surfer. Patience paid off and is going to be the smart way to go this year it seems.

Round 1 – Heat 3

Alain Riou/Travis Logie/Jordy Smith

Ok, one add-on to that last thing about catching the best waves being a must. You also have to make them. Stating the obvious again, sorry… Alain Riou got the best wave, an absolute beauty that swallowed him at the last moment… Shame, it would have easily been a high 9 otherwise. Logie got the second and third best waves but couldn’t manage to reach the channel on both occasions. So, not just a wave catching contest after all, positioning and tube riding skills will also be determining. Alright… If you are sick of me being obvious as FUCK today, you can always go back on Surfline I don’t care. Fun moment: Jordy Smith backup score on a righthander. Jordy Smith through to round 3, which is already a good result for him in Tahiti. But he really needs a breakthrough performance at Teahupoo to solidify his title campaign.

Round 1 – Heat 4

Joel Parkinson/Kolohe Andino/Anthony Walsh

Anthony Walsh did take the best wave AND he did make it (an incredible 10 point ride that would have been an 11 or 12 with an open-scale scoring system (it had to be more than 1 point better than Kolohe’s first wave). Problem was, he couldn’t back it up with a decent score. Anyway, Walsh has to be one the best barrel riders of our time. He continuously finds a way to come out of incredibly deep pits. This one was really impressive. I honestly don’t know how he managed to get out from so deep behind the foamball. Parko and Andino did get two good waves each, Parko taking the advantage and going through to round 3.

Round 1 – Heat 5

Kelly Slater/Brett Simpson/Ian Walsh

Good effort by Ian Walsh, great backside tube stance and really sharp turns. Simpo had a good barrel as well, just couldn’t get a second one. Kelly was in the ropes and needed an 8.33 to win this thing. He found a gem towards the very end of the period and got a well deserved 8.5 for a deep barrel, a roundhouse cuttie, a snap and a crazy air reverse attempt literally over dry reef. When that crazy guy needs a score he’s not backing off one bit for anything.

Round 1 – Heat 6

Fred Patacchia/Mick Fanning/Jocelyn Poulou

Patacchia desperately needs a result in this last part of the Pacific leg and was everywhere in this one. He made it out of a few really difficult barrel rides and convincingly beat the defending Tahiti champ, Fanning, that will be under pressure in round 2 against local wildcard Jocelyn Poulou that will be motivated to show more next time around.

Round 1 – Heat 7

Kieren Perrow/Adrian Buchan/Adriano De Souza

Nice heat, undecided until the few last minutes. KP took two bombs in the last 10 minutes and got the best of his two opponents. That guy is a threat anytime in hollow waves. I don’t have a fantasy team but if I had one I would have picked him for sure. Maybe I should join in on this fantasy thing after all. Who do you guys got for this contest? Let me know, I am curious. A few good wipeouts from the surfers in this one, always fun to watch too. I liked Ace’s snap at the end of his first wave as well.

Round 1 – Heat 8

Michel Bourez/Yadin Nichol/Kai Otton

The wind kind of picked up in this heat and the crumbly faces of the waves, combined with the chunky low tide conditions, favored the stocky backside tube styles of both Nichol and Bourez. Yadin got one of the best tubes of the day, after a super steep drop, for a 9+ wave that was enough to make it through to round 3 directly. On the fashion side of things, those pink jerseys really are awful. They remind me of a certain Rugby club in Paris that I don’t like. The Top 14 starts today by the way, if there is any Rugby fan out there. Congrats to Yadin on his heat win, I like that guy.

Round 1 – Heat 9

Gabriel Medina/Alejandro Muniz/Josh Kerr

Muniz seemed to adapt pretty quick from his recent win at the US open to Tahitian barrels as he dropped a good score to open the exchange in that one. Medina took the heat though. I thought his 4 pt wave was overscored but I also thought that his 7pt wave was underscored so I think his final tally of 12.16 was alright. Kerr almost was a non-factor for the most part of the bout until a late 6-pointer. He will be surfing against Pat Gudauskas in Round 2.



Round 1 – Heat 10

Jeremy Flores/C.J. Hobgood/Adam Melling

I am a big Jeremy Flores fan and I loved seeing him come back from yet another foot/ankle injury. It wasn’t sure he would compete in Tahiti but his pigdogging was spot on as always. CJ really was in form though and will be the one advancing straight to round number three. Hobgood looks extremely sharp at the moment, with a special aura about himself: he still is sponsor-less despite amazing performances as of late, he made it clear that he wants to be a force to be reckoned with towards this year’s world title and surfs real good, with more commitment than most. In a word: determined to show the world that he is still there in the mix. His insane attempt at a lip bash on a 4-footer is proof that this guy is in overdrive mode at the moment. Keep on going Ceej, show them all!

Round 1 – Heat 11

John John Florence/Julian Wilson/Miguel Pupo

John John takes over this one and sends Julian and Miguel to round 2, with a 9pt+ barrel and a 7.5 that consisted of three big turns. A 7.5pt might have been a bit too much I have to say. Julian showed good affinity with the lineup and still should go far in this contest. He is up against Muniz in Rd 2.

Round 1 – Heat 12

Damian Hobgood/Sebastian Zietz/Felipe Toledo

Alright, I just wrote about how sharp CJ looked in his heat and I must say that Damian looks even better right now. He is surfing the best he has ever surfed in my opinion. There is definitely a Hobgoood thing going on this year and this contest could really well go to one of the two. Damian’s 7.83 showed a level of confidence and skills in hollow surf that is top notch. Late drop, critical rail readjustment to enter the barrel in an optimal position and then maintaining his line to exit through one of the trickiest barrels of the day. It was the less contested heat of the first round: Zietz and Toledo got to a combined 9.53 to Hobgood’s 13.16.

Stay tuned for round 2 coverage coming up.

