Binnsie

Taj Burrow will take on fellow west coaster, Yadin Nicol in the quarters. Pic ASP

“I’m sitting in the impact zone with no pants on, ten footers breaking on my head, trying to pull my shorts back up my legrope thinking, ‘if my leggie breaks I’m screwed!’” laughs Sunny Garcia. “That wave actually blew my pants off!”

And that says it all about today, the day that Mother Nature bit back at Margaret River. Boards were broken by the dozen, Taj Burrow admitted fairly shitting himself in the first heat of the day, CJ Hobgood went berserk on his backhand, and a huge crowd soaked up some of the biggest competition waves seen in Australia in a long time. Fuel TV beamed the footage live into homes around the country, the event website crashed under weight of traffic, and the juggernaut that is the Drug Aware Pro rolled through 16 heats of old school drop-run-and-rail surfing.


Fanning free falling. Pic ASP

Surfers woke to 10-footers thundering under a heavy sky, and number one seed Taj continued to enjoy the luxury of his number one seed, up first in the cleanest and meanest of the conditions and keeping his bulletproof role going in 2010. Fellow local hero Yadin Nicol was sitting watching the action, thinking he was going to ride a 6’4 when Mick Fanning ran past after a morning freesurf.
“What were you on mate?” asked Yades.
“A 7’0,” laughed the champ, “but I needed a 7’6!” Yadin’s jaw dropped, but nonetheless he stormed through his next heat, and over the course of the morning surfers scrambled to find boards before entering the fray. Mick ended up riding the board Dan Ross won on last year, CJ Hobgood snapped Jake Paterson’s beloved Glen Pang gun he once rode to victory at Sunset, and as well as dropping trou, Sunny Garcia blew two fins out of his seven-footer bottom turning. “Man, the waves definitely have some push, huh,” he grins. And what does he look forward to tomorrow conditions-wise?
“Ha. Onshore, offshore, I don’t care. I just like big waves, so I like it here.”


Yadin Nicol using his local knowledge. Pic ASP

What else happened? The Aussies ripped. Bede Durbo, Ace Buchan and Josh Kerr all joining the two West Aussies in tomorrow’s quarters. Anyone who saw Kerrzy at last night’s Screaming Jets gig – and how good is pub rock, by the way – would have thought him getting out bed today was unlikely, so knocking the world champ out with a buzzer beater was near miraculous, but Josh just laughed it off and took the win.

For the foreign legion it was all about Sunny’s big drops and hacks, Cory Lopez’ monster drop to mid-channel mile-long ride, and CJ Hobgood getting upside-down and torqueing himself through some incredible backhand work to lock in the highest heat and wave totals of the event. His 9.17 was a combination of upside-down hookery and commmited carving, and his back-up 8.0 was the result of an incredible sideways, freefall drop straight into the turn of the contest.


Ace Buchan snuck by Nic Muscroft to book a spot in the quarters. Pic ASP

The local derby kicks things off tomorrow, and expect the whole thing to be wrapped by midday, western time. Get on the webcast or go to your mate-who-has-Fuel’s place, and enjoy the show, cos it’s going to be a helluva good one.


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