Adriano de Souza downs Owen Wright to enter Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast Semi-finals – Surfing News
Brazil’s Adriano de Souza got the better of Australia’s Owen Wright in the first Quarter-final of Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast that went down at Snapper Rocks in Queensland, Australia, on Sunday, March 4, to advance through into the Semi-finals.
The 25-year-old De Souza had been putting on an exceptional show at the primary event site throughout the course of the event despite the challenging small size of the waves. The presence of the best surfers from around the globe in the competition field
seemed to hardly intimidate him, instead motivating him to push himself even harder to perform better and score higher.
Pitted against De Souza in the first Quarter-final, Wright clearly had his work cut out for him. The 22-year-old Australian had been one of the stand-out performers in the 2011 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Tour, reaching the finals on
several occasions to face America’s iconic surfer Kelly Slater. However, he was failing to find that sort of form during the initial rounds of the first stop on the 2012 ASP World Tour in Snapper Rocks, with his performances being quite inconsistent.
As the first Quarter-final got underway in clean two-to-three foot waves, all eyes were on De Souza due to his deadly form. However, Wright managed to put his local knowledge of the waves to use and detect an incoming juicy wave in time to beat his rival
to it and scored an 8.00 off it to take the lead, much to the delight of the crowd.
As the heat progressed, the Australian surfer added an additional 5.73 points to his account to take his heat-total to 13.73 points.
De Souza got off to a modest start, but gradually built momentum to make a strong charge in the final minutes of the heat. Locking his first business-wave, he unloaded a series of exquisite manoeuvres to post a 9.00 on the score-board. Catching another wave
just moments before the buzzer went off, the Brazilian surfer added an additional 7.43 points to his account. The result heat-total of 16.43 points earned him a convincing victory over Wright to take him through into the Semi-finals while bringing the competition
to an end for the latter.
Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast presented by Land Rover continued to treat the fans to thrilling surfing action with the remaining Quarter-finals on Sunday.
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