Evan Valiere surrenders to Michel Bourez in third Quarter-final of 2011 Billabong Pipe Masters
Tahiti’s Michel Bourez got the better of Hawaii’s Evan Valiere in the third Quarter-final of 2011 Billabong Pipe Masters in Memory of Andy Irons that went down at the famed Banzai Pipeline in Oahu, Hawaii, on Saturday, December 10, bringing an excellent
run by the latter to a halt.
The conditions at the primary event site had not become any less challenging for the surfers, though the four-to-eight foot waves on offer provided the surfers with an ample opportunity to impress the crowd and judges. The fate of the battles continued to
depend on how well the surfers adjusted to the demanding waves while pursuing competitive scores in order to increase their chances of staying alive in the final event of the 2011 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Tour, which also happened to
be the last leg of the three-event Vans Triple Crown of Surfing series.
The 25-year-old Bourez had done exceptionally well to stay alive in the competition so far, exhibiting a promising form in nearly all his heats to eventually make his way into the Quarter-finals. Gaining confidence from his successes in the previous rounds,
the Tahiti-based surfer braced himself to square off with his next competitor, Valiere.
The Hawaiian talent had reached the Quarter-final after disposing of the formidable Australian force and former event champion Taj Burrow in the fifth round, a feat that served to make him an imminent threat in the following stages of the competition.
As the battle got underway, Valiere drew first blood with a poor 1.33-point wave and soon followed it up with another mediocre wave-score of 2.33 points to reach a heat-total of 3.66 points. Despite a determined hunt, he was unable to improve his scores
and therefore remained in a vulnerable state throughout the course of the heat.
Bourez had gotten off to a slow start as the conditions kept him on the back-foot. Almost half-way through the heat, he caught a wave and tried pulling off a few tricks on it, but it did not go the way he had hoped and was only able to post a 3.60 on the
score-board as a result. In the later stages of the heat, he rode a wave for 4.10 points, taking his heat-total to 7.70 points and consequently sealing the fate of the battle.
With a coveted Quarter-final win, Bourez advanced through into the Semi-finals to face the winner of the fourth Quarter-final between Australia’s Kieren Perrow and Brazil’s Gabriel Medina.
For more updates on the Quarter-finals of 2011 Billabong Pipe Masters, stay tuned to bettor.com.
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