Gabriel Medina looking lethal as he heads into 2011 Billabong Pipe Masters Quarter-finals
The 11th stop of 2011 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Tour as well as the final leg of Vans Triple Crown of Surfing series, Billabong Pipe Masters, continued at the surf reef break of Oahu, Hawaii, on Friday, December 9, as the
surfers battled it out for survival in the demanding waves that were on offer. After getting through a series of intense battles, some of which featured huge upsets, courtesy of the local talent, the competition came down to the fourth heat of Round 5, pitting
the formidable Brazilian talent, Gabriel Medina, against Hawaii’s Shane Dorian.
As the man-on-man concluded, Medina stood victorious with his place in the Quarter-finals confirmed through a performance that could hardly be termed anything below impressive after taking the conditions on offer into account. Dorian, on the other hand,
had been nothing short of disappoint and therefore ended up getting eliminated from the competition.
The firing 10-foot barrels being offered by the Banzai Pipeline were not to be taken lightly, something that the surfers had learned over the course of two days. They were still having a tough time despite spending a lot of time in the conditions at hand,
which highlighted the amount of difficulty in adjusting to the huge size and force of the waves.
Faltering in the fourth round due, both Medina and Dorian found themselves facing each other in a battle for survival and Quarter-final spot. With the pressure of elimination hanging over their head, neither of the two surfers was expected to go down without
putting up a determined fight.
However, the effort made by Dorian was nothing to write home about as he completely succumbed to the pressure of the battle and failed to adjust to the big waves. He managed to collect several poor scores, earning a 1.93 off his first and 0.37 off his second
business-wave to finish with a heat-total of 2.30 points.
Beating such a small target proved to be a piece of cake for the 17-year-old Brazilian prodigy, Medina. He scored a couple of fours to finish with a heat-total of 9.23 points and earn a convincing victory over his rival. While the score and performance were
definitely below the standards that the Brazilian had created for himself over the last few months, they seemed to be an over-kill under the circumstances.
Talking to a reporter later in the day, Medina said, “That was a fun heat with three guys in the water. I’m just stoked to be here. This is my first contest at Pipe and I’m so happy. It’s amazing to be out there. I’ve been here for a month and yesterday
was the first day Pipe was breaking. This is only my second day at Pipe and I’m trying out my boards now. Yesterday I got some waves and I feel confident and hopefully I can get some better waves in my next heat.”
The young Brazilian sensation had been making waves in surfing competitions throughout the year and had managed to earn the boasting rights for prevailing over the likes of America’s legendary surfer and the 2011 ASP World Tour Champion Kelly Slater and
other heavy weights of surfing since his inception into the elite tour following the September cut. Slater had fallen victim to Medina not once but twice in the last three-to-four months.
Coming down to the last stop of the season, it seemed Medina was all set to finish the season with a bang and his convincing victory over Dorian served to reinforce this expectation. The battles were bound to get even more rough in the Quarter-final and
the following stages of the competition, but the young Brazilian sensation had made it clear on more than one occasion that he was more than capable of taking any challenge head-on.
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