Hank Gaskell and Chris Ward clear the ASP 4-Star Vans Pier Classic Quarter-final stage
Hawaii’s Hank Gaskell and America’s Chris Ward continued their excellent forms at the Huntington Beach Pier in California, America, on Sunday, April 1, to claim top honours in their respective Quarter-finals of the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP)
4-Star Vans Pier Classic.
America’s Nathan Yeomans and Australia’s Mitch Crews advanced through into the Semi-final stage of the event as well after claiming first runner-up position in the first and second Quarter-final respectively.
There was a significant improvement in surfing conditions on Sunday, offering the local and international surfers plenty of opportunities to post a big score on the score-board. The crowd kept getting treated to a heavy dose of thrilling action as the surfers
took each other on in four-man battles for the Semi-final slot.
The first Quarter-final saw Gaskell take on his fellow countryman Evan Valiere, America’s Yeomans and Peru’s Cristobal De Col, all of whom had been exhibiting a formidable form over the last few years.
As the four-man battle got underway, Gaskell locked his first business-waves in the opening waves to post an 8.50 on the score-board and immediately followed it up with a 7.00-point wave to finish with a heat-total of 15.50 points.
Yeomans came really close to beating his rival’s heat-total after scoring a 6.50 and an 8.60 off his best-two waves, but was unable to go all the way and thus had to settle for runner-up place.
De Col finished in third place with a heat-total of 9.67 points, whereas Valiere rounded out the bottom-position with a two-wave total of 9.23 points. Both the surfers were consequently eliminated from the competition.
Pitted against his compatriot Tanner Gudauskas, Australia’s Crews and Brazil’s Krystian Kymerson in the second Quarter-final, Ward came up with an impressive performance to take the win.
The American surfer utilised his local knowledge of the waves to post a 7.17 and 6.17 on the score-board in the opening minutes of the four-man battle, finishing with a resultant heat-total of 13.34 points as a result. The score remained unbeatable throughout
the course of the heat to eventually seal the deal in his favour.
Crews made the Semi-final cut as well after securing runner-up place with a heat-total of 12.04 points, which included a 5.67 and 6.37-point wave.
Gudauskas and Kymerson saw their competition come to a premature end after rounding out the bottom-two positions with a heat-total of 8.97 and 8.10 points respectively.
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