Heitor Alves and Kelly Slater triumph in Round 3 of Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast – Surfing News
Brazil’s Heitor Alves and America’s Kelly Slater claimed top honours in the third round of Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast presented by Land Rover, first stop of the 2012 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Tour, which went down at Snapper Rocks in
Queensland, Australia, on Monday, February 27.
Alves took the win over France’s Jeremy Flores in the fifth heat to secure a spot in Round 4, removing the latter from the contention for the event title.
The sixth heat saw Slater put on yet another spectacular performance to down Hawaii’s Fredrick Patacchia to qualify for Round 4 while eliminating the latter from the event.
With absolutely no room for a hiccup, the surfers entered the clean two-to-three foot waves to put on their best performance to continue their pursuit of the event title.
As the fifth heat got underway, Alves put on quite an impressive performance. Detecting a juicy set halfway through the heat, the Brazilian quickly paddled towards it and rode it for a 7.27. He immediately backed it up with a 7.80-point wave to get to a
heat-total of 15.07 points.
Flores remained busy throughout the heat, searching for an adequate score, but only managed to get to a heat-total of 12.84 points, comprising of a 5.67 and 7.17-point wave. As a result, he was forced to concede victory to Alves.
The sixth heat featured an outstanding performance by the 11-time ASP World Tour Slater. The 40-year-old Floridian posted a 7.93 on the score-board off his business-wave and immediately backed it up with an 8.43-point wave to finish with a heat-total of
16.36 points.
Patacchia failed to rise up to the challenge presented by his intimidating rival and eventually finished with a heat-total of 12.40 points, which included a 6.00 and 6.40-point wave.
“I could see that Freddy’s (Patacchia) game plan was to sit and wait for those open faced waves,” Slater said. “I just wanted to get moving. There are a few sneaky ones that don’t look good at the peak, but grow down the point. At the start I fell on a couple
of good ones, and either one of those could have been a good score. Then I got into a couple of good ones and got some scores, and Freddy never really got into it. Everyone always makes a big deal about weather I’m going to keep going on.”
The surfing action continued at Snapper Rocks with the remaining Round 3 heats of Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast presented by Land Rover on Monday.
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