Jay Quinn and Jack Freestone bounce back in Round 5 at Mr Price Pro Ballito
New Zealand’s Jay Quinn and Australia’s Jack Freestone advanced through into the fifth round (Round of 16) at the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) Prime Mr Price Pro Ballito after emerging triumphant in their respective Round 4 (Round of 24) heats
that went down at Willard Beach in KwaDukuza, South Africa, on Saturday, July 7.
Quinn got his place confirmed in the next round after getting the better of Hawaii’s Sebastien Zietz in the seventh heat, consequently bringing the competition to a premature end for the latter.
The eighth heat saw Freestone claim a convincing victory over Brazil’s David do Carmo to move through into the next round of the competition while removing the latter from the contention for the event title.
The latest day of the competition saw one-metre waves on offer at the primary event site. There was enough juice in the waves to tempt the surfers to dig deep in their arsenal of tricks and pull out some of their most technical tricks.
Quinn and Zietz found themselves pitted against each other in a man-on-man battle for survival during the seventh heat of the fourth round. Both the surfers had failed to make a solid impact during their previous heat and thus faced a do-or-die situation
in their latest challenge. An intense battle was expected as there was much at stake.
The showdown went down to the wire as the two surfers desperately searched for decent scores. In the end, it was Quinn who managed to seal the fate of the bout in his favour with a heat-total of 12.60 points against Zietz’s two-wave total of 12.40 points.
The battle for the last remaining spot in the fifth round featured Freestone and do Carmo. Both the surfers had looked impressive during the first two rounds of the competition, but a hiccup in Round 3 led to their relegation to the fourth round, where they
faced a must-win situation.
As the battle for a place in the fifth round got underway, Freestone wasted very little time in taking control of the heat with his solid surfing. He eventually finished with a heat-total of 12.84 points. Do Carmo failed to come up with a decent response
and only managed to get to a two-wave total of 9.40 points, consequently conceding victory to his rival and sending him through into the next round.
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