Jordy Smith and Aritz Aranburu make the quarter-finals cut at Mr Price Pro Ballito – Surfing news
South Africa’s Jordy Smith and Basque Country’s Aritz Aranburu secured their place in the quarter-finals at the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) Prime Mr Price Pro Ballito after walking away with top honours from their respective Round 5 (Round
of 16) heats that went down at Ballito, South Africa.
Smith claimed a convincing victory over his fellow compatriot Beyrick De Vries in the third heat of Round 5 to make his way through into the next round.
Aranburu, on the other hand, finished on top of Reunion Island’s Maxime Huscenot to make the quarter-final cut, bringing the competition to a premature end for his rival in the process.
Powerful two-metre surf greeted the surfers on the latest day of Mr Price Pro Ballito, presenting them with a fair bit of challenge as they took each other on in man-on-man battles for a place in the next stage of the competition.
Smith, current World No.4, found himself involved in a local affair as he found himself locking horns with De Vries for the quarter-final spot.
The crowd had huge expectations off Smith and he definitely did not leave them disappointed. He exhibited some smooth backhand surfing during the course of the battle. His best scores of 7.50 and 6.93, which took him to a heat-total of 14.43 points, came
in the final minutes of the heat.
De Vries did not look in the best of forms and only managed to get a 4.13 and 5.17 off his best-two waves, thus finishing with a heat-total of 9.30 points. The score was evidently inadequate and consequently forced him to surrender victory to his rival.
“I’ve been watching Beyrick’s surfing for a long time, he’s a tough competitor, ‘AKA’ he’s very cheeky,” Smith said. “I went out there thinking I would be doing open face turns but the wind made it bumpy and there’s a lot of chop on the faces, so you have
to pick your sections and hold on.”
The fourth heat pitted Aranburu against Huscenot in a man-on-man battle for survival.
The Basque Country surfer got off to an impressive start and did not take too long to get into a dominating position, courtesy of a 7.83 off his first business-wave. In the final minutes of the heat, he added an additional 7.83 points to his account, thus
moving to a heat-total of 15.66 points.
Huscenot scored a 4.50 and 3.90 off his top-two waves for a heat-total of 8.40 points, which led to his defeat and thus elimination from the competition.
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