Josh Kerr downs Taylor Knox to qualify for Round 3 at Volcom Fiji Pro – Surfing News
Australia’s Josh Kerr put on an impressive performance to get the better of America’s Taylor Knox in the third heat of Volcom Fiji Pro’s Round 2 that went down at the main venue of Cloudbreak in Tavarua, Fiji, on Monday, June 4.
The victory served to add Kerr to the Round 3 line-up while bringing the competition to a premature end for Knox.
“I was worried because the doctor told me my ankle recovery was 8 to 12 weeks out,” Kerr said during his post-heat interview. “It feels super tender and I’m having non-stop work done. It’s really taped up and I don’t have much mobility with it at the moment.
I got bounced up in the barrel and that didn’t feel very good, but I’m happy to get through that one.”
The surfing conditions prevailing at the event site on day 2 of the competition turned out to be quite promising, putting the surfers in clean four-to-six foot waves. Failing to make a solid impact during the opening round of the competition, more than half
of the competition field found themselves competing for survival in man-on-man battles. The clash between the top surfers in the elimination round was expected to be nothing short of exquisite.
The third heat of Round 2 pitted Kerr against Knox in a battle for the Round 3 spot. Both the surfers had failed get a desirable result in their respective Round 1 heat. Finding themselves pushed against the corner, they were expected to make a determined
effort to bounce back, promising plenty of entertainment for the crowd in attendance at the primary event site.
As the battle got underway, Knox got off to a decent start, scoring a 6.23 off his first business-wave to grab an early lead. However, he struggled to back it up with another decent score and only managed to add an additional 2.33 points to his account,
thus reaching a heat-total of 8.56 points.
Kerr got off to a slow start, but continued to build momentum as the heat progressed. Almost halfway through the heat, the 28-year-old Australian caught a juicy left-hander to earn an impressive 8.50 off it. In the final minutes of the heat, he caught a
3.50-point ride to move to a heat-total of 12.00 points, which served to earn him the win.
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