Kai Otton and Dusty Payne remain alive after Round 2 of Rip Curl Pro Portugal – 2011 ASP World Tour
The beach-break of Supertubos in Peniche, Portugal, continued to play host to the latest Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Tour event, Rip Curl Pro Portugal, on Monday, October 17, with Australia’s Kai Otton taking on Brazil’s Raoni Monteiro
in the ninth, while Hawaii’s Dusty Payne squared off with Brazil’s Jadson Andre in the tenth heat of Round 2.
The ninth heat turned out to be an intense affair as both Monteiro and Otton put up a determined fight to stay alive in the competition. In the end, however, the latter managed to edge past his rival and walk away with top honours, consequently securing
a place in the next round while bringing the competition to a premature end for his rival.
The tenth heat saw Payne put up a dominating performance to down Andre and advance through into the next round, eliminating the latter from the competition in the process.
The second round continued to cut off heads as the day progressed, but the sight was not a depressing one for the crowd as they got treated to a series of thrilling contests featuring the elite ASP surfers.
With the pressure of elimination hanging over his head, Otton stepped into the arena to face Monteiro. As the battle commenced, both the surfers got off to a slow start, taking their time to get used to the conditions and waiting for a juicy wave to appear.
Carrying out a determined hunt throughout the entirety of the 30-minute heat, the Brazilian gathered a heat-total of 13.93 points. Otton struggled to find an adequate response to his opponent’s performance in the initial stages of the heat. However, the
Australian eventually got blessed with a couple of really juicy waves, which he utilised to get to a heat-total of 14.97 points, consequently moving ahead of his rival on the score-board and sealing the fate of the contest in his favour.
The next heat featured an exquisite performance by the 22-year-old Payne as he competed with Andre for the Round 3 spot and hence survival. Both the surfers needed to do better than they had done yesterday and couldn’t afford another lacklustre performance.
Payne seemed to have done some serious thinking overnight and turned out to be in a completely form on Monday, giving his Brazilian rival no chance of taking the win.
As the battle kicked off, the Hawaiian went down to work right away and locked a wave to earn 8.83 points off it. He later added an additional 7.80 points to his account and finishing with a heat-total of 16.63 points.
Andre failed to get a good start and even though he collected a 7.67 off a wave in the final minutes of the heat, he was unable to follow it up with another competitive score, consequently finishing with a heat-total of 12.27 points. As a result, he had
no choice but to surrender victory to Payne while getting eliminated from the competition himself.
For more updates on Round 2 of Rip Curl Pro Portugal, stay tuned to bettor.com.
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