Matt Wilkinson clinches victory in Round 1 of Rip Curl Pro Search – 2011 ASP World Tour
Australia’s Matt Wilkinson came up with a remarkable performance during the eighth heat of Rip Curl Pro Search San Francisco’s Round 1 that went down at Ocean Beach in San Francisco, America, on Tuesday, November 1. The effort carried him off to victory
and took him straight into the third round.
Tahiti’s Michel Bourez put up a determined fight and refused to give in until the very last minute. Despite all this, he was eventually forced to settle for second place. Brazil’s Raoni Monteiro struggled to find his rhythm and failed to get good scores,
consequently finishing in third place. Deprived of success in the Round 1 heat, both Bourez and Monteiro moved into Round 2 to surf again to earn a place in Round 3.
The 10th of 11 stops on the 2011 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Tour was graced by high-performance three-to-five foot waves on the opening day. This offered the surfers plenty of opportunity to unleash combinations of exciting
tricks, thus treating the crowd to a heavy dose of thrilling action.
Pitted against Bourez and Monteiro in the eighth heat, the 23-year-old Wilkinson went through a series of average scores before locking a wave to pull off a sensational stunt for an 8.43. He soon added another 8.10 points to his account and moved to a heat-total
of 16.53 points, putting his competitors under immense pressure. Despite such a competitive heat-total, the fate of the heat remained uncertain due to the determined hunt of Bourez. However, the Australian remained in the lead until the lead and thus walked
away with top honours.
Commenting on the heat afterwards, Wilkinson said, “It’s hard because you can’t hear any scores out there. I got a fun left to start with and a fun right to back it up. I was feeling solid, but I knew Michel [Bourez] was going mad and I didn’t feel safe.
It was a real fun heat. There’s a ton of paddling but it’s super fun out there and it’s worth it. There are some fun waves.”
Bourez had no intention of losing the Round 3 spot to Wilkinson and kept hunting for the scores required to strip his Australian rival of the advantage, though to no avail. With an 8.33 in his account, the Tahiti-based surfer stood a good chance of getting
his hands on the top position, but he failed to capitalise on the opportunity and struggled to find the necessary wave score. In the end, he finished with a heat-total of 16.23 points, losing to Wilkinson by a mere 0.30 points.
Monteiro failed to make his presence felt in the heat and struggled to get anything solid off the waves that he caught. He eventually finished with a heat-total of 9.10 points, which included a 4.00 and 5.10-point wave.
Bourez and Monteiro headed into Round 2 to face a compete for the Round 3 spot once again, though this time the pressure was much higher as failure meant elimination from the event.
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