Owen Wright and Heitor Alves jump into Round 3 at Billabong Pro Tahiti
Australia’s Owen Wright and Brazil’s Heitor Alves advanced directly into the third round at Billabong Pro Tahiti, the fifth of ten stops on the 2012 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Championship Tour, after claiming top honours in their respective
Round 1 heats that went down at Teahupo’o at Taiarapu, Tahiti, on Thursday, August 16.
Australia’s Yadin Nicol finished behind his compatriot Wright in runner-up place during the ninth heat, while Brazil’s Alejo Muniz had to settle for a third-place. Failing to clinch victory led to their relegation to the second round, having to surf another
heat to earn a place in Round 3.
The 10th heat saw Australia’s Matt Wilkinson and his fellow countryperson Julian Wilson fail to keep Alves from walking away with the win, thus getting forced to take a trip to the second round.
The shifty three-to-five foot waves breaking at the primary event site had offered a great deal of opportunity for the elite surfers to put on exquisite performances during the morning session, but the going got tough once the opening day entered the afternoon
session. Big scores just stopped coming easily, causing the surfers to push hard for a decent score.
Pitted against Nicol and Muniz in the ninth heat, Wright put on an energetic performance to steal the show. The Australian sensation got down to work right from the word go and collected a 6.83 off his first business-wave. He eventually added an additional
7.13 points to his account in the dying minutes of the heat to finish with a heat-total of 13.96 points.
Nicol finished in second place with a heat-total of 10.53 points, while Muniz scored a 1.23 and 5.67 off his best-two waves to finish with a heat-total of 6.90 points.
The 10th heat turned out to be a relatively low-scoring affair with all three competitors struggling to get hold of big scores.
Alves eventually managed to find a 5.67 and 3.83-point ride, thus finishing with a resultant heat-total of 9.50 points. The score held up until the end to seal the fate of the battle in his favour.
Wilkinson finished in second place with a two-wave total of 9.46 points, while Wilson had to settle for third place after registering a heat-total of 2.57 points.
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