Taylor Knox gets lucky in dying minutes of Round 4 heat at the ASP PRIME Nike Lowers Pro
America’s Taylor Knox continued his solid run of form in Round 4 (Round of 48) of the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) PRIME Nike Lowers Pro, putting on an impressive performance in the clean two-to-three foot waves on offer at the renowned beach-break
of Lower Trestles in San Clemente, California, on Wednesday afternoon, May 2, to advance through into the fifth round (Round of 24).
Hawaii’s John John Florence made his way through into the next round of the competition as well after securing runner-up position in the fourth heat of Round 4.
The appeal of the prestigious PRIME event title, coveted ASP ranking points and an opportunity to win a slice of the huge prize purse had attracted a huge field of surfers, both local as well as international, to Lower Trestles.
Knox, an experienced ASP World Tour veteran, had not been the luckiest with the waves at the event site over the years. His latest trip to Lower Trestles was not turning out to be that different, with him having to surf in wave-starved heats yet again.
Pitted against Florence and his two fellow Hawaiian compatriots Kekoa Bacalso and Kai Barger in the fourth heat, Knox sure had his work cut out for him. The early stage of the four-man battle did not go his way as he struggled to find a decent scoring opportunity.
However, a set of promising waves appeared in the dying minutes of the battle, allowing him to throw down a string of powerful carves to post a near-perfect score of 9.57 points on the score-board. Backing it up with a 6.13-point wave, he finished with a heat-total
of 15.70 points, which carried him off to victory.
“I have the most restarts in ASP history at this spot,” Knox said. “I don’t know how to explain it because I really love this wave and it doesn’t want to love me back. I guess it loved me today. Luckily today it gave me something at the end.”
An in-form Florence was nothing short of impressive during the course of the heat, collecting a couple of scores in the seven-point range to finish with a heat-total of 14.30 points. The score was good enough to put him in second place, thus carrying him
through into the next round.
Bacalso finished third with a two-wave total of 14.17 points, while Barger finished with a heat-total of 6.62 points, which included a penalty for getting an interference call early in the heat. Both the surfers joined the elimination list due to their bottom-two
finish.
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