Tim Macdonald and Nathan Carvalho advance to Round 3 of Billabong ASP World Junior Championships
Australia’s Tim Macdonald and Hawaii’s Nathan Carvalho successfully extended their life in the Billabong Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Junior Championships by clinching successful result in their respective Round 2 heats that went down
at the iconic Burleigh Heads in Gold Coast, Australia, on Monday, January 23.
With his win in the third heat of Round 2, Macdonald advanced through into the next round, eliminating his fellow countryman Ryan Callinan from the contention for the event title in the process.
Portugal’s Frederico Morais found the competition come to a premature end for him after conceding victory to Carvalho in the fourth heat, thus sending the latter into the third round.
The conditions prevailing at the primary event site on Monday resembled that of Saturday afternoon, with tricky two-foot waves and on-shore winds. While there were high performance waves on offer, the conditions demanded a strategic approach with careful
selection from the surfers.
Macdonald, the wildcard entry to the event, did well to adapt to the conditions and managed to put on a dominating performance to take down Callinan, the poster boy for the Billabong ASP Junior World Championships.
MacDonald locked a relatively decent wave in the opening minutes of the heat to post a 5.17 on the score-board and immediately followed it up with a 6.50-point wave to finish with a heat-total of 11.67 points.
Callinan failed to match his rival’s sharpness and speed and completely succumbed to the conditions, scoring a mere 1.50 and 3.50 off his best-two waves. While the defeat came as a huge disappointment for the Novocoastrian, it was not that surprising after
taking the ankle injury that he had sustained a couple of days ago into account.
Macdonald did not overlook the fact that his rival was indeed competing with a bit of a handicap, stating, “It feels really good to be through to Round 3. But I feel bad for Ryan [Callinan], he couldn't really fight back. You can tell that he's injured,
but we still had fun catching waves with just the two of us out.”
The next heat saw Carvalho and Morais engage in an intense match-up, with both the surfers giving their all to clinch the Round 3 spot.
As the heat got underway, Marais drew first blood with a 7.17-point wave. However, Carvalho managed to strip him off the lead by immediately responding with an 8.00-point wave.
As the heat progressed, the Hawaiian added another 8.07 points to his account, taking his heat-total to 16.07 points. Morais needed to get a big score off his second business-wave, but despite his efforts, he was only able to add an additional 7.73 on the
score-board. As a result, he finished 1.17-points behind Carvalho and consequently victory to the latter.
The Billabong ASP World Junior Championships Gold Coast in the third and final event of ASP World Junior Tour and will determine the men’s and women’s 2011 ASP World Junior Champion.
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