Women’s Open Semi’s and Men’s Quarter Finalists decided as some big names get eliminated on Day 4 – SOUL Australian Longboard Titles.
Jackson Close (Burleigh Heads/Gold Coast/Qld) was the biggest scoring heat
winner in round three
Clean small waves today at Town Beach Port Macquarie for the important round three Open Men’s and Women’s heats which have now decided semi finalists (Women’s) and Quarter Finalists (Men’s) for the SOUL Australian Longboard Titles.
The days biggest shock was definitely the elimination of the very talented, experienced and highly rated young Sunshine Coast surfer Harrison Roach.
Roach has numerous national titles and international success on the longboarding stage but today he struggled in a big way and in a tight heat ended up finishing 3rd in his four man heat and was eliminated from the event.
He failed to catch a wave in the first 13 minutes of the 20 minute heat which placed in a very precarious position and while he made a valiant late charge and nearly progressed, his slow start proved costly with WA surfer Rahn Goddard winning and Victorian surfer Jordie Brown edging him out of 2nd place and into 3rd and out of the event!
Clearly disappointed immediately after the heat Roach commented saying – “It was a shocking heat, the waves just would not break at the start. They were weak and poor waves and I just couldn’t find anything decent at all. It was a poor heat for me.”
Roach surfed in the final heat of round three and the heat certainly suffered with an outgoing tide on the beach which joins the local rivermouth which runs through the break and conditions can swing and did swing for the worse really fast today.
The earlier round three Open Men’s heats on the higher tide actually scored decent waves and there were plenty of excellent scores posted. Gold Coast’s Jackson Close made the most of the clean peeling waves posting the days top scoring heat tally of 17 out of 20 with an excellent 9 point ride backed up with another excellent 8 point second scoring ride. He easily defeated Coff’s Harbour’s Harley Ingelby who also progressed in second place.
Sunshine Coast surfers were strong with Josh Constable and Grant Thomas both easily progressing through to the quarter finals while Avalon surfer Christian Pimm (NSW) had a big heat win and notched up the highest scoring wave of the morning with a 9.1. – “ I wasn’t expecting to do that well out there but found some of the long peeling waves and got the scores – I’ve placed 3rd in this event two years ago and I’ve made the semi’s so a win would be really nice – Hopefully it gets bigger because my chances will improve in bigger more powerful waves for sure.”
Open Women’s quarter finals saw Chelsea Williams (Tweed Heads) again signal that she’s the surfer to beat for this years title. Chelsea surfed at the peak of the outgoing tide in what appeared to be really hard conditions but the very talented surfer with a record of titles to match, made it look all too easy posting an excellent 8.5 and was never troubled at all by her opponents.
Williams’ biggest challenge could come from the emerging Monique Keane from Caloundra Queensland. The young 17 year old is competing in her first SOUL Australian Titles and she’s already through to the semi finals in both the Open and Junior Women’s divisions.
Keane has been impressive with a very natural style and walks the board with incredible grace and speed and looks capable of going a long way here – After her round three Open win today she said “I’d love to win either division but I guess the Open division would be best because that has the best surfers in it. I’ll take each heat as it comes and do my best and have fun – that’s the main thing!”
The senior divisions are also through to semi finals across most age brackets and with optimism a plenty for a swell increase the final few approaching days are sure to be excellent.