Taj Burrow is the 2012 O’Neill Coldwater Classic Steamer Lane winner, beating fellow Aussie Matt Wilkinson in a very closely contested final.
With nearly identical highest wave scores, the heat came down to the last minute, with ‘Wilko’ needing a 5.90 on the final wave ridden of the heat to take the win.
Unfortunately he was unable to complete his final turn and scored only a 5.50, giving one of the best trophies in sport, the golden Jack O’Neill head, to Taj.
Talking Points – World Title
Neither of the title favourites, Joel Parkinson and Kelly Slater, could land a significant blow to the others’ title hopes, with Kelly losing in round five (to Adriano de Souza) and ‘Parko’ losing in the quarter finals (to Travis Logie).
This means the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) gets their dream tour finish, with the title to be decided at surfing’s most iconic wave, Banzai Pipeline, in December.
The remaining title challengers leading into the event all had disappointing results, with Mick Fanning and John John Florence both surprisingly losing in the second round and all but waving their title hopes goodbye. Mick, by the numbers, still has a chance, but it’s unlikely Parko and Kelly would both stumble to allow this opportunity.
Adriano de Souza’s slim title hopes were also dashed on account of Parko and Kelly’s solid performances.
Steamer Lane
The Steamer Lane rights lent themselves beautifully to the quick and powerful backhand attacks of the goofy footers in the event.
In particular Wilko and Travis Logie, and earlier in the event Nat Young and Ace Buchan, were able to show their full bag of tricks on the generally waist to head high waves.
Wilko dominated throughout the event and made his first ever World Championship Tour (WCT) event final, pretty well guaranteeing requalification for next year’s tour.
While the eventual winner of the event was a natural footer, the wave is definitely suited to the backhand attack, rather than the forehand cutback to the power source of the naturals.
Gabriel Medina, another goofy footer, was pretty well the only surfer through the event who caught waves away from the point, opting on multiple occasions for the lefts on offer further into the bay.
The lefts were nothing more than a nice rampy end section, which Medina used to full effect, stomping a couple of massive full rotation air reverses (with customary chest pump and super claim), but offered little else.
Between the right hand point break and the crappy lefts, Steamer Lane is not a WCT quality wave.
It has a reputation that precedes itself, and a beautiful setup for the fans, but has shown this year and the few before it’s a wave that doesn’t offer much more than a thousand other point breaks on the planet.
It might be a lot different in big swell, but as it stood for the competition it was a pretty underwhelming wave.
Controversy
What would a WCT event be without a judging controversy?
The talking point of the event was surely the round three match-up between Kelly Slater and Dusty Payne. Needing a 9.34 on the last wave of the heat, Dusty pulled off a huge inverted frontside air reverse.
Given the scores which had preceded it in the event for similar, if not less critical, aerial manoeuvres, Dusty most certainly should have gotten the score, but inexplicably was scored an 8.27.
Now say what you will about judging bias and favouritism, or the ASP influencing the judging for the narrative of the world tour, or any of the other conspiracy theories getting around, there is just no way that wave didn’t get the score.
Dusty’s wave was high in both commitment and degree of difficulty, as well as ranking highly in innovative and progressive manoeuvres, two of the major elements in the ASP judging criteria.
Given the judges had well and truly established that single waves could score highly (see Medina’s 9.53 and 9.43), there is no reasonable explanation as to why the score wasn’t awarded in this case.
I would be interested to hear if there is anybody within the surfing community who would disagree that if the roles were reversed, Kelly would have gotten the score.
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