As we continue the World Tour roll towards Hawaii, it’s gratifying to see Jordy Smith and his positive approach to the title hunt. The stats are fairly bleak to be honest, with 10-times World Champion Kelly Slater having to undergo some incredibly bad luck over the next three events for him not to win, but still. Jordy is charging.
The Rip Curl Pro in Portugal has kicked in, and already there have been some barrels and some close calls in the tricky beach break conditions. It seems to be that with the waves either peeling perfectly or closing out, the trend has been for either massive scores or pitiful scores. Still, the conditions make for nice photographs.
Jordy came up against Chris Davidson from Australia and Francisco Alves from Portugal in his opening heat, and it was a tough one with not too many good waves coming through. Davidson won the heat with a heat total of 14.60, with Jordy in second with a combined score of 8.9 with Alves in third place.
In his second round heat, Jordy found the nuggets and shut down Bruno Santos with some fine surfing in amongst the Peniche barrels. Bruno Santos is a dynamic Brazilian surfer who actually won the Teahupo’o event as a wildcard in 2008, and who wasn’t going to lie down for this heat, but Jordy took it in fine style with some clean tube rides.
Another South African surfer Travis Logie overcame his recent run of bad luck and judges calls going against him when he beat Brazilian Miguel Pupo in the last few seconds of their second round encounter.
Another South African surfer Travis Logie overcame his recent run of bad luck and judges calls going against him when he beat Brazilian Miguel Pupo in the last few seconds of their second round encounter. Travis was in desperate of a 7.27 as the clock ticked away, and sneaked into a bomb at the end of the heat to score an excellent 8.93 and advance into round three. Travis has felt the wrong side of a few calls recently, but this should be just the confidence booster needed to see him continue alongside Jordy through the next couple of rounds.
As fast as Jordy charged into the event, so was he bowled out. In his round three heat against Fred Patacchia. In perfect barreling waves, both Jordy and Fred were finding the good ones, both getting barreled. Towards the end of the heat Jordy was left hunting a very attainable 6.06 and snuck into a quick left-hand barrel. Jordy traveled in the tube, but fell just as he was about to come out it, snuffing his chances of getting the required score by a few meters, which saw Jordy out and Freddy through to round 4.
The next event after the Rip Curl Pro Portugal is the Rip Curl Pro Search Somewhere in San Francisco from November 1 – 12, before the tour lurches off to Hawaii for the Triple Crown Of Surfing on the North Shore of Oahu, culminating with the Billabong Pipeline Masters.
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