Emslie wins SA Open, again!

The Mr Price SA Open of Surfing culminated yesterday with Greg ‘The Foot’ Emslie clobbering the competition to win his second SA Open title at the The Mr Price SA Open of Surfing.

The competition was held at Nahoon reef and got top quality surf for the last day, with the well-known point break delivering glassy walls and the occasional big pit.Emslie, who has spent ten years campaigning on the ASP World Tour showed his class in the clean surf to overcome young J-Bay hopeful Steven Sawyer and Slummies ripper and shaper Simon Fish, who placed second and third respectively.

The junior division was won by grom king Slade Prestwich who opened his account in the finals with a nine point ride, which left the trio of Jeffrey’s Bay groms Lightfoot, Stuurman and Sawyer trailing for the rest of the heat. Hailing from Scottburgh in KZN, Prestwich is no stranger to right-hand point breaks, and made use of his knowledge to prove unequivocally that he is the right kid to be representing South Africa in the upcoming King of the Groms competition to be held in France.

Chantelle Rautenbach is also proving to be a rising star in South African surfing and took the Woman’s Division title with a smile, pipping Kirsty Delport (2nd), Alice Mcgregor (3rd) and Stacy Guy (4th) for the win. Chantelle is on fine form after having just represented South Africa at the ISA World Surfing Championships in Peru.

Nahoon reef proved a fantastic venue for the competition, despite its notorious reputation for shark activity. This year organisers took no chances with the men in grey suits and used anti-shark devices to help ensure the competitors safety.

However, more of an issue than sharks these days at Nahoon is sewerage contamination. If you would like to learn more about this issue and support the drive to save Nahoon from Sewerage contamination, you can attend the awareness campaign this Wednesday, September the 1st, In front of Life Savers shack at Nahoon beach.