Six from Eight

But first the gruelling repercharge rounds are being contested, with Day 3 seeing the world's best over 35 year surfers putting their Salusa 45 to good use in the clean 4' lines at the right-hand point-break waves in Montañita, Ecuador.

Unfortunately for Emslie's compatriot Gary Van Wieringen, he was knocked out in Round 3 of the Masters Repercharge. He drops out of the event.

It was a beautiful sunny day almost on the equator (the Galapagos Islands sit offshore from Ecuador). Surf conditions were challenging with a slight drop in swell to occasional head-high sets. The tidal variation was extreme, with an early morning low tide making for strategic surfing with a lot of closeouts, and not the long walls the surfers are accustomed.

Heather Clark, our sole contender in the women's division was still to surf her Round 1 repercharge. In the Grand Masters, Wayne Monk won his repercharge heat and goes through to Round 3. He still has a chance to make the main finals. However, Carl Roux is out of the event.

Brothers Malherbe, Andre and Dave, the Eastern Cape standouts, are still in a holding pattern in Round 3 of the Kahunas (the last 12) while the intensive repercharge heats are contested.

South Africa have six out of eight surfers still in contention, but only two are in the mainstream, with four facing instant death repercharge heats.

In the Grand Kahunas, Chris Knutsen still awaits his repercharge round 1 heat. In essence, South Africa have six out of eight surfers still in contention, but only two are in the mainstream, with four facing instant death repercharge heats.

“It was a very nice day in this paradise that is Montañita,” remarked ISA President Fernando Aguerre. “The top 150 surfers over 35 years old are here with over 20 World Champions, current and past. A bad day of competition here is better than the best day in most places in the world. So, if you are not watching the live webcast you are missing out.”

Today, even though it was a shorter day of competition, it was action packed. Day Three featured heats from every division, starting with the Qualifying Round 2 of the Kahunas, Grand Kahunas, and Women’s Masters, followed by Repechage Round 2 of the Grand Masters and Masters. Unfortunately, all the surfers that did not advance in the Repechage rounds are now out of the competition.

Brazil’s Andrea Lopes dominated her heat during Day 3 advancing to the Women’s Masters semifinals. Photo: ISA/Michael Tweddle

Hawaii’s Mike Latronic had the highest total heat score of the day with powerful, carving turns like this. Photo: ISA/Rommel Gonzales

One of the standouts of the day was Brazil’s Andrea Lopes, who successfully advanced into the Qualifying Semifinals with a total heat score of 13.50, defeating Siri Cota (USA, 7.93), Maria Celia Barboza (URU, 6.63) and Akiko Kiyonaga (JPN, 6.40).

Another notable surfer of the day was Hawaii’s Mike Latronic, who scored the day’s highest total heat score with 15.16 points, defeating Sergio Noronha (BRA, 7.30), Robert Ferrer (PRC, 5.27) and Horacio Ipucha (ARG, 3.53).

Brazil’s Saul Carvalho had the wave of the day, earning the highest single wave score of 9.53, which led him to win his Repechage Round 2 heat, defeating Kris Cabezas  (CHI, 8.63) and Paulo Viales (CRC, 7.14).

The ISA World Masters Surfing Championship resumes tomorrow at 7:40am with The Morning Show hosted by Otto Flores, which will be broadcast live on the internet at www.isawmsc.com.

Following that, the competition will feature:

Grand Masters (over 40) Repechage 3
Kahunas (over 45) Repechage 2
Masters (over 35) Repechage 3
Grand Kahunas (over 50) Repechage 1
Women’s Masters (over 35) Repechage 1
Grand Masters (over 40) Qualifying 3
Kahunas (over 45) Repechage 3