John Florence, drops the John John, on his way to becoming the Vans World Cup of Surfing 2011 Champion. The waves pumped as the contest headed into the later rounds in the last few days.
A win at Sunset is always a great accomplishment as the contest holds four-man heats in a very powerful and shifty lineup. The final day of action had classic 8 to 10 foot Sunset with some offshore winds that opened up some barrels.
John John Florence - 2011 Sunset Winner
The wave of the day would definitely have to go to Ola Eleogram who scored a perfect ten on a massive Sunset tube in the quarterfinals. In quarterfinal heat number 2, Ola took down Jordy Smith, Travis Logie and Dusty Payne in what could be considered as the heat of the day.
Ola won with a heat total of 17.83 to Smith’s 14.16, Logie’s 6.16 and Payne’s 17.50. Epic barrel riding by Eleogram and Payne left Smith and Logie scraping for big scoring rides trying to catch up the whole heat. Smith made a solid showing but fell short.
In quarterfinal heat # 4 heat there was a classic battle between some local Hawaiians and Australians, Florence and Walsh (HAW) matched Matt Wilkinson, and Adrian Buchan (AUS).
Florence finished 2nd in this heat which was very close and a good battle from the first horn to the heat ending horn. Buchan scored a 14.84 to Florence’s 14.23, Walsh’s 13.37 and Wilkinson’s 9.43. The top two moved on.
In the first semifinal Michel Bourez’s 12.03 and Adam Melling’s 8.00 took out Ola Eleogram’s 7.60 and Dusty Payne’s 4.60 heat scores. Bourez picked off some solid rides to move on into the final.
In the second semifinal, John Florence was in form and shredded this heat with a two-wave total of 18.40. Hank Gaskell also surfed his way into the final with a heat total of 14.50 sneaking by Adrian Buchan’s 13.57 and Raoni Monteiro’s 9.77.
The final was set as Michel Bourez, Adam Melling, John Florence and Hank Gaskell took to the water. Florence snagged a nice 9.50 ride in the final, which pushed him into the lead and he would not look back. The barrels were popping up all over the place and each surfer was charging.
John Florence took the final with a heat total of 17.00 to Bourez’s 12.03, Melling’s 11.96 and Gaskell’s 11.53. It was an epic final and John Florence definitely used his local knowledge to take the contest. Congratulations to John John Florence!
Florence takes the lead in the VANS Triple Crown of Surfing as the focus now moves to Pipeline . . . stay tuned!
~P. Franklin / Guerrilla Surf — Guerrilla.Surfers@gmail.com
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