Friday the 11th of november, 30 knots of breeze, 3-4ft swell and a busy avon beachpark, here's what went down at suwc's legendary 'Qui est le papa!'
Round 1 -
The first few rounds stated off tentatively, first heat saw sam, adam and rob take to the water, a noony wiggle was not quite enough to see rob progress, sam's nearly backloop and waveriding saw him through, heat won by our little legend adam cropper blasting big loops and kicking some seriuos spray from his top turns, mind you as luck would have it for rob the eastern european gypo braged his way through to the next round as adam had to drop out due a bout of rare self organisation and a meeting to go to.
The second heat saw Iain, irsh pete and phil blast out to the waves, big jump from phil, competition pressure made Iain and pete musted up the balls for their first forward loop attempts, both took absolutely awesome bails, pete's including a noony wiggle mid flight, top job boys!, phil cleaned up the heat with lofty jumps and solid waveriding, followed by irish pete with his sound waterstarting!!
Heat three brought out Oli woodcock (on invitation from bob, with hind sight not such a great idea!), pete 'boo'ey' boutsred and myself. Pete having to be notified of the fact he was competing mid way through the heat did himself no favours, seemed to be on a different wavelength, not that dissimilar to one of our other sailors Mr cropper. The two to go through from this heat were me and ollie, ol ripping up the waves with his distinctive avon style, i managed to bust afew loops and a table-top.
Heat 4 saw a healed liability, blair, braic and newbie craig, this heat saw alot of carshes, liability qnd blair exerted their high wind prowess with cracking wave riding from blair and a few floaty jumps and a loop attempt from the ginger wizard. Round one job done, roll on round two,
Round 2 -
The comp quickly progressed to round two, four minute heats meant no one could hang around, the first heat saw round 1 winners Oli, bob, blair and liability blast out to get the eyes of the sharp judges, again oli showed his comfort with the avon conditions, wave riding a peach, bob mixed it up a little in the air, dropping the front hand for a couple of one handed loops and yet more table tops (well from one to breakfast bar they were probly about coffee table), floaty jumps from blair and liability, liability showing his tesser's are plenty big enough by going for afew forwards, dispite Blair pointing out after returning to the beach that he had not been as high in his life the judges made the decision to halt team gingers progress in the comp, Bob and Oli through.
The second heat had Sambo, Noony, irish peter and Phil, sam getting ever closer to the elusive backloop, even comming close to a pushloop made him head and shoulders above the others, pete cranked out some rad waterstarts, good on the fella for forging way out through the waves on a whopper board, Phil goes floaty, and rather like pete in the first round wave rides himself half way to steamer point, Noony still wiggling away takes the second spot for the heat and progresses to the final.
Final -
The much hyped final of qui est le homme fall edition was now full up with Samson, Oli, Bob and Rob, With the wind turning up aother 5 knots its balls to the wall, time to bring out the trump cards, sambo going for back again, not so much luck as last heat, does go large with a one handed leap. Rob surpirsed by his arrival at the final did as he knows best, he wiggled it at every opportunity, make the judges laugh and you're half way there! The third time Oli and bob came p against each other, come on imagination lads! bob comes in close and goes for afew ponch's, whats he thinking, they are way to hard, get back out there and loop! Oli again selects some tasty looking waves and rips the piss out of them. So who has got it? The wiggles rib tickling as theyare land noony in 4th, Samson a close third and a tie for first, oli and bob take joint honours, head judge mummy lou just could not make a call between the two.
So overall a great success, yet again everyone at the beach enjoying some great conditions, job done cheque is in the post.
