IBC Fronton King Day 2.
By Dan Dobbin.
Day two. Grey day. Eliminating day.
Round one’s third and fourth place getters fighting to stay afloat in the comp in round 2. That’s a lotta’ numbers.
It’s slightly bigger, solid 4ft sets, with the slightly rainy, slightly onshore, periodically nearly glassy conditions that come from nearshore low pressure systems.
Anything higher than 5 on your wave score seemed to put a rider into contention to advance, a seven or above an almost guarantee, provided you could lock in a decent back up score. Most winning heat scores hovered just above or below the 10 point line.
Txomin Lopez locked in one of the highest wave scores of the day in heat 3 with a 7.75 for a decent tube on a 4ft right. The kind of wave you might think ” nice tube” if you witnessed it at your home break.
Diego Cabrera dominated the next heat, posting a 6 and a 7 for a loopy roll and then a solid barrel respectively on the right, before finishing the job with a tidy lofted flip on the left late in the heat for another 6.
Conditions got tougher as the day progressed with an increasing wind chopping up the wave faces badly.
Given the midnight start time here in Oz, it also became a tough watch and stay awake as night ticked over to early morning on my couch.
Daniel Quiles became potentially the first competitor to surf a tour heat with a GoPro attached to a helmet on his head, however it’s doubtful that he captured any great footage, finishing with a heat total of 2.55, which was still good enough for third place in his round 8 heat.
Round 3 saw much of the same, with the above 10 combined wave score remaining the benchmark for advancement. The swell seemed to increase slightly, as Jonathan Vega drained a large spitting right in heat 3 for an 8.5, the largest single wave score of the day, enough to see Team Infoamed’s Willy Lujan.
Competition was suspended after heat 5, round 3, where Pierre Louis Costes did what Pierre does, locking in a 7.50 and a 5.17 within the first two minutes of the heat. However he still had to settle for second behind Borja Granados who took the heat victory on the back of an 8.33 for a big loopy roll of a solid Fronton right.
The bi-ligual commentary approach is a welcome addition for we uncultured mono-language speakers, with Bego Martinez doing a stealer job of anchoring the broadcast, and communicating effortlessly in both Spanish and English.
With a rise in swell even further predicated for today ( or tonight in Aust.) heres hoping that the wind and weather play ball and we can finally get some real Fronton action.
Now off to work on minimal sleep….
