Top Seeds Continue to Impress at Chill Pro Junior
Felicity Palmateer with a monster carve.
TRIGG POINT, Western Australia/Australia (Saturday, June 5, 2010) - Day 2 of the Chill Pro Junior presented by the City of Stirling continued at Trigg Point, Western Australia today with competitors greeted with small but clean 1-2 feet waves, which was more than enough for Australia’s best juniors to impress the strong beach crowd on hand.
The women’s event kicked off the day’s proceedings with 2009 defending Chill Pro Junior Champion, Felicity Palmateer (Hillarys), staking her claim for back-to-back titles on her home beach.
The powerful goofy footer used her intimate knowledge of the wave to her advantage, picking off a number of good left hand waves and using her forehand attack to precision to defeat Dimity Stoyle (Maroochydore, QLD), Bronte Macaulay (Gracetown, WA) and Chiana Ireland (Mooloolaba, QLD) in a close opening heat.
“I struggled to find a good one for a while, but I was lucky and snuck into some left’s which allowed me to open up a bit more,” said Palmateer after her heat.
In what is shaping up to be an awesome final day of competition on Sunday, Palmateer will be joined in the quarter finals by New Zealand sister act Arini and Sarah Mason who threw down some scintillating surfing at Trigg Point this morning.
The two sisters are currently leading the ASP Australasia Junior Women’s ratings, with Sarah in first and Arini in second after the two met in the final at Raglan New Zealand last month.
Laura Macaulay (Gracetown, WA), Phillipa Anderson (Merewether, NSW) and Ellie-Jean Coffee (Cresent Heads, NSW) also advanced to the final day of the event after some impressive surfing in their opening heats. Coffee posted the highest scores for the women, with a combined total of 14.65 from a possible twenty, which included an 8.00 an 7.25 back up.
The men’s competition continued to the final 16 today with 17 of the top 20 rated ASP Australasia Pro Junior Series surfers making it through to the round of 32 after yesterday’s competition.
The level of surfing was outstanding as competitors rallied for the all important ratings points up for grabs at this Grade 4 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) event.
Day two action was highlighted by the performances of Mitch Crews (Currumbin, QLD), Sam Wrench (Ulladulla, NSW), Jack Freestone (Coolangatta, QLD), Chris Sailsbury (Newport, NSW), Davey Cathels (Narrabeen, NSW), Chris Friend (Alexander Headland, QLD) and the Woods brothers Thomas and James who all rose to the occasion.
No. 1 seed and ASP Pro Junior ratings leader Mitch Crews continued his stellar form from yesterday and looked sharp moving into the quarterfinals with ease.
“I’m really focused on getting a solid result here in WA, and hopefully things will go my way tomorrow in the finals,” Crews said.
Crews’ quick and stylish surfing saw him rewarded with a near perfect 8.00 out of a possible ten, and a back up 7.20 to finish with a combined total of 14.60 out of twenty.
“It was a close heat, Jack Freestone has been surfing really well the whole event and he had a couple of seven’s in our heat so I knew I had to go hard,” Crews said.
But unfortunately no WA male surfers made it past round two today, with Jethro Hedstrom (Margaret River), Darcy Maynard (Trigg) and Matt Baldock (Margaret River) all eliminated.
With another great day fore tomorrow, the women’s quarter finals will first thing with heats commencing at 7.30am.
If you missed the amazing action from day one of the Chill Pro Junior click www.chillprojunior.com for a sweet video package.
Comments
Category: All ASP News, ASP Junior News
