Pipe Pro: Brazilian Barcellos wins with Quarter Final finishes for the Saffas
posted by Kelly Footit on 22nd February 2008
The final day at Pipe started as a smoker with a thick early morning crowd taking advantage of the pre-contest conditions. As the water patrol were called in to chase the hoards off the peak at 8am, I dragged across a spare monitor at work to set-up the web cast in the background. 6pm in a different time zone and it was going to be another long night if I got sucked into the contest again.
With the web cast, a live score window and another heat draw tiled across the spare monitor and Ian, Sampi, Gareth, Juxsta and Simon on Skype chat ... we we're set for Round 7 and it was almost as good as being on the beach. Well, not quite but you get the picture.
Day 3 had 4 South Africans still in contention and all three progressed through Round 7. Darren Halse and Wesley Fischer placed second in their respective heats with Andre Botha moving confidently through his heat with a first. Being touted as the "Comeback King" by Terry McKenna on the commentary team.
Round 8 saw the 3 join seeded rider Mark McCarthy but it was Halse who was up first in a big heat against Pierre-Louis Costes, Damian King and Mike Stewart. Costes wins with Halse taking second with a big ARS on a left-hander.
Mark McCarthy took to the water in heat 3 against eventual finalists Hugo Pinheiro and Paulo Barcellos. Pinheiro storms the heat and Barcellos gets 2 solid waves to leave McCarthy needing 6.01. The sets don't co-operate and in the tough 15 minute heats Mark is left one good wave short and exits prematurely.
Heat 4 saw Dallas Singer (AUS) and Wesley Fischer totally dominate the opposition with some top class barrel riding. Singer opens with two early waves of 9.23 and 9.73 with 2 classic Pipe barrels and left the rest fighting for second. Wesley counters with a long Pipe barrel of his own, scooping just under the lip and riding high, negotiates the long barrel to exit cleanly just as it pinches. 8.73 and finishes on 17.23 which is good enough to win many of the other heats.
Heat 5 saw Botha drop his first heat. He starts off strong with two decent scores but it is Michael Novy (Aus) who betters Dre's 8.67 top score with an 8.77 of his own and sneaks into the lead which he retains till the end.
Quarter Final 1 saw Halse and Fischer up against each other along with World Champion Ben Player and an in form Pinheiro. Halse joined up with fellow South African Vijay Maharaj in Round 4 to blitz their heat but on this occasion it was the two South Africans who lost out.
A third in the heat to Darren and 9th overall, with 4th and 13th overall to Wesley.
An injured Pierre-Louis Costes took QF 2 with Barcellos in second and this heat saw the pairing of two Aussie riders Dallas Singer and David Crowley heading home.
Quarter Final 3 was eagerly anticipated by those after a bit of nostalgia but the GT vs McGee show was a mismatch as GT did what GT does and Kainoa McGee scrapped around for a few nothing waves in the deteriorating conditions.
Botha faced up with Jeff Hubbard and the two Brazilians, Uri Valadao and Luis Villar. Botha set the early pace with a 7.83 but conditions were now making it tough to find the barrels and sections and Botha only managed a 4.17. With plenty time left and needing a 6.0 to move into 2nd, it always seemed as if your money was safe with Dre but the waves eluded him and the clock ticked down with no change to the placings. Hubb took the heat with two good scores with Uri Valadao nailing a big ARS to card a 6.63 second scoring wave which secured him the 2nd place.
The end of the run for the South Africans who put on an display on their way through to the Quarter Finals, having started out in Rounds 2 & 3. Seven or eight heats later, some big names falling in their path and some impressive comments from the commentary team regarding the SA riders' performances is definitely a good result. For those moving on, on the tour their seedings will improve and it was great to see more than just SA's one man army of last year. Well done guys!
The semi-finals may have been a shock to see Ben Player exit in 3rd but Pinheiro and Barcellos had been powering through their heats and were always going to be tough competition. Pierre-Louis Costes picked up 4th and an overall 5th for France.
Semi #2 saw the last of the Australian charge with Novy exiting in 4th. A higher scoring heat than the first semi and it needed the second 10 of the competition to get Jeff Hubbard back into contention. Uri Valadao and Guilherme Tamega tied on 15.25 points with GT losing out on the count back.
The Final saw the two Brazilians upping their game with each carding a 9.25. Hubb as expected came out firing and it was Pinheiro who was the only man not to take the heat lead at some point in this final. In a high scoring heat it was Paulo Barcellos in a thick run of form through-out the contest who sealed it with a 7.75 on his final wave. Jeff Hubbard took second with 4 high scoring waves and Uri Valadao was left trying to improve on his 6.65 to claim third.
Well done to the champ, the rest of the riders and the organisers.
If you'd like a slightly more "as it happened" take on the event, visit:
www.sixty40.co.za/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=1352 2729 views
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