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Monday morning is easily the shittiest time of the whole week, except for maybe late Sunday night when you realise Monday is only one sleep away (grumble, work, grizzle, hate my life, grumble). The good news is, it’s finals day at the Volcom Pipe Pro, and because the comp was called off yesterday due to heaps gnar swell, it means that you can watch heats in cranking Pipeline and Backdoor all day instead of doing work. Hooray!
We knew yesterday would be massive and it was, the heaving west swell simply outrunning itself, creating hideous foamballs and very few barrels to create a line-up that was “less like Pipeline and more like a reverse Sunset… but shittier,” according to Ian Walsh.
For spectators however the heats that did run were absorbing, populated with heart-in-mouth drops, heaps gross wipeouts and some of the biggest upsets ever seen at the Pipeline, none more so than the elimination of two-time World Champ Johnny Johnny Floz Floz at the hands of our very own Noa Nozzie Mozzie-in-a-Cozzie Deane. Noa would be the first to admit it was less a heat than it was survival out there, but he got the only meaningful tub of the encounter and continued his revelatory form at the break this winter.
And while we’re patting Aussie’s on the back full props must also go to Soli Bailey, who’s turned up looking every bit like he’s capable of going back-to-back, Mitch Parko, who packed one memorable close-out in full Gonad Man stance and Mikey Wright, who did a pretty fair impersonation of the Muppet’s bezerkoid drummer Animal with his own grunt run into a hopeless eight foot shut down. Classic Aussie mongrels the lot of ‘em.
The VPP will end today so give Monday the bird and get stuck into it. And keep an eye on that Jack Robbo kid. He’s really good at surfing barrels ay.