Eggy-ness: Mundaka's Short Tide Windows Suck

Check out the reports from Round 1 and Round 2

EVENTS HELD: Heats 15-16 of Round 2, Heats 1-7 of Round 3
CONDITIONS: 2-4 feet and occasionally draining
NATURE’S CALL: Tough to call
PREDICTIONS: We’ll finish someday

Joel Parkinson spent his entire round 3 heat in the tube and went on to post a near perfect score of 19.70 (out of 20).

“Parko is the happiest guy I’ve ever met.”

Over the weekend, Joel Parkinson was the guy who stayed in Mundaka and didn’t get eggy. Everyone else was in full stop start mode as tidal windows appear and disappear at will. All of us have who’ve been here too long have had a moment where we’ve straight up lost it. “Most frustrating contest ever” has been the battle cry. But Parko? He never seems to stop smiling. He’s got his wife and daughter with him and he’s surfing the best he ever has. His heat this morning was the easily the highlight of the contest so far. Nothing but dredging shacks led the flowing one to an unthinkable 19.7 points. It’s too bad the surf was pretty much dribbly for every other heat. The gods are smiling on Parko and he’s loving it. The rest of us though are losing it.

Chris Ward managed to defeat Australian Nathan Hedge. Conditions were being affected by the strong rip and improved rapidly after their heat.

Ah, but for the surfers who escaped to France it was night and day. “I was getting stand up barrels by myself for two days at __” (spot’s name censored but check out Surfing TV from Day 1 at the Quiksilver Pro France to see it), said Timmy. “My girlfriend was freaking that she didn’t have a camera and couldn’t film it.” Then there was Chris Ward who waited all day in vain for his heat to start yesterday and then bolted Northeast around 3pm once Round 2 was finally called off. “I was doing 150k’s on the freeway. How many miles per hour is that?” he asked. Once he arrived at La Graviere pulled into tubes that were literally spitting him out on the sand. “I saw Tom Curren get one and I swear it was the deepest barrel I’ve ever seen anyone get,” he said.

So there you go. If this contest still had the Anglet option we’d be done by now and it would’ve been epic. But unfortunately we don’t and now we’re only through half of Round 3. With a diminishing swell forecast over the next few days, no end is in sight. Mudaka’s reputation as one of the most fickle waves in the world is well deserved. We could be looking at deciding the world title in two-foot onshore beachbreak waves at Bakio.

Let’s hope not. Pray for surf.

Round three heat results: (1st to round four 2nd receives 17th placing and 410 ratings points)

Heat 1: Joel Parkinson (Aus) 19.70 def. Jarrad Howse (Aus) 8.27
Heat 2: Bruce Irons (Haw) 13.84 def. Luke Stedman (Aus) 7.66
Heat 3: Victor Ribas (Bra) 11.27 def. CJ Hobgood (Aus) 10.84
Heat 4: Mick Fanning (Aus) 18.00 def. Toby Martin (Aus) 15.00
Heat 5: Pancho Sullivan (Haw) 15.10 def. Tim Reyes (USA) 13.34
Heat 6: Tom Whitaker (Aus) 17.27 def. Chris Ward (USA) 13.67
Heat 7: Cory Lopez (USA) 12.17 def Travis Logie (ZAF) 10.34

Remaining round three heats:

Heat 8: Kelly Slater (USA) vs Hodei Collazo (EUK)
Heat 9: Andy Irons (HAW) vs Yuri Sodre (BRA)
Heat 10: Shaun Cansdell (AUS) vs Trent Munro (AUS)
Heat 11: Bobby Martinez (USA) vs Peterson Rosa (BRA)
Heat 12: Phil MacDonald (AUS) vs Jake Paterson (AUS)
Heat 13: Taj Burrow (AUS) vs Adrian Buchan (AUS)
Heat 14: Greg Emslie (ZAF) vs Adriano de Souza (BRA)
Heat 15: Damien Hobgood (USA) vs Mikael Picon (FRA)
Heat 16: Dean Morrison (AUS) vs Michael Lowe (AUS)

 

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