Former world surfing champion Wayne "Rabbit" Bartholomew was describing the action at the Australian Open of Surfing today as a "Snap shot into the future." Bartholomew had just watched the round of 24 of the six-star event and the finals of the junior men and women's divisions.
Young Australian Matt Banting blasted his way into the quarterfinals with scores of 9.33 and 9.93 to post the single highest heat score of the whole event. The beach commentators were almost speechless. All they could come out with after Banting pulled off his second air reverse was, 'Wow, wow, and wow!" Two hours later Banting took the Junior over fellow Aussie, Tim MacDonald.
Banting has been one of the in-form surfers all week, having one of the toughest heats of the whole event late yesterday afternoon against Jordy Smith and Matty Wilkinson.
"The heat against Matty and Jordy was probably the heat of my life," he said this morning. "It was massive to get through. I just went into it thinking that I'd just be surfing with them and I ended up taking them both down. I was just frothing -- frothing 'til about 9 o'clock last night, so much I could hardly talk."
After he won the Juniors today it was hard not to wonder if he's on a roll or peaked too early.
"It feels amazing! That's the first junior I've ever won," he said after receiving the winner's check and trophy from Joel Parkinson. "I've made lots of quarters and semis, but never the big one. I've got really close before when things haven't gone my way, but this week everything has rolled together. Tonight I'll try and relax and not think too much about tomorrow. Then just see how far I can take it."
Former World Tour surfer Rob Machado, who was born in the Manly hospital and is basically a "local," was on the stage to help Parko present the awards to the juniors. Talking with him later, he admitted to being shocked by the surfing he's been witness to this week.
"The level of surfing has been insane across all the divisions," he said. "The waves have been below average, but the guys have been flying through the air. If you just watched the highlight package at the end of each day it's been pretty sick! Guys don't need much to go bananas."
Machado also expressed surprise that virtually all the top seeds had been knocked out by the quarters: Kolohe Andino, Joel Parkinson, Adam Melling, and Jordy Smith were all denied.
"I have been totally blown away that all the top seeds have been knocked, out bar one, Ace Buchan," said Machado. "I think there were 12 World Tour surfers, and now we are down to one. I know their focus is probably on Snapper next week, but it still has to be a wake up call like, 'Wow, I just lost in the second round,' or whatever. The young kids have sent them all packing. The Tour guys are competitive humans. They wouldn't be where they're at if they weren't, but they still hate to lose."
The Junior Women's division included an elite field of girls with the likes of the newly-crowned world junior champion, Hawaiian Leila Hurst, number two Australian Philippa Anderson, France's Johanne Defay, and Quincy Davis from New York, but it came down to the Australian country girl, Nikki Van Dijk who stole the show, collecting the winners check and trophy.
When asked how she felt to have won she had trouble articulating. "It's actually amazing," she started before adding, "I'm so overwhelmed, so proud of myself. I'm just buzzing, over the moon. It's just crazy."
After taking a couple of big breaths she calmed down and continued. "Manly has been one the funniest comps I've ever done. The crowd, the place, everything about the comp has been crazy. Everyone is just frothing down here. It's so good for women's surfing to be here in front of this huge crowd. I actually couldn't get into the skate bowl yesterday it was so packed. Maybe they'll let me in now."
Are we witnessing a snap shot into the future of surfing as Rabbit stated? Rob Machado was basically saying the same thing in a different way.
The quarterfinals of the Australian Open of Surfing are wide open with only Ace Buchan holding up the World Tour end. It'll be all over tomorrow and the odds are solid that we will see a fresh face on the podium holding up the victor's check and trophy.