The swell pumped for the 2017 Drug Aware Margaret River Pro, making it one of the most exciting contests ever held in Western Australia! With epic waves lined up for most of the contest waiting period the organizers had their pick of locations to hold the heats, but Main Break was where the bombs were…
WSL history was made in Round 1, with heats going off at North Point in Margaret River. A long barreling right hander that everyone on tour was frothing to get a piece of! The swell was macking, making it the perfect option over Main Break, but with the swell needing to wrap around the point a little the sets were a little slow to begin with. As everyone rattled through their first heats it seemed the unpredictably of North Point wasn’t paying off, and then Sebastien Zietz came out of nowhere, in the last heat of the day, to show exactly what everyone had missed out on! An insane 10 point barrel that set the mark for the entire contest, it’s worth remembering too that Seabass was defending his Margaret River trophy from 2016…
After Round 1 the event moved to Main Break, where it stayed for the rest of the contest. Organizers and surfers alike were hoping it would move to The Box at some stage but the conditions didn’t materialize. Owen Wright, wearing the yellow jersey, was fighting elimination in Round 2, where he was pitted against Hawaiian Ezekiel Lau to stay in the game. With a touch over 10 minutes left on the clock and just a couple of 5 pointers in the bag, Wright broke loose on a monster double overhead right and rode it out nice and smooth, racking up a 8.50 and winning the heat…
Onto Round 3, and the biggest upset had to be the early departure of Slater. It’s common knowledge the 11-time world champ is going for gold this year and it’ll be his last stint on the Championship Tour. So far this season he isn’t getting the results he needs, with Aussie Jack Freestone sending him packing before he could really get into his stride…
As the numbers whittled down it became more and more obvious who was the man to beat at the 2017 Drug Aware Margaret River Pro. Defending world champion John John Florence was already putting on one hell of a show in Round 3, with a barrel to high power cutback, earning him a 9.70. On his next wave, he’s pushing a turn so hard his back foot comes off his board, and somehow he still recovers…
John John powered through to the semifinals, where he met Jack Freestone and clocked up an impressive 19.27 to Freestone’s 10.57. Kohole Andino and Felipe Toledo had a much closer semifinal matchup, with just 0.63 of a point in between them. Andino took the win, and it was a Hawaii versus California final in the depths of Western Australia…
With Florence on absolute fire he totally deserved the win, taking back the yellow jersey from Owen Wright as they go into the final Australian contest of the year at Bells Beach. Matt Wilkinson’s the defending champion there, but John John sure ain’t gonna give up his lead without a fight…