26-year old Australian-borne surfer Mitch Coleborn walked away with a first place win at the 2013 Quiksilver Saquarema Prime, beating out France’s Marc Lacomare by less than 2 points. It wasn’t a blowout finish by any means, but Coleborn still managed to walk away with a clean win along with a cool $40,000 payday. To learn more about this Australian pro surfer’s most recent win and how it affects his standings in the ASP World Ranking, keep reading.
You might be surprised to learn that this was in fact Mitch Coleborn’s first ever ASP win, but he certainly didn’t surf like it. Itauna Beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil has some incredible surfing conditions with waves in the 2.5-5 foot range, which were ideal for most most surfers. Coleborn took advantage of this by hammering out some huge barrels with lots of air. The judges responded kindly to Coleborn’s techniques, giving him a 17.60 final scoring in the prime.
Marc Lacomare, however, was right behind Coleborn throughout the competition. At one point, the judges gave Lacomare a perfect 10 score, which certain sent some doubt into Coleborn’s mind. When asked about the incident, Coleborn responded “It was crazy because Marc got a 10 right at the end and I couldn’t believe it! I got really nervous, but he still needed to get another good score and no other waves came through. I’m just so happy that everything worked out. It was an amazing week here, the waves were great and I’m stoked with the win.”
So, how did Coleborn’s first place win affect his ASP World Ranking? With the 6,500 points earned, he jumped up to 14th place, giving him a nice standing to help balance out future events. Of course, Lacomare also saw improvements to his ASP World Rankings with a second place finish at the Quicksilver Prime. Now, Lacomare is sitting comfortably in 21st place. “It was crazy because Marc got a 10 right at the end and I couldn’t believe it! I got really nervous, but he still needed to get another good score and no other waves came through,”said Lacomare.
Mitch Coleborn is certainly a name to watch out for this year in the ASP. He’s a goofy-stanced surfer who’s creating some big waves in the community. While this is his first win, he’ll likely have plenty more to come in his career. Check back with our blog for more news on Coleborn and his pro surfing career.