November 11 Archive

Super Team grom Chris Bluthardt from Oahu scored 1st place in the HSA Shortboard division this weekend.

Kai Sallas Wins Bear Pro presented by Jeep. Taylor Jensen Clinches World Title

ANDORA, Italy (Sunday, November 20, 2011) – The ASP World Longboard Tour (WLT) Bear Pro presented by Jeep has been won by Kai Sallas (HAW) defeating Taylor Jensen (USA) in a high scoring final 17.17 to 13.50 in clean small 1-2ft waves at the back up site of Andora. Jensen's runner up finish was sufficient for the talented Californian to clinch his maiden ASP WLT World title.

Taylor Jensen (USA) clinched the world title with his semi-final win and was carried up the beach by his fellow competitors. The natural footer had been along with Sallas the inform surfer of the event and showed his true longboarding ss in the tough conditions.

“I haven't got it all in yet but I will feel pretty good tonight for sure. I was stressed out. I've been stressed out all week with running or not running so got into the event and it is a relief. In the last couple of minutes he (Silvagni) needed a 9 and the conditions were tough. I mean Kai (Sallas) got a 9.5 in the heat before but it is very hard to get one. As long as I didn't let him get a good wave I was okay. I just held on and it worked.”

Kai Sallas (HAW) claimed his second ASP WLT victory with a convincing win over newly crowned WLT champion Taylor Jensen. Refocusing on the victory after his title hopes were dashed after the semi-finals, Sallas showed his superiority with an amazing display of technical nose rides and high speed turns in the small conditions.

“It was a final full of mixed emotions. I had a slight chance to win the title if Taylor didn't make it. So I lost that opportunity right before the final so I had to shake it off and just focus on the heat. Some good waves came through and the waves stuck around the whole event. Within that half hour final I managed to get two good scores so it worked out good. It is the second WLT event I have won in my career and still no title, (laughs) but I'll keep trying. I'm super glad we got to run the contest and to come away with the win. I was stressed out if they were going to run so to win is just amazing.”

A full report on today's action will be available shortly.

ASP WLT Bear Pro presented by Jeep Final
Kai Sallas (HAW) 17.17 Def. Taylor Jensen (USA) 13.50

ASP WLT Bear Pro presented by Jeep Semi-final Results
Heat 1: Kai Sallas (HAW) 16.17 Def. Eduardo Bage (BRA) 12.83
Heat 2: Taylor Jensen (USA) 14.66 Def. Tony Silvagni (USA) 10.37

ASP WLT Bear Pro presented by Jeep Quarterfinal Results
Heat 1: Eduardo Bage (BRA) 11.60 Def. Rodrigo Sphaier (BRA) 11.30
Heat 2: Kai Sallas (HAW) 15.67 Def. Damien Castera (FRA) 9.00
Heat 3: Taylor Jensen (USA) 13.24 Def. Amaro Matos (BRA) 8.70
Heat 4: Tony Silvagni (USA) 13.73 Def. Harley Ingleby (AUS) 10.00

ASP WLT Bear Pro presented by Jeep Round Two Results
Heat 1: Eduardo Bage (BRA) 11.65 Def. Antoine Delpero (FRA) 11.10
Heat 2: Rodrigo Sphaier (BRA) 14.50 Def. Justin Bing (ZAF) 9.45
Heat 3: Kai Sallas (HAW) 14.15 Def. Thimotee Creignou (FRA) 11.60
Heat 4: Damien Castera (FRA) 12.25 Def. Duane DeSoto (HAW) 9.00
Heat 5: Taylor Jensen (USA) 16.50 Def. Ned Snow (HAW) 13.30
Heat 6: Amaro Matos (BRA) 9.25 Def. Jefson Silva (BRA) 7.95
Heat 7: Harley Ingleby (AUS) 13.25 Def. Ben Skinner (GBR) 10.75
Heat 8: Tony Silvagni (USA) 13.55 Def. Edouard Delpero (FRA) 12.30

Words Courtesy of aspeurope.com

ASP WLT Bear Pro presented by Jeep Relocates to Complete Round One

Andora, Italy (Saturday, November 19, 2011) – The ASP World Longboard Tour (WLT) Bear Pro presented by Jeep relocated to Andora, 180km North West of Levanto allowing for Round One of competition to be completed after nine consecutive lay days had plagued the event. A small low pressure pushing through a building south swell was enough to offer clean 1-2ft (50cm) waves at the main beach of Andora.

Event officials and surfers were excited with the prospect of commencing the Bear Pro presented by Jeep and met early at the beach to set up a make shift site in front of the best peak available. The ‘green light' to start was given at noon with the action in the water heating up from the first to last heat.

Kai Sallas (Waikiki, HAW) 30, put on a brilliant performance in the tricky conditions with huge roundhouse cutbacks, flowing carves and critical nose rides to claim the day's highest two-wave combined total of 17.30 out of 20. Sallas managed to generate speed and power in conditions that played havoc on many of the competitors.

“It is such a relief to finally get the contest on its way and it was such a stressful week thinking we might not even run with no waves coming. There was a lot of work involved to come down here and actually find a pretty good, long, fun longboarding wave for us. It couldn't be better to walk away with a good win and some good scores. It felt great to surf again after over a week of not surfing. It is very good.”

Taylor Jensen (Coronado, CA) 27, top scored pulling of two hang-ten nose rides blended with rail turns to clinch a near perfect 9.25 (out of 10) in his first up appearance at the Bear Pro presented by Jeep. Currently nº2 on the WLT ranking, Jensen shook off early heat nerves and adapted to the small waves to take down Bear team rider Ben Haworth (GBR) 22.

“I was definitely a little shaky there at the start but a couple came through and I got lucky. It was a smaller wave and it doubled up and hit the sand bar real nice and just sort of ran off. I got lucky to get in two little ‘tens' and a couple of turns and in these conditions I guess it is what it takes to win.”

“I grew up in Coronado,” continued Jensen regarding his abilities in small wave surfing. “This is probably the best day for there so we used to surf in small junky wind surf. So I am used to it and just getting used to being on the board after nine days of not surfing. Definitely a shaky start.”

Click on NEWS for a full report.

Upcoming ASP WLT Bear Pro presented by Jeep Round Two Matchups
Heat 1: Antoine Delpero (FRA) Vs Eduardo Bage (BRA)
Heat 2: Justin Bing (ZAF) Vs Rodrigo Sphaier (BRA)
Heat 3: Kai Sallas (HAW) Vs Thimotee Creignou (FRA)
Heat 4: Damien Casteras (FRA) Vs Duane De Soto (HAW)
Heat 5: Taylor Jensen (USA) Vs Ned Snow (HAW)
Heat 6: Jefson Silva (BRA) vs Amaro Matos (BRA)
Heat 7: Harley Ingleby (AUS) Vs Ben Skinner (GBR)
Heat 8: Edouard Delpero (FRA) Vs Tony Silvagni (USA)

The gun has fired, and the Score Int'l Baja 1000 is underway, our moto team 301x is out and shredding the deserts of Baja! Good luck boys!

Words by: http://www.aspworldtour.com/
LEVANTO, Italy (Tuesday, November 15, 2011) – The ASP World Longboard Tour (WLT) Bear Pro presented by Jeep has called another lay day due to no swell at the main event site of Levanto. An excursion to nearby Carrara was held to visit the famous marble caves where the stone for Michelangelos works of art were extracted offering visiting officials and surfers a unique cultural experience during the lay day.

Once again a beautiful morning greeted officials and surfers as they arrived at the event site for the morning call. It was obvious to all that competition would not be able to commence today as the stable weather pattern continues to produce no swell in the Mediterranean Sea.

ASP International Longboard Head Judge Tim Mashall was onsite as always with the latest swell fores from the net. The fore is not showing any real major developments in swell over the next few days meaning the event is running out of time in the waiting period.

“So far the swell fore for the rest of the Bear Pro WLT is not looking too great. It looked like there was going to be a pulse for the weekend and now the internet is showing pretty much flat conditions. We are hoping the internet may be wrong as there are only two real buoys here in Italy which are at least a hundred miles away from where we are on each side of the contest area. Hopefully they are a little bit wrong and we can still get something out of this event for the longboarders and run some heats but as of today Tuesday it is not looking great for the rest of the week. Mother Nature always has her way of proving us wrong so hopefully she’ll do it again and we will get a successful event away.”

Rusty Keaulana (HAW) was one of the fortunate few who were taken to visit the caves where the marble was extracted for Michelangelos art works in the nearby town of Carrara. The sheer size of the mountain and the amount of marble that is still today cut and shipped to all parts of the world due to its high qualities and colour was an aspect that impacted all the visiting competitors.

“For me it was like history,” began Keaulana. “It was something that I will not be back to see I think. Not all the guys on tour could come and visit so it was a special thing to see Michelangelos arts and the marble from Italy and the type of stone we got to see in the mountain.”

“It was unbelievable. It is hard to explain it. You have to be there to see it but I was lucky because they had three pieces of stone that I am going to take back. Hawaiians we don’t want to take back stones but the guy offered them to me so it is all good. It is totally a thing I can share with my kid about the mountain and how the people work so hard and how cold it is over there.”

“There was marble from the bottom to the top,” continued Keaulana. “We couldn’t believe we were going to go all the way up to the top of that mountain. I was wondering how they get up their but if you got the good four-wheel drive cars it is okay. It was awesome to be part of that show yesterday.”

Highlights from the pre-event free surf sessions and from the previous days of the waiting period can be seen by clicking on ‘videos’ at www.bearpro2011.com as well as the LIVE broad of ‘The Morning Show’ each day at 9am with interviews, fores and all the latest news on activities at the ASP WLT Bear Pro presented by Jeep.

The ASP Bear Pro presented by Jeep will run from November 10 to 20 and will be web LIVE with the ‘Morning Show’, all results, photos and daily highlights seen at www.bearpro2011.com

The Bear Pro presented by Jeep is proudly produced by Reset Communications in association with Area 51, the Liguria Region, the Province of La Spezia and the town of Levanto. For further information regarding the ASP Bear Pro presented by Jeep log onto www.aspeurpe.com

ASP WLT Bear Pro presented by Jeep Round One Matchups
Heat 1: Antoine Delpero (FRA) Vs Matt Aldridge (AUS)
Heat 2: Eduardo Bage (BRA) Vs Mitch Surman (AUS)
Heat 3: Jared Neal (AUS) Vs Justin Bing (ZAF)
Heat 4: Rodrigo Sphaier (BRA) Vs Alessandro Demartini (ITA)
Heat 5: Kai Sallas (HAW) Vs Shohei Akimoto (JPN)
Heat 6: Tim Creignou (FRA) Vs Adam Griffiths (GBR)
Heat 7: Damien Castera (FRA) Vs Bradley Weare (ZAF)
Heat 8: Duane De Soto (HAW) Vs Marco Boscaglia (ITA)
Heat 9: Taylor Jensen (USA) Vs Ben Haworth (GBR)
Heat 10: Ned Snow (HAW) Vs Remi Arauzo (FRA)
Heat 11: Rusty Keaulana (USA) Vs Jefson Silva (BRA)
Heat 12: Amaro Matos (BRA) Vs Yasuaki Higashikawa (JPN)
Heat 13: Harley Ingleby (AUS) Vs Zak Lawton (GBR)
Heat 14: Ben Skinner (GBR) Vs TBA
Heat 15: Edouard Delpero (FRA) Vs Andre Derizans (HAW)
Heat 16: Tony Silvagni (USA) Vs Cole Robbins (USA)

Team rider Taylor Jensen is in Italy and cruising some of the fun tourist stops while waiting for the swell to hit for the ASP World title competition.

The call has been made to run round 1 of the main event, first heat starts at 06h30 local time The conditions are looking good waves in the four to six foot range. Ryan Hardy, Mike Stewart, Tom Rigby and Babby Quiñones first heat of the day.

Round 1 heat winners:

Heat 1: Ryan Hardy [Australia]

Heat 2: Roberto Bruno [Brazil]

Heat 3: Jared Houston [South Africa]

Heat 4: Jeff Hubbard [Hawaii]

Heat 5: Eder Luciano [Brazil]

Heat 6: Mitch Rawlins [Australia]

Heat 7: Dave Winchester [Australia]

Heat 8: Amaury Lavernhe [Reunion Island]

Courtesy of www.ibaworldtour.com