danw's WCT 2009 thread

[steve shearer]

Mick Campbell - crazy small..

Don't know what you've been smoking Graz.
Mick's 5'9" and 75 kilos.
Not a giant but again classic middleweight.
Tom's about 5'4" I believe.

[Carpark King]

I think Kelly's board looked to small.

Everyone just gets excited coz they are bored with seeing people on 6'0 rounded squares (which seem to work fine for 90 % of the tour)..

[Nick Carroll]

i'm tipping a aussie this year....too help our struggling surf market out

Well it's the US market that's up shit creek, fongy, not Australia, so surely if your theory holds up, Dane Reynolds will kill 'em

[danw]

i'm tipping a aussie this year....too help our struggling surf market out

Well it's the US market that's up shit creek, fongy, not Australia, so surely if your theory holds up, Dane Reynolds will kill 'em

did you see dane in his heat? kept throwing his board.
pottz was saying ankle injury and should take some time off.
have not seen dane r surf like that before

[Buff_Brad]

i'm tipping a aussie this year....too help our struggling surf market out

Well it's the US market that's up shit creek, fongy, not Australia, so surely if your theory holds up, Dane Reynolds will kill 'em

Slater will rip it in. Too confident and nothing to lose. Whichever way it goes this year will be his last I'm tipping.

[steve shearer]

Slater is injecting a little bit of freshness into what is looking tired and stale.
The first day at D-Bah contained very few highlights.......stock standard all the way.
The main point of interest was some mind bogglingly erratic judging.......take a pen and go watch the heats on demand and give each ride a score....now compare to the judges.
By the way the judges are carefully cultivated for qualities of conformity and group thinking....that is why the erratic but mass nature of their little brain explosions seems so unbelievably choreographed.
Judging remains the elephant in the room for the ASP.
I thought Jordy looked the goods from day 1.....little more flow and carry in his boards.
Taj still on Firewires dispels that BS rumour.
Models favouring something juicy off the QLD coast towards the end of the week.
A Slater victory here would demoralize the rest of the 44 completely.

[danw]

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25131732-2,00.html

[boardscape avalon]

^^^^jeez they (asp) have kept that info a bit hush hush... what about the ski operators safety lanyard? legal action methinks....

[danw]

^^^^jeez they (asp) have kept that info a bit hush hush... what about the ski operators safety lanyard? legal action methinks....

^^ im assume, but he may not have had it on??
have never heard of them failing??

[boardscape avalon]

had dinner with some quik people last night, and a full review as to happened is under way .Rod Brooks is very un happy about the entire episode...Formal complaints have been lodged over the last few quikpro events by people being sprayed with 1200ccs of jet water at very close range, and they weren't even in the restricted area...

[steve shearer]

What the fcuck is up with the heats on demand ?
Slater v Wilson cuts out half way through (do they have someone checking this stuff?)
It's not up on Bigpond.
Very, very shabby web coverage.
Seems like budget cuts are impacting on the quality of the coverage.
Judging seems wildly inconsistent still, and heavily agenda based.
Now that Slater is gone, it's a wide open race but smart money would be on a Coolie kid, based on local knowledge and the aforementioned factor.

[boardscape avalon]

^^^^ agreed Steve, i think if kelly had Joel or Mick yesterday it would have been a real flogging, that board just didnt work. Slats looked out of touch .... mick or joel to win put ya house on it ...

[thermalben]

What the fcuck is up with the heats on demand ?
Slater v Wilson cuts out half way through (do they have someone checking this stuff?)
It's not up on Bigpond.

From my end, the Slater/Wilson heat wasn't streaming whatsoever - from either the Quik Pro website or the Bigpond feed. Not sure why they don't have heats on demand working though - that's an unrelated issue.

For what it's worth, I can't get the webcast to work at all from the Quik Pro website, on my PC - I've reinstalled the latest WM player, Silverlight and Flash and can only get the audio up. Interestingly, the stream works fine off the Bigpond site link - but there are no scores.

[danw]

i always have trouble trying to get live feed on ct events. for some reason i have had no trouble at all with snapper this year. i cant work out why sometimes good and other times get nothing.

[tiger]

If Kelly is serious at having a crack at 10 world titles, I wonder how long he will persist with these boards?

The limitations inherent in stubby little boards was obvious in that heat y'day. It was too easily overpowered, even at gutless wobbly snapper. It's never a good look having to nurse your board through turns. Snub nosed boards also seem to have trouble with foam climbs, and getting on top of the lip if you're a bit late on a reo.

If Bells has OK waves, and he rides that style of board, I'm predicting another 17th/33rd.

[Clif]

There is no way Jordy beat Knox. What a hoax! that Jordy bloke is over-rated ... while blokes like Bede etc struggle to get sponsorship.

[Nick Carroll]

For what it's worth, I can't get the webcast to work at all from the Quik Pro website, on my PC - I've reinstalled the latest WM player, Silverlight and Flash and can only get the audio up. Interestingly, the stream works fine off the Bigpond site link - but there are no scores.

Me either.

It's funny huh, this is the first event in Oz that I've pretty much managed to avoid seeing live for the past 10 years ... and viewing it entirely from outside is proving a most intriguing experience.

From a ht/technical POV I think you don't want to be too quick to write off Kelly and his new gear, though its weaknesses (tendency to snap rather than arc through top turns - a classic 4-fin thing - plus a lack of back-end lift thanks to the narrow tail) were a bit on display from what I could see on the replay they had up on the site this morning. The thing is when you're trying new stuff your performances tend to be a bit uneven. Nobody was chortling at KS's expense after his D-Bah show. But you know he's gonna actually have to work for this number 10, even if he can manage it. You would not want to give Mick or Joel the sniff of a lead because they're both looking like complete thoroughbreds right now.

[Nick Carroll]

btw there's some great heats in rd4

Davo vs Parko, though god knows none of us will ever be able to forget smnmntl's crazy deconstruction of Davo the Good Guy, he is nevertheless one of the few who might match Parko's actual skill level, this could be closer than most would imagine

Bede vs Jordy, I'm not in clif's camp on Jordy, the guy is a superb surfer, this is a great test of both competitors for different reasons

Taj vs Dane, I bet they're both feeling this one right now, it's a heat worth both their best efforts