Wet and Wild with Rockin’ Fig:World tour stops at Spain

The Assn. of Surfing Professionals World Championship Tour headed to Spain last week for some action at the killer left-point break, Mundaka.

The surf was on and off, with pulses of surf anywhere from flat to 3 to 6 feet, from insane to just .OK. Also, there were some extreme tides that made it work for a while and then shut it right down at times. So they’ve been running as many heats as they can in the tricky conditions.

In round two, there were a couple of upsets, as two former Australian winners were knocked out: last year’s champ, Luke Egan and the 1999 winner ‘Occy’ Mark Occhilupo, plus the Trestles winner here in Cally a couple weeks ago, Bede Durbidge, and WCT standout from Carlsbad, Taylor Knox.

In round three, Surf City’s one and only Timmy Reyes had a rough one, falling on a nice set wave and never really recovering. He was surfing against Hawaii’s “Power Master” Pancho Sullivan, who was on fire, cracking some straight-up off-the-lips for the win.

But the man of the day was “Parko” Joel Parkinson, the winner in France last week, who had three waves scored in the mid-nine zone — almost perfection — for three of the sickest barrels of the event in one heat.

Can he go two for two?

Hawaiian Bruce Irons got shacked and won, Mick Fanning was blasting and looking super quick, and advanced. Kelly Slater, who was a no-show in the first-round heat when he apparently mistimed the draw time, showed up for round two.

Slater took out a wild card, a hot amateur kid from California, Cory Arrambide, who got the spot because veteran Troy Brooks was injured.

Arrambide broke his board in half after pulling in a closeout barrel midway through the heat, giving a valiant effort. Slater then took out another wild card, a top-ranked Spanish surfer, in round three to move on again in search of world title No. 8.

Aussie Taj Burrow advanced, as well as USA hopefuls Bobby Martinez (from Santa Barbara) and Florida’s Corey Lopez, who needs a good result to stay in the top 28 or he might have to requalify next year, which would be tough. San Clemente’s Chris Ward, who tore up his previous heat, was eliminated from the competition after some nice runs.

The Billabong Mundaka Pro should be finished up by the weekend.

The Gals have been surfing it up over in Oz, at their WCT event, the Havaiana’s Classic. It’s down to the semis, with Peru’s former world champ, Sofia Mulanovich, and a wild card who’s been on fire, Stephanie Gilmore, both in semi one. And in semi two, last year’s world champ Chelsea Georgeson vs. veteran world champ Layne Beachley.

The USA’s Julia Christian made it to the quarterfinals before losing out. Gilmore, in round one, upset Melanie Redman Carr — who has won three events this season and has a title shot this year — but took an early exit, opening the door for the other gals to move up in the standings.

The Western Surfing Assn. has held events in Ventura and Santa Cruz recently, and some of Huntington’s surfers did pretty well.

In the super grom 12-and-under division, Paige Ortiz ripped to third while Tess Lustbaum, in the girls’ 17-and under, took the big win at Ventura. Nichole Jenderko placed fifth in the girls’ 17-and-under and Shiela Huber was third at Santa Cruz last weekend.

Danny Misken was going off at both events, winning two in a row in men’s, gouging some turns. Chucky Rigano placed fifth in open men’s at the Hook, in the low-tide kelpy conditions. The Figster took a double double, with two big wins while the ‘Slickster’ Pat Schlick got a second and a third. Jay Boldt took a fifth and a fourth in grand masters at both surf contests.

Boldt was third in longboarding at Ventura. Schlick took second and Bryan Stanley rounded out the top four in longboards at the Cruz, which saw small surf but beautiful conditions, with hardly any wind and sunny skies.

That’s it for now. See ya. Fig, over and out.