Christian Surfers NZ ran the RPM Classic West Auckland community surf competition over the weekend (25th-26th March) at Muriwai beach.
The event used the H2 format with surfers initially surfing in a qualifying round. At the end of this round the surfers with scores in the top 50% of the leader board advance to the cup round and the remaining 50% to the plate round. The event was split into 3 divisions, Open, U16 and Woman’s.
The contest was blessed with great surf on Saturday with 3-4ft swell and offshore winds. But the low tide during the qualifying round made the conditions tricky with a number of strong surfers being relegated to the plate round. Raglan’s Zennor Wernham was the top scorer of the 50 surfers competing in the open division qualifying round.
As the tide pushed in the conditions improved producing fast bowling waves with some spectacular surfing going down, even the odd tube ride and a broken board.
West Auckland Christian surfers put a lot of planning and preparation into the event and aside from the surf action there was something to keep everyone entertained. A pack of grommets of all ages spent the majority of Saturday skating the mobile half pipe that the legends from Remain Industries had set up at the contest site. There were also free surf lessons running throughout the day and a free bbq thanks to the Mad Butcher.
Both the under 16 and woman’s cup and plate divisions were completed in fun high tide peaks on Saturday afternoon, Sonya Michaels dominated her home break to take out the woman’s cup final and Zen Wallace won the U16 cup final.
The RPM and Backdoor Surf shop prizes were dished out just before the music kicked off on Saturday evening. Four Auckland based bands "All Else Fails", "Geneva", "Redeyswhite", and "Kingston" entertained the 200+ crowd on the mobile stage set up next to the half pipe.
The open division was run to completion on Sunday morning, but unfortunately the swell had dropped over night, with 2ft sets being fanned by a strong rain and offshore wind.
In the open plate final Levi O’Conner was surfing fast and smoothly, scoring a strong left-hander and executing several great re-entries early in the heat. Once he backed up with another good score, none of the other finalists (that were all twice Levi’s size) were ever going to catch him.
In the open championship final Rowan Klevstul started strongly latching onto a fast right-hander and found himself a great little tube ride. Rowan was in the lead for the rest of the heat until the final minute of the final when Mike Phillips stroked into a nice shaped lefthander and completed a number of nice turns surfing all the way through to the shore break to steal the title. Along with a bunch of RPM and Backdoor prizes Mike also won a 3-day campervan holiday thanks to Kea Campers.
Results
Open Cup
1st Mike Phillips
2nd Rowan Klevstul
3rd Rowan Aish
4th Shea Parton
Open Plate
1st Levi O’Conner
2nd Mike Smith
3rd Gordon Webb
4th Jason Vink
U16 Cup
1st Zen Wallace
2nd Liam Jeffries
3rd Peter Ralph
4th Aaron Wearn
U16 Plate
1st Finn Forde – Lyon
2nd Cerise Davis
3rd Dylan James
4th Tyron Parata
Woman’s Cup
1st Sonia Michaels
2nd Jessie Nicholson
3rd Nicola Colson – Koster
4th Daisy Mason
Woman’s Plate
1st Hayley Vink
2nd Amy Fletcher
3rd Cerise Davis
4th Thandi Durham
Thanks to caught on radar for the images (click the link to view more photos from the event)
http://www.caughtonradar.com
Thanks to RPM, Backdoor Surf Shop and Kea Campers for the great prizes
http://www.rpm.co.nz
http://www.backdoor.co.nz
http://www.keacampers.com
Thanks to Remain Industries for the half pipe
http://www.remain.co.nz
Thanks to the Mad butcher for the sausages
http://www.themadbutcher.co.nz
