Monday, October 25, 1999
Anyone who has ever dared to dream big is going to love this year's Triple Crown of Surfing.
Australian surfer Mark Occhilupo's biggest dream came true when he recently won the Association of Surfing Professionals world title more than a decade after the rising superstar plunged to the bottom and abandoned the world tour.
Occy, as he is universally known, now enters Hawaii's season-ending contests a new child, with no pressure, except his own determination to win the Triple Crown of Surfing title for a storybook finish to the season of his professional rebirth.
And he could do it at the Banzai Pipeline, the scene of his previous greatest triumph where in 1985 he won the Pipe Masters in giant waves.
Kauai's Keala Kennelly also is poised to put the final exclamation point on a season that already has seen her dreams come true. After clawing her way from the plebeian World Qualifying Series to next year's elite World Championship Tour, Kennelly is now keen to end the year by winning both the WQS title and the Kahlua Triple Crown for Women.
BILLABONG GIRLS AND JUNIOR WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP A women's $30,000 World Championship Tour event, and a championship event for junior men's amateurs. COMING UP
Oct. 30-Nov. 10. Honolua Bay, Maui.
G-SHOCK HAWAIIAN PRO
A men's $80,000, 5-star World Qualifying Series competition plus a 32-man $15,000 Longboard Invitational event, plus a women's $16,000, 4-star WQS event.
RIP CURL CUP AND QUIKSILVER ROXY PRO
A $100,000, 6-star men's WQS, the final men's WQS event. The $30,000 final women's WCT event.
MOUNTAIN DEW GERRY LOPEZ PIPE MASTERS
The $120,600 the final men's 1999 WCT event.
Australia's Layne Beachley has an almost insurmountable lead for the women's world title, but with two WCT events left, there is still a chance for an upset. But even if Beachley suffers horrendous bad luck and fellow Aussies Serena Brooke or Melanie Redman win both events, the title would still remain in Australian hands.
Other members of the international cast of competitors have less lofty goals. The Van's G-Shock Triple Crown of Surfing in Hawaii is a life-and-death struggle for surfers, at least professionally. The top 28 finishers on the WCT remain on that tour next season, and the remainder of the 44 total slots will go to the top 16 finalists on the WQS.
Hawaii surfers Conan Hayes, Shawn Sutton and Andy Irons are in danger of missing out on next year's tour, although Sutton is likely to qualify through the back door of the WQS.
In violation of all known laws of professional surfing physics, Occy, 33, won the world title surfing against surfers nearly 15 years his junior. A talented group of even-younger Hawaii surfers is eager to show that they aren't in awe of the world's top professionals. The local kids are hungry, and impatient. They want to knock out the top guys and make a name for themselves, and they want to do it now.
The same names keep popping up as potential giant killers: Jason Shibata, Bruce Irons, Kai Henry, Fred Pattachia Jr. and aerial acrobat Nainoa Suratt. And for the wahine, Waianae surfer Melanie Bartels.
"I'm not intimidated," said Bartels, 17. "I have nothing to lose, I am an amateur, and just getting more experience. I am learning from them because their surfing is a whole level higher than mine.
"I love seeing them surf, because they all rip. Everybody is going off, not just one or two."
Eventually, Bartels plans to turn pro and follow in the footsteps of Hawaii pros Megan Abubo and Rochelle Ballard. "Keala, Megan and Rochelle are all good role models. But I wouldn't mind beating them in a heat, so I could gain more confidence."
Unfortunately for Hawaii's young male surfers, many won't get the international stage they so desperately crave to earn the attention of potential sponsors. The last WQS event of the season, the Rip Curl Cup at Sunset Beach, has been cut back to four days of competition to satisfy community concerns. That means the majority of the slots in the event will go to the seeded surfers in the top ranks of the WQS and the WCT.
And if the kids don't torment the world's top pros, six-time world champion Kelly Slater is determined to remind everyone that he is still the man. After stepping off the world tour this season to enjoy life, Slater has entered all three Triple Crown men's events, as well as the North Shore surf-season-opening XCEL Pro at Sunset Beach.
The stage is set: The world's best surfers battling for $400,000 in prize money and crucial ratings points, three contests for men, three for women, a junior amateur competition and a longboard event, and maybe a storybook ending.
Hawaii wahine happy to
By Greg Ambrose
finish the grueling
tour at home
Special to the Star-BulletinAfter enduring an exhausting season that included a nightmarish stretch of eight countries in three months, Hawaii's road-weary wahine pro surfers are happy to be home to finish the world tour in front of friends and family.
"I never imagined a year could be this long," said Megan Abubo, rated sixth in the world. "It's good to be home at last, and not have to plan another trip until the next century."
Both Abubo and Rochelle Ballard started the season determined to take the Association of Surfing Professionals world title away from Australia's Layne Beachley.
Abubo came out blazing with solid finishes early in the season and a victory in the Town & Country Lacanau Pro, while Ballard picked up momentum midway through the year with a victory at the Gotcha Girl Star Pro at Huntington Beach and another win in the Hossegor Rip Curl Pro in France.
But as the constant travel drained their batteries, they dropped back farther in the pack. Now, with the world title out of their grasp, each has a special plan to help them salvage the season by winning the Van's G-Shock Triple Crown of Surfing title.
"I'm just thinking of having fun, and winning the Triple Crown," said Abubo.
Ballard's homecoming was equally appreciated. "I just want to find that love of surfing again after a long, hard year," said Ballard, rated fifth. "I'm really going to enjoy surfing in front of my place at Sunset Beach.
"In the past, I focused too much on results and the time in each heat, rather than just going out and enjoying the ocean."
Standing in their way is Keala Kennelly, who began the year with a resolve to surf her way onto the elite World Championship Tour by dominating World Qualifying Series events.
"I told myself at the beginning not to concentrate on winning every time," Kennelly said. "If I just make the finals, I will qualify for WCT."
The results of such a strategy were gratifying, and with one WQS event remaining, Kennelly is assured of a spot on the WCT next year.
But attaining that goal is no longer enough. In a dream season where Kennelly was named wahine surfer of the year and won the Panasonic ShockWave U.S. Tour title, she wants to make a few more dreams come true as the season winds to a dramatic finish in Hawaii.
"Now I want to win the WQS title, and if I could win the Triple Crown, that would be best."
Because the Triple Crown has two elite WCT events for wahines this year, Kennelly had no chance at the title. But when Australia's Haley Tasker retired, Kennelly was invited to compete in several WCT events, as well as the final two in Hawaii.
"It's great to have a chance and know it's available to me. Winning the Triple Crown has always been one of my dreams. It's about time a Hawaiian won the Hawaiian Triple Crown."
The two remaining WCT events, the Billabong Girls at Honolua Bay on Maui and the season-ending Roxy Pro at Sunset Beach, give Ballard and Abubo an excellent chance to rise in the ratings.
"I'm excited for the Honolua Bay event," said Abubo. "I've never surfed there, but it seems like a fantastic place to surf. If I get two really good results, I can move up pretty far (in the ratings)."
"I have been pulling for the Honolua Bay contest for at least three years," said Ballard. "Just to bring women's surfing to another island will be good for some of the girls. It's not every day that top women surfers show up at the local break.
"We want to encourage the local girls."
Regardless of how she finishes this season, Ballard has her sights firmly fixed on the future of women's surfing. While competing this season, she has been working tirelessly to help create a new tour sanctioned by the ASP that will give wahine surfers a better stage on which to perform.
Tentatively scheduled for the 2001 season, the women will have a tour with twice the money, great venues for TV and videos, nine contests of their own and three that they plan to share with the men's tour.
"We want to be able to put out a good product, and a good developmental program for young athletes who want to be pros, as well as girls that just want to pick up some tips and have fun hanging out at the beach," Ballard said. "We want to help women surfers fulfill their dreams and enjoy the beach lifestyle.
"The men's sport is growing so much that there isn't enough room for men and women in one week of competition at each location. We're always fighting over the best waves for our events.
"We need to help each other."
