Local surfers fared well on opening day, including Myles Padaca, a former Triple Crown champion and three-time winner at Sunset Beach. He was in fine form, winning his heat yesterday in the tricky 3- to 6-foot conditions at the HIC Pro at Sunset Beach.
"Stoked to be surfing in an event again because I only do a couple a year," Padaca said. "There are a bunch of local surfers who are vying for eight or 10 slots to get into the Triple Crown, so it’s really important for me to do well in this event. Being my home break I look forward to it every year."
Sunset is known as one of the hardest spots in the world to surf. Padaca himself has coached many surfers out at Sunset, including current woman’s world champion Carissa Moore. He considers local knowledge a huge advantage.
"It’s such a big playing field. From the channel to the outside point it’s a couple hundred yards, so it spreads everything out, so experience counts out here," Padaca said. "I am looking forward to the swells that are coming and hopefully it gets big in the 10- to 12-foot range so that I have to use the cliche ‘separates the men from the boys.’"
Another past champion to advance yesterday was Kauai’s Evan Valiere, 29, who won the event in 2006. He used critical and precise backside surfing to advance in first place.
"It was pretty wild out there," Valiere said. " It feels great, I love to surf at contests in Hawaii. It’s the most fun to compete in these kind of conditions, super challenging, lots of speed, bigger boards and bigger turns. Positioning and paddling is super critical out here."
Another Sunset Beach local to advance was Marcus Hickman. A bit of luck saw him getting the score he needed in the dying minutes of the heat.
"I didn’t think I made it, but I got enough points to make it through," Hickman said. "I had cobwebs, rust, shakes, you name it. I am stoked to make it through. I want to try and carry the momentum into the next rounds. My strategy was just to catch a lot of waves because I saw a lot of heats earlier that were really slow."
Some of yesterdays standouts included Ian Walsh (Maui), TJ Barron (North Shore), Skip McCullough (California), Imaikalani DeVault (Maui) Breyden Taylor (USA) and Kalani Chapman (North Shore).
Some surfers to look out for when conditions permit in the round of 96 include past champion Hank Gaskell (Maui), Bruce Irons (Kauai), Teppei Tajima (Japan), Anthony Walsh (Australia), Parker Coffin (California), Taylor Clark (California) and Jeronimo Vargas (Brazil).
Valiere acknowledges that the season-opening 4-star ASP event is crucial to Hawaii surfers and is excited for the rest of the competitive winter surf season.
"It’s a great event for Hawaii, " Valiere said. " I would love to see more events in Hawaii because there are so many solid surfers and a lot of them just want that opportunity to compete.
"We are just here year after year just waiting for the Triple Crown to come around."
