Cronulla’s Jay Brown will attempt to defend his 2016 title when he returns to the NSW junior surfing titles at Port Macquarie starting on Friday.
The championships, presented by Ocean and Earth, will call Port Macquarie on the mid-north coast home again this year with 250 of the state’s best junior surfers taking part in the week-long competition.
“I just want to do my best, it’s all about consistent results,” Jay said.
All qualifiers were determined by eight individual regional titles which took place up and down the NSW coastline earlier this year.
The winners will qualify for the Havaianas NSW junior team for the Surf Dive ‘n’ Ski Australian junior titles.
The last two days of the event will also comprise the NSW School surfing titles.
This is the seventh year Surfing NSW have combined the NSW School titles into the NSW junior state title event.
Former competitors in the junior state titles include current World Surf League (WSL) Championship Tour surfers Owen and Tyler Wright, Matt Banting, Stuart Kennedy, Sally Fitzgibbons, Laura Enever, Ryan Callinan and Cronulla’s Connor O'Leary.
The event will be fully mobile in the Port Macquarie area with Town, Flynns, Light House, Bonny Hills and North Haven Beach all venue options.
School holidays haven't disappointed with waves dropping under the 3ft mark for most of the week
A little kick last Friday gave the kids some hope but really it was a 2-3ft south swell if you were lucky albeit with perfect winter offshores most days.
Swellnet predicts the southerly that picked up yesterday to provide the weeks best waves as conditions overnight push through a new 3-4 ft southerly groundswell peaking at midday with light southerly winds.
The banks are pretty average but if you can surf around midday the high tide should provide the best conditions.
Wednesday’s south swell will then ease into Thursday with light winds in general,we should then see a new swell filling in on Thursday afternoon (peaking Friday) around the 2-3ft range and surf size will be small to start the weekend.
Jordy Smith won the Ballito Pro pres. by Billabong in front of a packed beach of partisan spectators last week, defeating powerful Brazilian Willian Cardoso in a pulsating final to add the 2017 event title to his previous victory in 2010.
The big South African overcame a stomach bug to reach the final of the first World Surf League QS10,000 rated event of the year where he used his trademark repertoire of aerial manoeuvres to post an impressive heat total 18.06, including near perfect 9.73.
The world’s best surfers are at the acclaimed righthander of Supertubes in Jeffreys Bay, South Africa, for Stop No. 6 on the 2017 World Surf League (WSL) Championship Tour (CT), the Corona Open J-Bay. The event marks the halfway point on the CT and will resume this season’s title race, with the top five athletes on the Jeep Leaderboard separated by just 600 points.
The event holds a competitive window of July 12 - 23, 2017 and is the only CT stop on the African continent.
Aussie Matt Wilkinson heads into the event wearing the coveted Jeep Leader Jersey after an impressive win at the OK Fiji Pro over Connor O’Leary. Wilkinson’s best result in South Africa is a Semifinal finish in 2014 and this year the Australian will need to place higher in the event than the other surfers in the top 5 in order to retain his position at No. 1 on the Jeep Leaderboard.
Just 250 points behind the Australian is reigning WSL Champion John John Florence (HAW), who made it to the Final of the J-Bay Open in 2016-for Cronulla locals it's all about Connor and he surfs in Heat 9: Connor O’Leary (AUS), Adrian Buchan (AUS), Jack Freestone (AUS)
Finally Jarvis Earle is the last man standing at the 2017 Skullcandy Oz Grom Open presented by Vissla as competition intensified on day four of the prestigious event.
Jarvis used his pint-sized frame to positive effect in the 14-and-Under Boys division performing a variety of mammoth hooks. Earle’s repertoire of turns led the Cronulla goofy-footer to claim victory in his round four and quarterfinal duals and booked his ticket into the semi-finals where he’ll meet Ethan Huxtable (Jan Juc, Vic) and Takumi Yasumbia (Japan). Josh Grange (Burleigh, Qld), Ryley Smidt (Corindi, NSW) and Lennox Chell (Avoca, NSW) will form the opposing 14 Boys semi-final.
Anyway all eyes on JBay ,I dont care who wins as long as its Mick fanning-or Connor! Up Up