Challenging conditions faced Cronulla Boardriders Club surfers running their monthly point score contest at the North Cronulla Alley on Saturday.
After a week of solid swell and onshore winds, the surface conditions cleaned up a little but the two-metre nor-east swell had left Cronulla's beach breaks in a treacherous state with closeouts the order of the day.
It was a long day on the beach as experienced Australian titles finalist Hayden Blair showed that wave selection and execution is what it takes to collect the cash in the opens, leaving young gun Jay Brown just short of a second consecutive club contest win with defending champion Jordan Widenstrom in third.
The under-13s and women's events did it tough in the low tide closeouts with April Davey showing her class with Giselle Abraham second and Kash Brown catching the wave of the heat to defeat Korbin Whyte and Lucas Correa.
Former club champion Stu Gooch showed his form taking out the very competitive over-45s over Ritchie Brown and Bevan Gosby.
The under-16s is Cronulla Boardriders' largest division and, even with school holidays and alternative surf contests competing for attention, a total of 24 juniors battled it out.
Pocket dynamo Dane De Coque took the win over an exhausted Zac McMartin and Oliver Watson who had to surf in the open final immediately after.
Jay Brown and Jordan Widenstrom are fighting out the club point score leading into next month's Northies Alley Masters which is a two-star rated contest and worth double points.
It wasn't good news in South Africa with Brazilian Deivid Silva crowned as the winner of the 2019 Ballito Pro after convincingly defeating Aussie Jack Freestone in the final of the 51st edition of the world's longest-running professional surfing event on Sunday.
Freestone's father played for the Cronulla Sharks in the NRL and both Silva and 2018 event runner-up Freestone (members of the top 32-ranked surfers on the elite WSL Championship Tour) opted for a power surfing strategy on finals day.
Cronulla's Connor O'Leary fought hard but did not progress out of his first round heat and now heads to the Vans US Open of Surfing, another 10,000-point event, held between July 27 and August 4.
The victory and haul of 10,000 points saw Silva rocket 126 places up the QS rankings to No.4. O'Leary drops from ninth to 17th position but is still within touching distance of re-qualification for next year's world tour.
Cronulla has had picture perfect small waves for the start of this week and this morning there has been a kick in the south swell.Clean swell and light offshore winds have groomed the banks and on the higher tide it's pretty good everywhere.
Low tide is still a problem as all the sand is sitting offshore in a straight line after last weeks big seas and closing out in 6 inches of water.
Our long run of east swell - which kicked off last weekend - will slowly fade after today's lift and will drop to ankle high by Saturday-but the main feature on the forecast this week is an intense low that has developed well SW of New Zealand and is predicted to bring some bombs when it picks up on Sunday morning to 4-5ft before disappearing as quick as it came then returning Monday night with an 8ft BANG!
Still in South Africa,the Corona Open J-Bay the sixth stop on the 2019 World Surf League Championship Tour openedyesterday and holds a competitive window through Monday, July 22, 2019.
With a start on opening day-with Chest-head high SW swell easing into waist-head range for the afternoon with offshore winds-the world's best surfers have arrived in South Africa ready to compete at the world-renowned Jeffreys Bay.The 2019 World Title race is heating up with five events complete so far and new leaders emerging on the Jeep Leaderboard heading into the Corona Open J-Bay.
Our Sally Fitz is the new Jeep Frontrunner for the women's field with Hawaiian Carissa Moore in second and Stephanie Gilmore in third.
On the men's side, the current World No. 1 John John withdrew from J-Bay, and possibly the entire season, after suffering a knee injury in the Quarterfinals at the Oi Rio Pro last month. Now, American World No. 2 Kolohe Andino ,Brazilian No. 3 Filipe Toledo and No. 4 Jordy Smith are all ready to capitalize on Florence's absence to overtake the lead.
In Queensland (almost) the micro-grommet divisions have kicked off on day four of the 2019 Billabong Occy's Grom Comp, which once again was held at Duranbah Beach on the Gold Coast in punchy 2-3ft waves.
The 12 and under boys/girls got in the water for the first time in the event, as well as the 14 and under boys/girls, followed by round three of the blue ribbon 16 and under boys division.
The prestigious event, now in its 16th year, is one of the most highly anticipated junior surfing events in the world and has displayed an extremely high caliber of young local, national and international surfers the event today.