As day turned to night in Lemoore, California last week, Noosa’s Harrison Roach needed a miner’s helmet light to find the bottom of the Surf Ranch right as he launched into a trademark smooth-as-silk cutback.
Needless to say, he didn’t have one, he bogged a rail of his favourite Thomas log and handed the Cuervo Open title to France’s Edouard Delpero. It’s not all bad for Harry, of course. Following his runner-up finish at the Ranch, he sits second in the rankings going into the 2020-21 longboard world title decider at Malibu this week, only 1250 points behind Edouard, the man-bunned bombshell from Bidart.
What is bad news is that the WSL final had to be played out under woefully inadequate lighting after a “scheduled maintenance pause” (read breakdown) of the freight train that delivers the waves. Watching it live, I was reminded of a Malibu Surfing Association Teams Classic a decade or so ago when someone had miscalculated the number of heats to run in daylight, and some of us had to surf in the pitch black while a runner in the shallows had to relay each wave score to the judges in the tower, who couldn’t see either. Quite a few members of the Noosa team will never forget that either.
Fading light plus a bit of wind on the face played havoc with other top-line longboarders at the Cuervo – including former world champ Justin Quintal and the veteran Joel Tudor – but the man-made wave is clearly no picnic for longboarders at the best of times. Although I’ve never surfed it, I’ve mind-surfed the inside barrel from the apron of the pool and wondered if I’d ever have the split-second timing to make one of them. Answer: probably not. It looks benign but it’s anything but.
None of this is to take anything away from Edouard’s stellar performance. I’ve enjoyed watching the Delpero brothers surfing in Noosa and at Cote des Basques for years, and Edouard has a good shot at the title at Malibu. Me, I’m backing Harrison to win a maiden world title, and given his diverse career path, I reckon it needs to be now. If he wins, it will be thoroughly deserved, because had it not been for a quirk of fate, he’d already have it in the bag.
Harrison was on fire at the 2020 Noosa Open, the season opener for the 2021 WSL world championship. He seemed to pick every runner out of the garbage heap on offer at Access 11, Noosa West. And then, as he edged towards the Noosa title, he was called for an interference on California’s Kevy Skvarna in what can only be described as bizarre circumstances. In the many months since, Harry has generously described it as his own “brain fade”, but there is an entirely different interpretation, which I probably share, having watched it from the beach.
The upshot was that Harrison finished seventh and 45-year-old Joel Tudor took the event. A couple of weeks later the entire season was called off thanks to the spread of Covid, and points from Noosa 2020 were eventually added to the two-event tally for the 2021 season, which means that Tudor is sitting in third going into the Malibu decider.
Meanwhile, another Noosa favourite, Hawaii’s Honolua Blomfield, took out the women’s division at the Surf Ranch with an absolutely beautiful performance that included a switch-foot perfect score. The WSL reported: “A marathon day, including six waves, tested the two-time WSL Longboard Champion but her grace under pressure paved the way to a massive win heading into the final event of the season.”
It sounds silly to call six waves in a day a marathon, but the long, long ride down the pool taxes both physical and nervous energy, and it was apparent by final runs that several surfers were battling exhaustion. But at least they got to finish before dark!
Honno’s victory at the Ranch puts her in pole position for Malibu, with a 2500 points lead over Hawaii’s Kelis Kaleopaa, who won the 2020 Noosa Open. But her biggest threat might come from Ranch runner-up Soleil Errico, a further 1000 points behind but on her home break at Malibu.
With a good south swell predicted for this coming weekend, Malibu should be a treat for longboarders.
FOOTNOTE: On the other side of the world at beautiful Ericeira, Portugal, WSL Challenger Series competitors in the MEO Vissla Pro had difficult and blustery sideshore conditions to contend with during the opening day of the event, but it didn’t seem to bother Australia’s Dylan Moffat who posted the day’s highest heat total of 15.93 to move into the round of 48. Dylan is a young Narrabeen surfer who has been doing the hard rounds on the qualifying series for several years now, but he’s anything but a journeyman. He raised eyebrows at this year’s Rip Curl Narrabeen Pro when given a wildcard ahead of bigger names, but I watched him surf there and was very impressed. I’d love to see him make a mark in Portugal.
