South African surfers still going for gold at Worlds

Tricky conditions with inconsistent waves and onshore winds saw four members of the South African junior surfing team eliminated on Day 4 at the VISSLA ISA World Junior Surfing Championship at Oceanside in California.

Salt Rock’s Shane Sykes and SA team captain is the only South African left in the main event stream.

He placed second in his U18 boys round three heat to advance to the last 16 and is now halfway to reaching the grand final.

Only Teal Hogg is left in the U18 division after Chanelle Botha in her do-or-die repercharge round two heat, while Hogg finished runner-up to stay in contention.

Olivia Izzard also moved on to repercharge round three in the U16 girls division, while Salt Rock’s Sophie Bell lost in her repercharge round two heat.

Joshe Faulkner stays on track in the U16 boys as he is up in repercharge round three, as is Sebastian Williams, Luke Malherbe and Adin Masencamp.

Ntando Msibi dropped into U18 boys repercharge round four after ending fourth in his main event round three heat.

All will resume their campaigns in the repercharge rounds where competitors are given a second chance in cutthroat 15 minute heats.

The other South Africans team members dropped out of the event after losses in their respective repercharge heats are U18 boys Richard Kidd and Michael Monk who placed equal 49th overall and contributed 240 points each towards SA’s team total.

South Africa has dropped to tenth place in the provisional team standings. Hawaii, France and the USA still have all 12 team members in contention while Japan, Australia and Portugal have had one surfer eliminated, Costa Rica and Tahiti have ‘lost’ two and Peru three.

All eight South African still in the event will be competing today.

Watch it live at isaworlds.com