South Africa surfers surge into medal contention after day 5

The South African surfing team yesterday surged into medal contention at the INS ISA World Surfing Games at Jaco Beach in Costa Rica, jumping up four places to sixth in the provisional team standings heading into the final three days of the event.
All four SA team members in action on Day 5 reveled in the slightly bigger waves and good conditions to progress to the next round in their respective divisions.
The 140 athletes who started the event last Sunday have been whittled down to just 42, with 11 of the 26 national teams already eliminated Team captain Faye Zoetmulder (Cape St Francis) led the South African charge, posting the only double digit tally in her Women’s Repecharge Round 3 heat to advance to Round 4 along with runner-up Idalis Alverado from Puerto Rico.
Tanika Hoffman was next up and held onto second place behind Brittani Nicholl (AUS) as the pair eliminated opponents from Japan and New Zealand. Hoffman joined Zoetmulder in the last 18 of the women’s division and the duo will contest Heat 3 of Round 4 where they will be up against competitors from host nation Costa Rica and from Australia.
Shane Sykes (Salt Rock) continued the South African surge in the next heat, racking up a heat total of 13.60 to narrowly outpoint Eduardo Fernandes (POR) who earned 13.33. Their opponents from USA and Venezuela were relegated to supporting their respective teams from the beach for the rest of the event.
Matt McGillivray (Jeffreys Bay) then completed a great day for the team when he ousted the last two Australian men from event.
McGillivray finished runner-up to Japan’s Hiroto Arai, whose highest heat total of the round, 16.64 out of 20, included an excellent 9.17.
Only defending team champions Costa Rica and Portugal still have five of their six surfers in contention for medals. South Africa, Peru, France and Japan have four while Argentina and New Zealand have three and perennial medal contenders Australia and USA, along with Venezuela, have just two.
Surfline, the official event forecaster, is predicting that the 1-1.5 metre South West swell will continue to hold through the contest period, which ends with the finals on Sunday, August 14.
All four South Africans still in contention will be in action in the Repecharge Rounds at Jaco Beach today. The day’s action will conclude with the semi-finals of the Aloha Cup where four-person squads from the top eight nations from the 2015 ISA World Surfing Games compete in a form of relay surfing. South Africa is not included as the team did not attend last year’s event.

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