17th Annual Quiksilver King Of The Peak Set
To Go Down In Solid Northeast Swell Conditions On November 6th-7th By
Nick McGregor; Captions by Dick “Mez” Meseroll
One thing
you can always count on for the Quiksilver King Of The Peak is Event Director
Matt Kechele conjuring up waves, and plenty of ‘em. And 2011 will be no
different, with a solid six- to eight-foot northeast windswell on tap for
Sunday, November 6th and Monday, November 7th. Of course, like always, the ENE
winds will also be cranking, turning First through Third Peak, OK Signs, and
up-the-beach Inlet into a whirlpool of treacherous ramps, pounding barrels, and
man-eating sections. As always, those with experience in unruly conditions like
that will persevere — as will those who are experienced with Quiksilver’s
patented skins format.
If you’re
looking for a little history on Florida’s most prestigious surf contest, check
out www.EasternSurf.com’s detailed
features on the contest’s past winners here and its 16 Most
Monumental Moments here.
Also, contest reports with tons of A+ action and peripheral images can be found here, from 2009and here, from 2010.
For surf
fans, this is hands down the most action-packed contest on the Central Florida
docket. And for competitors, the whopping $13,250 prize purse, which includes
an additional $3,000 to the overall skins winner and another $500 for the ESM Airshow champ, is front and center
in their minds. But here’s a few other things you can look forward to in 2011 after
the random heat draw goes down on Sunday at 7:30 a.m.:
1) Prime King Of The Peak conditions. Who
needs sunshine, offshore winds, and feathering lips when you can watch
Florida’s best duke it out in detonating shorepound and wind-skewered sections?
The forecasts for Sunday and Monday are nearly identical: six- to eight-foot
surf at 10 to 12 seconds, occasional double-overhead sets, 20-plus mph ENE winds,
the potential for rain, and raw, moody, weather. In short, exactly what this
corest of core surf contests is all about.
2) Aaron Cormican to go all out in his
effort to defend the 2010 KOP crown. It should come as no surprise that no
surfer has ever won the King Of The Peak in consecutive years — and the
only person who’s ever won it twice is Mr. Robert Kelly Slater, who founded the
whole damn thing back in 1995 as a fundraiser for his alma mater, Cocoa Beach
Jr./Sr. High School. But if there’s one guy who knows how to scrap it out in a
four-man heat, it’s East Coast contest circuit veteran Gorkin. And after trying
for a decade-plus to finally add the KOP to his laundry list of contest scalps,
he ain’t giving this one up easy in 2011.
3) The Thompson brothers. Cody Thompson
won here in 2008 — only the second surfer in contest history hailing from
north of New Smyrna Beach to do so. Cody also won Quiksilver’s Sandy Forsyth
Memorial Contest at home in Jax Beach last month, proving he knows what’s up
with the skins format. And then there’s lil’ bro Evan, who nearly walked home
with the 2010 crown last year, before Gorkin won the last three heats of the
event to catch, tie, and surpass Evan’s impressive seven-skin total. Evan’s also
been dueling it out on the elite ASP World Junior Tour the last couple of
months, so the only question will be whether he can adjust from that standard
judging criteria back to the one-maneuver, wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am surfing
required at the King of The Peak. But since the last three crowns have been won
on the strength of aerial surfing, we’d say Evan’s got a damn good chance.
4) The local cavalry. This is Sebastian
Inlet after all, where local knowledge reigns supreme and ten of the contest’s
14 champions were or are considered Inlet kingpins. But with the old guard of
Hartley, Speir, Reinecke, and company finally giving way to the youth
generation who’ve grown up traveling the world more often than posting up at
First Peak, a tectonic shift might finally be in order. Take 2010, for example,
when equal-4th-place finisher CT Taylor was the highest-placing Brevard County
resident of the event. Of course, with the global economy weighing on
everyone’s shoulders, no self-respecting Space Coast surfer is going to pass up
the chance to win $211 per skin — and potentially take home an extra
$3,000 bonus for topping the skins count at the end of the day. Watch for these
loc’dogs to come flashing out of the gate with their teeth bared.
5) The out-of-state contingent. The
highest-placing out-of-staters at the King of the Peak both hail from Virginia
Beach, and both placed 2nd in their respective years: Brendan Petticrew in 2003
and Jason Borte in 1997. So history certainly isn’t on the side of non-Florida
competitors. But Event Organizer Matt Kechele savors every out-of-state guy who
enters, emphasizing the fact that a more diverse field always pushes the cream
to surf that much better on its rise to the top. Who knows whether 2011 will be
the year that a North Carolinian, Virginian, New Jerseyite, or even Canadian
like repeat entrant Logan Landry will steal the King Of The Peak crown up I-95.
Either way, we’ll be watching every single one of ‘em to see if they have what
it takes to conquer thick ‘n’ chunky Sebastian Inlet.
For
updates on the 17th Annual Quiksilver King of the Peak, call Event Organizer
Matt Kechele at 321-259-5443.
17th Annual Quiksilver King Of The Peak Set
To Go Down In Solid Northeast Swell Conditions On November 6th-7th By
Nick McGregor; Captions by Dick “Mez” Meseroll READ MORE…
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