Quincy Davis, Cody Thompson Bring Home The Bacon At Volcom
VQS Championships By Allison Arteaga; Photos Courtesy
Volcom/ Kenny Morris
TURF: 2010 Volcom Totally Crustaceous VQS World
Championships (Crustaceous Oaks Summer Camp); 54th Street, Newport Beach CA;
May 13th-15th, 2010
ENERGY: If
you’ve ever seen a Volcom Totally Crustaceous Tour event, you know that
attending one is a bit like entering the twilight zone. Each year, the championship
gets an outlandish new theme, and in 2010, competitors and spectators were
forcibly enrolled in the Crustaceous Oaks Summer Camp as soon as they set foot
on 54th Street in Newport Beach. A menacing stuffed grizzly bear was stationed
in the sand beneath the camp entrance, and whistle-blowing “camp counselors” decked
out in goofy bucket hats roamed between the tents and warned everyone to wear life
jackets and watch out for raccoons.
There were plenty of games
and activities to entertain the groms, tons of free schwag for spectators, and
a $50,000 purse waiting to be claimed by the worthiest competitors. Volcom’s
VQS champs always attract a wide field of international talent, and all the
action was broadcast live to viewers across the world via webcast. Despite onshore
winds that brought a bit of chop, wave size built throughout the event, from
the waist-high conditions of the first two days to the chest-high to overhead sets
that rolled through on the last day, just in time for the quarters, semis, and
finals.
FIRST TIME
AT FIGHT CLUB: Although the Volcom Totally Crustaceous Tour has been
running for almost a decade now, it still feels like a completely new event
each year, thanks to the annual change of themes. Past events have been based
on topics ranging anywhere from pirates to hippies to hillbillies, and the one
constant among them is they’ve always been crowd pleasers. This year’s summer
camp theme was a fun and creative addition to this long list of successful
ideas from the guys and gals over at Volcom, from whom we wouldn’t expect
anything less.
Aside from the new theme,
the live scoring system that allowed spectators on the beach and the web to
keep a closer eye on the competition was also a first. Daniel Terry, a
coordinator of the event and Volcom’s East Coast Marketing Manager, said that
the system is likely to become a staple in future Volcom events. But the most
notable first at this year’s Totally Crustaceous World Championships was New
Yorker Quincy Davis’ 1st-place finish in the Girls division. She fought her way
through a field of fierce competitors to become the first woman from the East
Coast to ever win the event.
“That’s huge, especially
when you look at the past champions,” Terry said. “It’s always been a lot of
big names winning it, so for her name to fall in line with those others really
solidifies her and all that she’s been working on. She looked pretty excited
holding that check.”
SLIDE: The
battle for the Totally Crustaceous World Championship crown has been raging
since July 2009, when regional qualifiers for the event kicked
off, including a handful of comps from Texas to the Northeast. That allowed
plenty of talented East Coasters to represent their home turf amid a stacked
field of international competitors.
By far the most successful
of these Rightsiders was Empire State native Quincy Davis. By the quarterfinals
of the Girls competition, all East Coast candidates had been knocked out except
for Davis, who had yet to lose a heat. The semifinals presented more of a challenge
for her, but Davis came out with a close 2nd-place finish behind Bailey Nagy of
Hawaii, earning her a spot in the finals. Then she really stepped up her game
and dominated all the girls in the final for a clear-cut victory and a fat
$4,000 check.
In the Pro-Am division, Garden
State hero Andrew Gesler, Florida heavy hitters Cody Thompson and Blake Jones, and
Virginia Beach’s own Michael Dunphy cruised through the first two rounds and
into the quarterfinals of the contest, where things heated up a bit. In the
first quarter, Cody Thompson and Cory Arrambide battled it out for 1st-place,
with Thompson squeaking by on the strength of a 7.0, the highest wave score of
the heat. Meanwhile, Andrew Gesler had trouble finding scoreable waves amid the
Newport Beach chop and went down with a 4th-place finish.
In the third quarter,
Michael Dunphy and Blake Jones fought for 2nd-place behind Santa Cruz wonderkid
Nat Young. Jones bagged an amazing ride that earned him a 7.83, even besting
Young’s highest score, but by the end of the heat he was still sitting on a
1.27 backup, which allowed Dunphy to swoop in and take 2nd-place and the right
to advance.
Dunphy and Thompson were the
East Coast’s only hopes heading into the semifinals of the Men’s Pro-Am, and
for almost his entire heat, it seemed that Dunphy had 2nd-place and a spot in
the finals on lock. But Brazilian surfer Heitor Pereira posted a buzzer beater
with less than a minute left in the semi, pulling 2nd-place out from under Dunphy.
In his semi, Thompson pulled
out another narrow victory over Tyler Newton of Hawaii for 2nd-place, claiming
his spot behind Nat Young by only .17 points, but earning the right to represent
the East Coast in the finals nonetheless. Progressive Australian Mitch
Coleborn, who blew up in all of his heats from the beginning of the contest,
cranked up the intensity in the finals and left all his surfers in the dust
with an array of high-flying aerial maneuvers. The competition for 2nd, 3rd,
and 4th was tight, with less than .2 points separating each competitor, and
Thompson ended up with a 4th-place finish and a $1,000 check.
In the other divisions, Right
Coast riders didn’t fare so well, but New York half-timer Ryan Carlson placed
6th in the Air Show final, while Cody’s little brother Evan Thompson hung in
there in the Juniors division until the quarterfinals. And New Smyrna Beach, FL’s,
Noah Schweizer advanced through his first two heats and into the quarterfinals
of the Groms division.
“Evan had a really good
showing, and Noah Schweizer was definitely a standout,” Terry said. “A lot of
people hadn’t really seen Noah surf much, and they were all super impressed.”
THE PAIN: Michael Dunphy seemed
like a sure bet to move on to the finals of the Pro-Am, right until everything
slipped through his fingers in the last few seconds of his semifinals heat. You
know that one had to sting a bit. “I couldn’t even hear anything in that heat,”
Dunphy said. “I thought I was losing but I was actually making it — I
just needed a second wave, and I could have made it to the finals if I wasn’t
falling all over the place [laughs]. It was pretty painful though, because 3rd
in the semis gets no money.”
THE MAN: Quincy
Davis made history (and a sizeable paycheck) at this year’s Volcom Totally
Crustaceous VQS World Championships, and for that, she’s The Woman. Congratulations
Quincy.
YOU DO NOT TALK ABOUT FIGHT CLUB: “Volcom contests
are always a good time. They’re more like an expression session than a normal
contest. Everyone was going big all weekend, and the international crew that
shows up every year are always turning heads.” –Cody Thompson, 4th-place Pro-Am
finisher and highest-placing Men's East Coast representative
“People come from all over the world for this event, and it really
gives it some cool international flair. It shows people what else is out there
besides just the same old song and dance.” –Daniel Terry, event coordinator
and Volcom East Coast Marketing Manager
FINAL RESULTS OF THE 2010 VOLCOM TOTALLY CRUSTACEOUS
VQS WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS:
Sweetwater Leaves It Up To The Grom At Oakley Surf Shop Challenge Mid-Atlantic Regional Qualifier; “Uncle” Andrew Gesler Drives Heritage Win Home In Northeast
By Matt Pruett and Nick McGregor;
Photos by Matt Lusk
