Newquay Surf School owner Adam ‘Bearman’ Griffiths is over in California with his family in toe, to compete in the 2nd stop on the Surf Relik world tour. After a 2nd place finishes in the first top at Malibu, Adam had his sights set on the number one spot for the 2nd and final stop on this years tour.
After a quarterfinal finish at the Boardmasters event at Fistral beach in August, Adam left for California feeling confident but knew it was going to be fierce competition as the worlds best longboarders all head towards lower Trestles. One of the most high-performance waves in the world.
The Surf Relik tour, unlike the WSL, splits the longboarders into two categories, modern and classic. Adam surfs in the modern division, where the emphasis is all on high performance turns, critical nose rides and even airs.
As the day started, the surf was pumping 4-6ft waves, and light offshore winds greeted the surfers as the competition began. Adam was in heat 4 in round one which is a non-elimination round. He placed 3rd in that heat as started to get used to surfing a new wave that he hadn’t surfed in competition before.
Round two is a man on man heats, and only the 1st place surfer progressed. Adam stepped up his performance taking the win and made his way into round 3.
Where he was in a heat with fellow UK surfer Ben Skinner. The top 2 surfers go through to the quarter-finals with the 3rd place surfer going home. It was a tense and hard-fought heat. Adam was in 2nd place with 20 seconds to go when Ben took off on a wave needing to post a high score to go into 2nd place. He surfed the wave well. The heat ended with it all in judges hands.
After what felt like an hour but was only a few minutes the commentator announced that Ben had not got the score and Adam had come 2nd in the heat making his way into the quarter-final of the competition.
Next, up for Adam was the Quater Final heat, surfing against a tough opponent, surfing well but not getting the scores he needed to advance any further. Adam can leave with his head held high though, with a 2nd place and a Quater final place in the two stops on tour.
Well done yet again Adam, see you at the Surf School soon.
