| Who blew up: |
| 1. Wayne Monk, Klee Strachan and Bianca Buitendag |
The Mr Price Open was certainly an event of extremes. Bianca who is one of the younger girls on the women’s PST beat all the older girls to take out the top slot. This she did quite convincingly. Go girl! Then Klee Strachan has had quite a year so far. This weekend he won the JNR’s and came third in the Open Men’s. Not bad for the teenage powerhouse from Winkel. Finally the man who never says die, the one guy you can count on to fight till the bitter end and one of the most dedicated competitive surfers SA has ever produced, Wayne Monk. Wayne, who if he isn’t yet 40 is damn close, sliced his way through the field only to peak in the final. In so doing he won the event, which I think is his maiden PST victory and beat a bunch of super hot surfers who are literally half his age. What can we say but... Respect!
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| 2. Rudy Palmboom SNR and Rudy Palmboom JNR |
In heaving barrels the father and son went head to head at Cave Rock on Saturday. It was no formal competition but witnesses were treated to an amazing spectacle as the two Palmbooms traded waves and pushed each other deeper and deeper over the notorious Cave Rock and Swimming Pool Reefs. I’m not sure what’s cooler, surfing those kind of waves with your son or surfing those kind of waves with your father? Either way they were the clear standouts of the session.
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| 3. The Bokke |
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My word, courage, determination and BMT in buckets. The boys did an amazing job in NZ over the weekend sealing the deal on the tri-nations and proving definitively to all concerned that they are without question the best rugby playing team in the world.
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| And who blew it? |
3. Kulula |
| Two weeks in a row these buggers got me. Last week flying down to J-Bay they smashed the tails of my boards and then to add insult to injury they charged me for excess baggage on my way home when I arrived with a bag full of the wetsuits I’d been testing. I was 6kgs overweight. The ‘new’ weight limit is 20kgs. I weighed in at 26. “Didn’t it used to be 25kgs?” I asked. “Ja” replied the check in tannie, “but we reduced it so we didn’t have to increase the airfares.” MMnnn ja well no fine, there is no such thing as a free lunch! |
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| 2. The City of Durban |
| These amazing geniuses of town planning have pulled some interesting ones over the years. After their last caper of changing all the street names so that none of us can give directions to visiting friends anymore one would have thought they’d leave us alone for a while, but no. In their quest to revamp the beachfront they’ve disconnected all the showers so surfers and bathers enjoying Durban’s Golden Mile now leave the beach crusted in salt and covered in sand. Nice work boys, what’s next? A surfboard tax? Shssh, don’t say that too loudly it may give Mike Sutcliffe some ideas |
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| 1.Clinton Gravitt |
| Is at his home break, in his sponsors event and he is in the final. He is leading that final until somehow in the dying moments he allows that never say die competitor, Mr Wayne Monk to get his paws on a walling wave. Bang, bang, bang and Wayne shoots the lights out of it and scores a 9, in so doing taking the lead and ultimately the victory from under his nose. Eish! Look on the bright side though if he’s anything like Wayne he has got another 20 years or so to set the record straight. |
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