They wrapped up the Volcom pipeline Pro surfing contest yesterday at perfectly glassy 4-6 foot Pipeline. It was the earliest that anyone can ever remember seeing a contest at Pipeline finish. There were just the 2 semi finals and final. The final itself was kind of hard to pick for most of the way because everyone was getting pretty decent rides. I never saw the scoring, but it must have been pretty close. There really wasn’t any doubt about Jamie OBrien being the winner though. Everybody seemed to know that before the final even ended actually. Aussie journeymen; Anthony Walsh and Mark Mathews both finished 2nd and 3rd respectively while Danny Fuller from Kauai rounded out the top 4. It was a beautiful glassy day, so you know that all the Pipe regulars were stoked to get their break back so early in the day. :)

Sean

Jamie OBrien just took out the 2010 Volcom Pipe pro surfing event right here at Pipeline, on the north shore. This is just a quick report right now. I’ll file a more detailed one later. The results were:

1st Place: Jamie OBrien
2nd Place Anthony Walsh
3rd place: Mark Mathews
4th place: Danny Fuller.

The day started off real gloomy and pretty much victory at sea conditions, but it did have that look like it might clear up to perfection, like it did on thursday (the 28th) on day 2 of the event. I got there pretty early because Jamie’s bud; Ruben needed a lift up to Pipe.

Frankly, I sat it out for about 3 hours, but the surfreally was struggling to show any sign of quality, so I eventually left and ended up watching a fair chunk of it on the live HD broadcast on channel 1250, here on Oahu. Of course, it did eventually clean up, but never quite to perfection, however there were some amazing rides including one by John John Florence that just blew me away. Here’s some of what I grabbed there today….

My wife Lane has been waiting just about all season for the ugly sandbar to move away and let Pipe do it’s thing properly. Finally, it did this morning, all be it under still ragged and large swell which at times was rolling entire heats of contestents. Those contestents found themselves in a real life battle with the huge waves and conditions at times, but as Volcom competitor and north shore lifeguard; Dave Wassel was happy to point out; whoever wins this event will really earn it, in conditions like these.
The wind kept turning more offshore all morning and by midday, it was grooming the solid west lines into what many have called the best Pipe, this year so far. There were some ridiculous dream heats. Reef McIntosh could do no wrong and then Jamie OBrien’s 2nd round heat was so reminiscent of Kelly’s complete domination of the 1995 Pipe Masters. It was a damn good afternoon of waves at the Pipe for sure. No sooner had they sounded the last siren than the lineup changed from four surfers to fifty in about the same amount of seconds. We’ll see what tomorrow brings……