Thursday, November 30, 2006

Lanuza International Longboard Championships

Lanuza International Longboard Championships- Philippines;
Prize money $US10 000

Australia's Harley Ingelby wins Lanuza International Longboard Festival in the Philippines!

Harley Ingelby (Australia/NSW/Coff's Harbour) today posted one of his biggest ever wins by taking out the Lanuza International Longboard in the Philippines in an all Australian final.

Ingelby, the current world professional number three rated surfer surfed superbly all event and maintained his excellent form into the final where he posted two excellent rides, a 9.17 and an 8.13 giving him an outstanding final tally of 18.10 out of a possible 20 to easily win today's final.

"What a way to finish such an incredible week in the Philippines! We're all totally stoked on this place, the waves have been so fun, only small but it's such an amazing river mouth set up that it peels perfectly and offers massive scoring potential" said Ingelby after his win today.

"I'm honored to win the Lanuza International Longboard and I'll be back next year for certain and I can tell you all of us will be back, we love the place and the people and the waves!"

Ingelby secured his win today with his outstanding 9.1 ride mid way through the final when he unleashed a long hang ten nose ride combined with his trademark smooth and complete roundhouse cut back.

Gold Coast surfer Jackson Close (Currumbin) finished second today, also posting two excellent 8 point rides in the final.

Satisfied with his result Close said - "I can't complain, I had a good final and found some good waves but Harley was the man today - He's very hard to beat in long peeling waves like this"

Sunshine Coast Queensland surfers Grant Thomas (Maroochydore) and current World Champion Josh Constable (Noosa) finished 3rd and 4th respectively in a high scoring final that saw all four surfers post excellent scores.

World Champion Constable said after the final - "We've all enjoyed it here and we're very impressed with the wave set up. I'd love to surf it bigger and hopefully that's in store for us next year!"

Apart from the final a feature of the day was the Lanuza Bay Bamboo Boards expression session which ran between the semi finals and the final.

These high tech. bamboo boards are an amazing product being produced right here at Lanuza Bay. Former Australian shaper Richard Mathews is the creator and has set up production here and the incredible quality boards being produced were put to the test by four of the world's best.

Jai Lee, Ian Bell, Dane Pioli and Jacob Struth ripped on these boards, performing all the typical moves from their quarter finals and some more! Ian Bell pulled a successful air on one wave, Lee was outstandingly stylish on the nose, Pioli was typically powerful and Stuth delighted the crowds with a headstand.

The boys showed their seal of approval by jointly raising the boards above their heads as they returned to the beach and Bell was later announced winner of the expression session!

Congressman "Butch" Pichay, chairman of The Philippine Surfing Federation, announced his intention to at least double the prize money for next year's event following the outstanding success at this year's event which was greeted with wild applause from the large crowd and especially from the competitors.

While the waves throughout this year's event were small, the quality of this intriguing river mouth sandbank still dished up long clean peeling performance waves which were unanimously regarded as excellent small waves by all the world professionals here.

Even more encouraging for future years is the fact that the North Pacific Ocean is unusually quiet at present as has been highlighted in the Hawaiian Pro events which are running concurrently and those events have had some of the smallest contest surf in Hawaiian North Shore history to date.

So this event has delivered and another classic river mouth surf location which is firmly on the global map!

Final Results:

1st Harley Ingelby (Coff's Harbour/Australia)
2nd Jackson Close (Gold Coast/Australia)
3rd Grant Thomas (Sunshine Coast/Australia)
4th Josh Constable (Sunshine Coast/Australia)

Equal 5th - Michael Bellamy (Coff's Harbour/Australia), Dane Pioli (Wollongong/Australia)

Equal 7th - Jai Lee (Noosa/Australia), Ian Bell (North Haven/Australia), Luke Landrigan (La Union/Philippines)

- Steve Robertson

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