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Third For Christie In Australia |
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Written by Ben Kennings
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Monday, 11 February 2013 |
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| Richard Christie - Image ASP / Will Hayden - Smith |
Richard Christie (Gis) has placed third at the Breaka Burleigh Pro on the Gold Coast of Australia getting himself off to a confident start for the 2013 competitive year.
Christie, who many felt was in the form of his career, was eliminated in the head-to-head semifinal
against ASP World Tour surfer Adam Melling (AUS) who went on to be defeated by
fellow Australian Owen Wright in the final of the 4-star World Qualifying
Series event.
Christie pocketed $4,250 for the result and with only three events contested to
date this year, sits 22nd on the ASP world rankings.
In the semifinal Christie fell behind the pace as a rampant Melling posted two
scores above 9.0 points to finish with an 18.43 point heat total compared with
Christie’s 12.40 points.
“Melling was on fire out there, I was just watching him blow up” said Christie. “He is one of my favourite surfers so I loved
surfing with him in that heat” he added.
Christie had earlier progressed through the quarterfinals of the event posting
a massive 16.17 point heat total to defeat Mitch Crews (AUS) 11.93.
Despite the 4-star status of the event, which is relatively low for international
events, the location and quality waves at Burleigh Heads makes the field of
surfers as good as many of the top events around the world. “The quality of surfing is high and it is awesome
to surf with these guys” said Christie who is off to Sydney for a week to visit
family before heading to the next event at Newcastle, New South Wales. The Newcastle event starts on Monday 18th
March.
Earlier in the event Billy Stairmand (Rag) finished
in 17th, Matt Hewitt (Mnt) 33rd Tane Wallis (Piha) 97th
and Alex Dive (Mnt) 129th.
In the six star women’s division, the two Kiwi girls Sarah Mason (Gold Coast)
and Paige Hareb (Tara) came head-to-head in Round 3 where they were both
eliminated placing third and fourth in their heat respectively to finish 13thand
19th overall.
You can check all results, images and highlights on the Breaka Burleigh Pro website.
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