Gabriel Medina has conquered the 2011 Sooruz Lacanau Pro and enters the surfing history by becoming the first rider to win both the 6-Star main event and Pro Junior event in the same year.
The Brazilian defeated Mitch Crews by scoring an incredible 19.23 out of 20 in the final heat. Taking the drop and pulling off a massive aerial-reverse followed by carving turns through to the shore break and landing yet another incredible aerial maneuver, a unanimous 10 was given by the entire International judging panel.
“I feel so good, best feeling ever ! I'm so happy to win one more time here and I want to thank my dad and all my family. It was a 40 minute heat so I was very comfortable out there. I was just trying to have fun and I got two good waves. I am stoked right now.”
“That was my first win in the Pro Junior and now I just won the Star Series so I’m really stoked,” continued Medina. “I’ve been training a lot since last year. I’m getting older, I have more experience and more training now than last year so that’s probably why I did better this time. I just like to go big. I’ve got nothing to lose out there so I’m trying the hardest moves to get big scores. Mitch got some good rights and got an 8 and a 7 so I’m just lucky I got those good lefts and got the opportunity to do my thing.”
Medina will now move on to the upcoming ASP 6-Star event in Zarautz, Basque Country where he finished in 3rd place last year and will be focusing on going through to the final and possibly make back-to-back ASP Star tour victories.
“I'm really stoked and at the same time I'm shocked. I just got the Medina ‘snake bite’ I guess. He just embarrassed me out there. I had fun surfing out there, he's an unbelievable surfer and you can pretty much learn from him with how talented he is. I'm stoked to get second. I've had an awesome time here in Europe.”
Crews, despite finishing in a ‘combo’ situation, surfed well in the final claiming two excellent waves. Predominant tricky left-handers during the final made it an even more difficult task for Crews to make a show of the final.
“There's not much really I could do. He's a goofy footer and the waves and wind favor the goofies today. He was going into big ramps and throwing big airs and spins. Basically I just needed to hope for a miracle, it was very hard for a natural footer to do big airs on a left like this and generate speed. I'm stoked I still got an 8 and a 7 so any other heat I could have won probably.”