Yup, he landed this. Dane Reynolds set the tone early on Thursday morning for what's sure to be a ridiculous aerial dogfight as the week progresses.
As scary as it sounds, it was raining men on day 6 of competition in Huntington Beach.
Round 3 of the Hurley US Open of Surfing hit the water at 8 am and the youngsters didnt waste any time taking to the sky.
From the start of the day, Dane Reynolds drove the pace car straight into the clouds with an enormous frontside full rotation air-reverse for a 9.87 in heat 1, the highest single wave score of the day.
From there, it was a flurry of fins and spins as the new generation of surfers, many of them competing in the junior division as well, dismantled the small peaks on offer and made the field of veterans look like they were riding longboards. Owen Wright, Evan Gieselman, and the three Brazilian musketeers, Gabriel Medina, Muguel Pupo and Jadson Andre led the aerial assault, landing almost every rotation and grab variation in the book.
The consistency these youngsters are landing their tricks is astonishing, especially when one considers the waves they are surfing. Huntington today was sub-par at best, crumbly chest high sets that allow for one or 2 maneuvers before going fat into deep water, then if the surfer can hop his way into the reform, for one suicide hit onto dry sand. Not exactly performance inducing, yet these kids were finding ramps on everything, while many of the veterans struggled to do foam-climbs and cutbacks. With an increase in swell expected by Saturday, it will be exciting to see what these guys can do when the waves actually get good...
