Fantastic Noodles Pro Junior – Noah Lane and Laura Enever win the Fantastic Noodles Pro Junior in South Australia

Noah Lane and Laura Enever win the Fantastic Noodles Pro Junior in South Australia

Sunday 19th July Waitpinga Beach South Australia: Noah Lane (Rainbow Beach/Queensland) and Laura Enever (North Sydney Beaches/NSW) have won the Pro Junior Men’s and Women’s divisions of the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) Australasia Fantastic Noodles Pro Junior.

In very good three-to-four feet (1 meter) surf both surfers produced outstanding 9 point plus rides to secure today’s wins.

Laura Enever ‘s victory was one of the best of her career and has further extended her lead on the ASP Australasian Pro Junior Series Women’s ratings for 2009.

Seventeen year old Enever was staring at a big defeat at the half way stage in the final which saw Tyler Wright open with a strong 7.75 and shortly after take a commanding lead with an excellent 8.75.

Enever, with just two moderate scoring rides was requiring a combination of scores to take the lead and with just 10 minutes remaining in the 30 minute final she found an excellent wave, unleashed four major bottom to powerful top turn snaps and found herself right back in the final when she was awarded the finals top scoring ride of a 9.25.

Her task was still difficult, requiring a 7.25 to win with Wright also holding priority and by the time Enever had returned to the outside peak the final had less than 5 minutes to go.

Surprisingly Wright allowed Enever to take a mid-sized wave under priority (Wright had the right to take the wave) and Enever wasted no time extracting every potential point out of the ride which she rode through to the beach and was awarded a 7.35 to take the final on 16.60 out of a possible 20 to Wright on 16.50.

“I never gave up at all in the final even tho I knew Tyler had a big lead” said Enever.

“I scored a 9.8 in the opening round so I actually thought I need to do that again and I was chasing a 9.5 ride to try and win it on one wave when I caught that second last ride.”

When the score dropped at 9.25 and it wasn’t quite enough to take the lead I at least realized another reasonably strong ride would win it and that’s exactly what happened, — I’m quite proud to come back and win like that, it feels like a hard fought out win.”

“My ratings lead is extended and I feel really comfortable to fully qualify for the ASP World Junior Championships (top two on the season ratings qualify) and my goal this year was to win the ASP Australasian Junior Series and I’m on track to achieve that.”

AITPINGA BEACH, South Australia – Clean three-foot (1 metre) surf at Waitpinga Beach in the southern waters of South Australia was on offer today as Australia’s top 20-year-old-and-under surfers completed rounds three and four of the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) Grade-4 Fantastic Noodles Pro Junior.

The cold waters, which are down around 13 degrees celsius, and significantly colder with a wind chill factor in full force, did not stop the high-performance surfing with impressive showings from the events’ top two seeds, Owen Wright and Garrett Parkes, both Byron Bay region of NSW.

Owen Wright is the defending event champion and he has not been defeated this entire season, having won all four ASP Australasian Pro Junior events to date in an display of unprecedented dominance at national ASP Pro Junior level.

This year he has also stormed the world with his surfing performances which sees the unassuming 19-year-old highly placed on the ASP World Qualifying Series (WQS), following a major win in the Maldives last month and he is widely regarded as the hottest emerging surfer globally.

Despite all this great form and his comfortable heat win today, Wright cannot win this year’s Fantastic Noodles Pro Junior because he’ll forfeit his Semifinal place tomorrow as he heads to California for the ASP WQS 6-Star Hurley US Open of Surfing.

“I’ve had a break from competitive surfing the past month and thought this event would be good to get back into it before the US Open,” Wright said. “I was hoping the event might finish today, but it won’t, so I’ll have to depart tonight, but it’s been good and I’m ready to hit Huntington Beach in California.”

So, Wright will suffer his first loss here by default, but his appearance has none-the-less delighted the surfers of South Australia who realize they are possibly watching surfing’s next emerging star who has had great success in these waters over the past two years, winning this event last year and an Australian Junior title the previous year.

Wright’s pending absence opens the door for all others and No. 2 seed Garrett Parkes should be hardest to beat here.