Day two of the 2009 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) six star PRIME rated SriLankan Airlines Pro in the Maldives saw excellent clean small waves at Pasta Point providing ideal conditions for high scoring heats as the final round one heats were completed and then straight into round two which introduced all the highest seeded surfers.

Hawaiian surfers have dominated this event over recent years and there’s a solid contingent here this year clearly intent on trying to emulate last years all Hawaiian final.

Mason Ho lead the charge today and the extravagant young Hawaiian pulled some extremely high risk and unique moves on his way to an entertaining heat win over Joao Guedes from Portugal.

“I try not to think about the moves I go for but rather just do what feels right once I catch a wave” said Ho.

“I’ve been practicing aerial rides and landing them in the classic hang five position and it sometimes works and feels right and that’s what I went for today” added Ho.

As the event moved into round two, Hawaii’s Casey Brown continued his great form from yesterday winning the opening round two heat ahead of Aritz Aranburu (Spain) who also progressed in second place.

Makuakai Rothman joined his Hawaiian mates through to round three when he scored a required 5.6 ride in the final seconds of his heat to jump from 3rd to 2nd place to advance behind Wigolly Dantas (Brazil).

The events best performance to date undoubtedly belonged to Pat Gudauskas (USA/CAL/San Clemente). Gudauskas posted two excellent scores with an 8.43 and an 8.33 to notch up the events highest heat tally to date of 16.76 to easily account for fellow USA surfer Eric Geiselman who also advanced in 2nd place with Masotoshi Ohno (Japan) a surprise elimination in 3rd place.

“That was a great start for me and I was really surprised!” said Gudauskas.

My warm up surfs yesterday and this morning were really ordinary and I was concerned with my surfing but then right on time I had a fantastic heat” added Gudauskas.

“It’s my third year here and we always get great waves here, it’s just an ideal contest venue.”

Australian surfers also performed well today lead by Adam Robertson who took out a blockbuster round two heat defeating former ASP World Tour surfers Cory Lopez (USA) and Jay Thompson (Australia).

Robertson was later joined into round three by fellow Aussies Yadin Nichol, Luke Munro and Brent Dorrington.

Just eight heats of round two were completed today and with an optimistic forecast ahead organizers will meet early tomorrow morning confident of a full day of action tomorrow.

SriLankan Airlines Pro 2009 is made possible thanks to the following sponsors: SriLankan Airlines, John Keells Group, Chaaya Island – Dhonveli, Atoll Travel, Atoll Adventures, Ocean & Earth International, Dhiraagu, Maldives Tourism & Promotions Board, ASP Australasia.

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SriLankan Airlines Pro 2009 Maldives – SriLankan Airlines Pro underway at Pasta Point in the Maldives

The 2009 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) six star PRIME rated SriLankan Airlines Pro began at the famous Pasta Point in the Maldives today and the world’s finest surfers wasted no time acclimatising and ripping into the fun 1m (3ft) surf.

Hawaiian Casey Brown opened the event impressively scoring both the days highest heat win (15.66 out of a possible 20) along with the highest wave score of an 8.83 (out of a possible 10) on a ride which saw him complete a series of powered critical turns along with a perfectly executed air reverse.

“It’s always good to win through that round one heat, we’ve all travelled a long way to get here and you’d feel really down to lose out and be eliminated straight away so it’s a relief” said Brown.

“It’s such a fun event here, great free surfing waves in all directions and you just want to do well and enjoy the whole week.”

While today’s waves were not perfect there was plenty of scope for strong scores with the mechanical peeling point offering multiple sections for surfers to perform on.

Other heat winners to impress were former event champion Daniel Redman (South Africa), Portugal’s Ruben Gonzalez, Rudy Palboom (South Africa), Christophe Allary (Reunion) and Alejo Muniz (Brazil).

Australia’s Jack Perry summarized the feelings of most surfers here today after his strong heat win by saying, “ I always have a great time here, we’re competing in a really important event at the midpoint of the year but the atmosphere is just great, it’s like we’re all on holidays but a good result here means a lot to your ASP season so you have to remain focused.”

“The waves today were nothing like as good as it can get but still they were a lot of fun and you can really perform in these conditions – the outlook is solid and if it gets like last year then we’re surfing in amazingly perfect waves so fingers crossed!”

Strong afternoon winds saw event organizers finish the day early with just 8 heats completed and organizers will reconvene first thing tomorrow morning.

SriLankan Airlines Pro 2009 is made possible thanks to the following sponsors: SriLankan Airlines, John Keells Group, Chaaya Island – Dhonveli, Atoll Travel, Atoll Adventures, Ocean & Earth International, Dhiraagu, Maldives Tourism & Promotions Board, ASP Australasia.

ASP Australasia as the event managers will deliver a quality live Webcast along with Television News Feeds, complimentary Digital Images for newspapers and websites, Web highlight packages and a dedicated 30 minute international television program.

Follow this event live at http://www.srilankanairlinespro.com/