Despite deciding to fall off tour last year, Dane has accepted to surf at Snapper for the first leg of the ASP 2012 tour after his main sponsor Quiksilver offered him their wildcard slot.

In years previous, the wildcard has most often gone to younger, up-coming team riders looking to prove themselves against the world’s best and gain valuable experience (e.g. Balaram Stack, Marc Lacomare, Julian Wilson etc.) but seeing as everyone is just drooling to see more of Dane’s extraordinary talent in the water it must have been a bit of a no brainer.

Reynolds will therefore be one of two wildcards, with the second going to the winner of The Moskova Trials. On the prospect of who he might face in Round 1, the 26-year-old Venturan said, “I hope it’s Kelly. It would be fun,” Reynolds said. “I’ve surfed this event as many times as a wildcard as I have a WCT surfer and the wave can be super fun. “It can be barrels or peelers so it’s good for everything. I rate it highly.”

However Dane was also visibly excited at the prospect of surfing against some of the younger crew like Owen Wright, Julian Wilson, Gabriel Medina, John John Florence and Kolohe Andino. “Hopefully all of them will step up this year,” Reynolds said. “I really dig their surfing.”

Snapper will also witness the long-awaited official introduction of the ASP’s Anti-Doping Policy, which has been warmly welcomed by all athletes, industry and media, bar the controversial inclusion of alcohol as one of the banned substances. If any competitor is tested positively on three occasions for alcohol (or any of the other listed recreational drugs), they could face being banned from tour for a whole year.

Recently on Twitter, Dane aired his opinion on the subject, “Just under a month until the Gold Coast event. We’re gonna rock up to the event w/ some crown lager and make the boys drool… Nope, sorry boys. No beer for you – you’re serious athletes now… Of course the way the ASP does things, next year they’ll reverse their decision and make pre-heat beers mandatory!”

In the meantime though, to keep everyone sweet, surfing’s beloved anti-hero has released another short video segment ‘Single part 3 – Epilogue’ on his website.www.marinelayerproductions.com.