Sunset Gravière, 2012
Sunset Gravière, 2012
So yes, the QPF 2012 was supremely rad, partly because it was Kelly Slater who beat Dane in the final, and partly because until then the Quik Pro France was the only longstanding world tour event Kelly had never won.
Mostly though it was because on the penultimate day of competition Contest Director Micky Picon decided to run the quarter-finals just before dark rather than wait for the morning, and because on cue la Gravière cleaned up into the biggest, most perfect la Graviére most of us had ever seen. As the waves got progressively better the winning heat totals got progressively higher, but only one surfer at a time was attracting the good ones and the losing heat totals remained low. John John passed the wave magnet to Dane who passed it to Joel, who did a soul arch inside a gaping pit for a 10-point ride, which did not in itself make him a great hero but perhaps made him some kind of living deity, for as he exited the water several spectators bowed down before him.
By the time the wave magnet got to Kelly its cumulative force was so great it was sending the whole Atlantic wild. It was also so dark that the beach was now aglow with mobile phones held high in the air by those members of the enraptured crowd not on their knees. Kelly also got a 10, to go with a 9.93 and another 9.9-something. All in all it was pretty much the raddest fucking thing ever.
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