Like the waves, today's action at Teahupoo was a mash up. After seven consecutive lay days the WSL sounded the hooter and the remaining surfers paddled out into sideshore wobbly, but occasionally barrelling, 4-6 foot surf. The week long wait put paid to any continuity or narrative within the comp so we had a random collection – a veritable mash up - of skills, spills, title contenders, rookies, and wildcards. All of it thrown into a blender and popped out the end of round 4 and completion of round 5.

Last year's finalist's Gabriel Medina and Kelly Slater were going wave for wave in their freesurfing session making it look better than it was before the 12:00 noon start of Heat 9 Round 3.

Commissioner Perrow said on the webcast: “We've been waiting for this swell - it's arrived, it's building and getting better throughout the day. Right now there's some great tube rides out there and we're excited.”

Unfortunately, not quite...

Today's competition kicked off in slowly building surf with fresh trade winds blowing down the reef. The surfers appeared to struggle putting a positive ID on heat winning waves. Guys with priority would swoop on what they thought was the biggest wave in the set only for the other surfer to paddle into a lesser wave and win the exchange. The truly good ones were few and far between and this meant the busiest surfers tended to make it through.

Josh Kerr and Ace Buchan broke boards and got worked in their heat. Ace had the heat tied up until Kerrzy pulled into one which held open long enough for him to notch up an 8.13 in the last minute.

Kelly Slater and Sebastian Zietz looked to impress but the conditions quickly soured and the boys could only manage a handful of waves between them. Kelly kept busy and managed a just get it over the young Hawaiian.

Judges and bookies were split on Jeremy Flores v Joel Parkinson. You would have never thought the 2011 AI award winner recently hit his head so hard he had bleeding on the brain. Flores charged again today but was controlled in his wave selection and posted the highest heat total of the day with a 9.77 and 9.10 to – using a technical term here - shit it in over Parko.

The title contention has hit an all new gear of mystery with Julian Wilson going down to the holy CJ Hobgood. Julian scrapped through the heat and looked to have it secure until CJ pulled into an impossible barrel. CJ described it as, “Two little angels on fluffy pillows picked me up and then I seen the light.” Well those two little angels helped CJ post the first 10 of the event and knock out current number 3 Jules.

Round 4 had to continue today and the fact it wasn't a knockout round made it palatable. Kai Otton, Owen Wright and Filipe Toledo waited until 15 minutes before the end to start posting contestable scores. With 4 minutes to go Filipe took the lead, an improbable scenario considering the reefbreak chops of his opponents. However, Owen knew the script, dropped into a last minute set and posted a heat winning 8.17. With ADS, Mick, and Jules out of the equation Filipe will be very happy to have made it this far in a comp he wasn't expected to succeed at.

The all goofy, all Brazilian mash of wildcard, rookie, and title holder was never going to disappoint. Italo Ferreira, Bruno Santos and Gabriel Medina put on the heat of the day. Italo took a beating in the early stages which seemed to have the rookie rattled. Bruno posted a 9.00 early which was quickly countered by a 9.97 from Gabe. Everyone posted solid back up scores and heading into the last minute Bruno's deficit was 8.65. In the dying seconds he took off wide and rode it succesfully to the channel. The exit was ungainly but the consensus in the channel was he'd done enough. The consensus in the judging tower, however, said otherwise. They gave him 8.10 and Gabs just wriggled through to the Quarter Finals.

Kelly Slater, CJ Hobgood, and Jeremy Flores had a scrappy finish to the day with a close heat restart. Flores took off and got worked after a wave hadn’t been ridden in nearly 10 minutes. There was no little angels nor fluffy pillows for CJ going down along with Flores. Slater pulled out the Kelly of old with a perfect display of Chopes tube riding to score a 9.77 and move into finals.

Tomorrow conditions should improve for finals day. With ADS, Mick and Jules out the opportunity is there for Filipe, Owen, Kerrzy, and Slater to make up some ground on the lead pack. It'd be hard to go past Slater, Medina, and Owen for the win, all are very familiar with this conditions and these circumstances.

However Kerrzy, Santos, and even CJ threaten those top picks with the confidence plays they've had throughout the contest. In these conditions there are limited chances to win and, as the ol' saying goes, fortune favours the brave. Anyone that puts a good read on a couple of sets can win tomorrow.

William Hill actually have odds on the event winner up now:

• Kelly Slater $4.50
• Owen Wright $4.50
• Gabriel Medina $5.00
• Jeremy Flores $8.00
• Josh Kerr $11.00
• Bruno Santos $11.00
• CJ Hobgood $13.00
• Kai Otton $13.00
• Filipe Toldeo $17.00
• Wiggolly Dantas $17.00
• Italo Ferreira $17.00
• Aritz Aranburu $17.00

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