The Gold Coast Pro 2025: Day One

Entertaining 18 heat day conducted in zippy, tricky 2-4 feet Burleigh and which concluded Round One of the Men's and Women.

After a six year hiatus, vibes were high to see CT surfing back on the Gold Coast. Every competitor on the glass praised the zippy, cupped out waves and ability to surf in warm water. Overshadowing all though was the huge news about the tour restructure dropped last night. A couple of brief thoughts before we hit the recap.

First, this is a total repudiation of the Erik Logan, post-Covid Tour which kicked off in 2021. All the elements Elo and every WSL minion told us were great for the sport: the Final's Day concept, the mid-season cut, the tour starting in Hawaii instead of ending there, are gone. That whole experiment has been completely discredited and now consigned to the dustbin of history. Everything contained within that historical period will now be seen as aberration and carry an asterisk because the sport's highest authority has deemed nothing of it is worth saving.

The reaction to fan disapproval of a playful wave like Trestles has been the most decisive. Pipe has been reinstated as the tour finale, except with even more weighting given to it. The era of world champs who are not experts at waves of consequence is over.

It shows the power of the WSL. It was this way, yet now they have completely reversed it and made it that way. Things can change, things can improve. The tacit admission is things had to change. There was simply too much drift and fan disengagement to continue on the same path. Too many world champs walking away.

It's a huge improvement with a couple of caveats - all of which could be changed according to the principle outlined above. With no mid-year cut, the mid season potentially suffers the same drag and sag it has previously done. Aussie Treble is great. Moving onto El Salvador and Brazil will likely see Brazil fade again in importance. Nixing El Sal and slotting in Indonesia would stop that sag. Keramas would be perfect to slot in there. Even better an Indo double of Keramas and Ulus, as they did in 2018.

The weirdest thing about the tour restructure is a “post-season” double where a reduced field surfs the Kelly Tub in Abu Dhabi then Supertubos. Coming after an insane Grand Slam run of J-Bay, Teahupoo, Cloudbreak, and Trestles that's just too much of an anti-climactic dead spot before Pipe, as well as being just a very strange way to decide seeding for Pipe. Why would you decide seeding for Pipe in a man made 3 foot wave with zero transferable skills?

Scrap the Tub at least and move back to a Triple Crown on the North Shore, as part of a truncated Challenger Series which decides next year's CT tour rookies.

Immediate elimination from Round 1 is brutal. The sport has toyed with that before, notably in 2009 when it was was nixed by surfer protest. In this instance, audiences and the CEO will likely win out over surfers travelling around the world to be sent home after a thirty minute heat did not go their way.

All in all though, the quiet gamer guy has put the tour on a much better path. Ryan Crosby, we salute you.

Jordy (WSL/Shield)

High times at Burleigh point for Jordy Smith who sounded joyful at surfing a wave with “typical Gold Coast shape” in his heat. He'd been going for a surf with Burleigh maestro Michael 'Munga' Barry who he said had been tuning Jordy into the intangibles of the Burleigh sandbar.

Ronnie Blakey called the bank “epic” and Ethan Ewing, after a dominant win, backed up that call, calling the bank “insane”. As a surfer who's spent decades obsessing over the minutiae of pointbreak sandbars I'd respectfully demur.

A good pointbreak sandbar bends the wave to its will. It creates its own reality. It overrides other factors. Makes bad days fun and good days all-time. The bathymetric gradient has to be deep to shallow to maximise the full energy of the incoming swell line and create the cupped out hollow shape. That rules out the current bank with its outer storm bar which robs the swell of energy and makes wave shape inconsistent.

No, this is a serviceable, good enough sand bank but it's no Snapper Rocks, or even good Burleigh. It will do the job. There is no other option. As Rabbit Bartholomew said today, what a cyclone gives in terms of insane waves, it also takes away in terms of destroying sandbars.

Ian Gentil (WSL/Ryder)

Magic small wave boards came to the fore today. Ian Gentil on a carbon Lost which he called a “magic groveller” found easy speed and boosted air after air. He called the conditions “dreamy” and praised the “arena vibe” with the crowd on the point, metres away from a close-in bank. 

Sammy Pupo likewise on a magic JS.

Burleigh is the original natural amphitheatre and it was in full effect for the heat of the day between local boy Liam O'Brien, front-runner Italo Ferreira, and wildcard Julian Wilson who comes back from three years of retirement to relaunch CT dreams. The bald and chunky Wilson was a far cry from the teen heart-throb who beat Kelly in 2009, but the surfing still looked every bit CT standard. What he may lose in fast twitch turn speed he gains in power and full arc surfing, and the airs are still there.

LOB (WSL/Shield)

J-Dub surfed a great heat but still ended up last as Italo went fizzy nuts in fun runners, catching a million waves and launching frenzied attacks on them. Tail-drifting top turns, backside rotors, classic bottom turn top turn combos. It wasn't pretty but it was undeniable. For once LOB got the love of the judges with a solid three-turn set wave hitting the excellent range which caused apoplectic reactions from the crew on the hill. LOB through to the next round without having to scrap around in the Elimination Round.

One thing we have not yet seen from Jack Robinson is his form on Gold Coast pointbreaks (Kirra during TC Alfred excepted of course). The last Quikkie Pro in 2019, Jack was still stranded on the QS waiting for Sunset Beach to throw him a lifeline. His small wave game has improved but it remains the weak point. Three consecutive starts at Trestles Finals Day without a single heat win demonstrates that. He's just not as switched on in head-high or under surf as his top five peers. Or too switched on - that nervous, twitchy energy which turns into a preternatural calm in heavy water still controls him like a marionette in small surf.

Today was no exception. He did some decent turns and fell on regulation closing manoeuvres which sends him packing to the Elimination Round. Cal Robson got the big win in that heat with Al Cleland Jnr second.

Jack (WSL/Shield)

Australians voted today in a general election where cost of living was the number one concern. A burger and schooner of beer at the Burleigh Pav will set you back $50 bucks and it was packed all day long. The young Americans from Southern California love journalling, self-help, and they break hard right. They compete on the Gold Coast at a comp sponsored by soy milk and Chinese SUVs. The decadent days of the Stubbies are over but the discordant elements remain.

There was nothing discordant about the performance of eight-time World Champion Steph Gilmore. She admitted to feeling nervous and super-scared before her heat then once the heat started “felt great”. Straight into that impeccable point surf rhythm of speed and turn linkage and flaring the sections. She caught the better waves and was unlucky to end up behind current World Champ Caity Simmers who later called it a “champion heat”.

Simmers herself said she felt “definitely more tense” and was “excited, nervous, and scared” but relaxed after seeing a rainbow and the sight of the bluewater, whence she came to the realisation that “surfing is fun." That does not imply a lack of competitiveness with Simmers saying she “was trying pretty hard out there."

Unfortunately, they will meet in the Round of 16 and not the Final, which would seem fitting after the opening encounter.

Steph (WSL/Ryder)

Will we see Steph back on tour next year as a full-time competitor? Especially with the title again being decided at Pipeline, where she does not have a strong record. Asked by Vaughan Blakey, she offered coy, non-committal answers. Speaking of Pipeline determining the women's title for the first time she commented, “It's insane, women's surfing has been pushed into a whole new realm these past few years. I've been watching from afar, a lot of it because I took some time off and I think it's just mind-blowing."

After distancing herself from the current level of women's charging she demurred, “ I don't know if I'll really be able to win another title, but we'll see”. Asked more directly if she saw herself competing at Pipe (for a title) she said. “It's a helluva long way away. We'll see what happens."

Doesn't sound like a person committed to competing on the 2026 tour to me, but I guess we will see what happens.

Pickles was dominant and Sally Fitz scrapped out a deserved win before giving an emotional presser, describing the effect of early losses as making her feel “pretty flat these days." She maintained surfing competitively was the “only thing I want to do” but described the pressure of twenty years of pro history as a “bag of concrete” she had to carry around. Sally will be back next year and is a slim chance to snavel a world title at Pipe. If she does I'll buy a Best Shed and fill it full of Harvey Norman's whitegoods as a shrine to her determination.

Good, fun day of pro surfing with a reasonable chance we'll get some heats done tomorrow.

//STEVE SHEARER

Bonsoy Gold Coast Pro Presented by GWM Men's Opening Round Results:
HEAT 1: Kanoa Igarashi (JPN) 13.83 DEF. Marco Mignot (FRA) 13.34, Ryan Callinan (AUS)
HEAT 2: Jordy Smith (RSA) 11.40 DEF. George Pittar (AUS) 11.03, Imaikalani deVault (HAW) 10.20
HEAT 3: Yago Dora (BRA) 12.60 DEF. Jackson Bunch (HAW) 10.44, Edgard Groggia (BRA) 10.30
HEAT 4: Callum Robson (AUS) 13.26 DEF. Alan Cleland (MEX) 10.27, Jack Robinson (AUS) 9.13
HEAT 5: Ethan Ewing (AUS) 11.66 DEF. Joao Chianca (BRA) 10.87, Jordan Lawler (AUS) 10.17
HEAT 6: Italo Ferreira (BRA) 16.03 DEF. Liam O'Brien (AUS) 15.77, Julian Wilson (AUS) 14.07
HEAT 7: Deivid Silva (BRA) 10.00 DEF. Seth Moniz (HAW) 10.00, Barron Mamiya (HAW) 9.10
HEAT 8: Ian Gentil (HAW) 14.14 DEF. Leonardo Fioravanti (ITA) 11.23, Connor O'Leary (JPN) 8.40
HEAT 9: Alejo Muniz (BRA) 11.87 DEF. Miguel Pupo (BRA) 11.60, Matthew McGillivray (RSA) 10.34
HEAT 10: Samuel Pupo (BRA) 14.67 DEF. Cole Houshmand (USA) 12.46, Rio Waida (INA) 11.83
HEAT 11: Filipe Toledo (BRA) 12.70 DEF. Ian Gouveia (BRA) 10.30, Griffin Colapinto (USA) 10.23
HEAT 12: Jake Marshall (USA) 13.50 DEF. Crosby Colapinto (USA) 11.30, Joel Vaughan (AUS) 9.83

Bonsoy Gold Coast Pro Presented by GWM Women's Opening Round Results:
HEAT 1: Molly Picklum (AUS) 15.60 DEF. Erin Brooks (CAN) 7.93, Nadia Erostarbe (ESP) 5.76
HEAT 2: Caitlin Simmers (USA) 13.23 DEF. Stephanie Gilmore (AUS) 12.70, Luana Silva (BRA) 10.36
HEAT 3: Sophie McCulloch (AUS) 12.00 DEF. Gabriela Bryan (HAW) 11.50, Bella Kenworthy (USA) 11.04
HEAT 4: Sally Fitzgibbons (AUS) 13.40 DEF. Isabella Nichols (AUS) 12.77, Lakey Peterson (USA) 12.43
HEAT 5: Vahine Fierro (FRA) 13.94 DEF. Tyler Wright (AUS) 9.57, Brisa Hennessy (CRC) 7.43
HEAT 6: Bettylou Sakura Johnson (HAW) 14.10 DEF. Caroline Marks (USA) 14.10, Sawyer Lindblad (USA) 13.47