In her return to competitive surfing, Alana Blanchard is demonstrating some of her best traits that originally got her a spot among the world’s elite wahine on the Championship Tour. As one of the toughest events on the annual Qualifying Series schedule, the Los Cabos Open of Surf has been the stage for Blanchard to again put on the jersey for the first time since delivering her baby, Banks, a little over eight months ago.
Since her last full season on tour in 2014, Blanchard has focused on other endeavors, most notably starting a family with fellow pro surfer, Jack Freestone. But Blanchard has dipped her toe back into competition occasionally along the way, including the Cabo event each season, except while she was pregnant in 2017.
It’s been a very successful and reminiscent return in 2018 as Blanchard finds herself in the final 16 and heading into round six with an extremely strong crop of competitors.
With a bye into the fourth round, Blanchard had a stacked four-woman heat to navigate. She went up against CT rookie Caroline Marks, Maud Le Car and Teresa Bonvalot. Any of the four was capable of advancing but the waves were slim pickings and selection was key. Marks dominated the scoring but Blanchard managed to slide through in second place, as her 8.60 total just outpaced Le Car’s 8.27.
She was able to show more of her classic style in round five as she again took second with 11.50 points in a three-woman heat, advancing along with Oahu’s Brisa Hennessy. Aussie Kobie Enright had been a standout to that point, but she was outworked by Blanchard, who found the better waves and appeared more and more comfortable as the heat moved along.
That result sets up a head-to-head meeting between Blanchard and Marks in round six. It’s not exactly a matchup of different generations, but Blanchard, 28, and Marks, 16, do represent two different eras of the Championship Tour.
Hawaii has dominated the event thus far, as home to seven of the final 16 wahine. Tatiana Weston-Webb is certainly one of the favorites and has been unstoppable in her two heats. She put up the contest’s highest heat total with a 17.70 in round four to advance with Summer Macedo. She followed that with a 15.33 in round five, moving on with Bronte Macaulay and eliminating Bianca Buitendag.
Weston-Webb now has a matchup with Oahu’s Alessa Quizon, who is trying to work her way back to the CT. Quizon needs a big result at a contest of this magnitude to move up the QS rankings. She is currently 33rd and has a lot of ground to make up for a chance to re-qualify.
Another all-Hawaii heat will see Hennessy take on Coco Ho. As usual, Ho is cruising through a QS contest, but this is a pivotal matchup for both. Hennessy is well ahead of schedule in her CT qualifying quest, but she is still realistically another year or two away. Ho has needed her QS ranking for a few straight seasons and she already has one QS 6,000 win this year in New South Wales. Another big result would essentially lock her into the top six and assure her a re-qualification spot in 2019.
Kilauea’s Gabriela Bryan, 16, is still in the field and will take on CT regular Keely Andrew. Bryan is also light years ahead of most surfers her age and she has shown time and time again that she loves to compete. She has won the last two contests she’s entered, first in Tahiti and then the Wahine Pipe Pro. However, this is already her best professional result to date and a win over Andrew would be a phenomenal achievement.
Zoe McDougall will close out round six against defending Cabo champ Silvana Lima. McDougall used her calm, focused approach to advance with Holly Wawn in round five, eliminating former CT surfer Laura Enever. McDougall can make a big move up from 29th in the QS rankings with a strong performance the rest of the way and she has made a QS 6,000 quarterfinal before.
Blanchard is a huge story, but the entire Hawaii group showed off Saturday and heads into the final few rounds with a number of contenders. The Mexico event is always a tour favorite and whoever pulls off the win will certainly be a worthy champion.
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David Simon can be reached at dsimon@thegardenisland.com.
