Under tough and challenging conditions Tamil Nadu surfers stood tall to dominate the proceedings on day two of the 4th Indian open of Surfing here on Friday.
The men’s open category will see an Tamil Nadu semifinal on Saturday . Karnataka’s Sinchana Gowda and Pradeep Pujar kept the host’ hopes afloat as they booked their slot in the finals of Women’s Open and Groms (16 and Under) Boys categories respectively.
The highlight of the day however were Tamil Nadu Surfers Srikanth D and Kishore Kumar (13 points) as the former managed to score the highest points in the open category while the latter managed 11.67 points, the highest in the Groms (16 & Under Boys Categories). Sugar Banarse from Goa managed to score the highest points in the women’s open category gathering a total of 10.17.
Earlier the semifinal encounter in the women’s open surf category saw 17-year-old Sugar Banarse from Goa impressing all the judges with her surfing. Gathering the highest points (10.17) amongst the women who made it to the finals, Sugar will look forward to defend her title tomorrow.
Tamil Nadu’s Kamali Moorthy (8.50) and Shrishti Selvam (4.74) along with Karnataka’s Sinchana Gowda (5.17) were amongst the other three surfers who advanced for the finals. Kamali will also compete in the finals of the groms (16 & under) girls surf category tomorrow.
Speaking post booking her slot in the finals, Sugar said, “I feel elated to be in the finals and there is a little pressure on me as well as I would be having the responsibility to defend my title, given the tough competition and conditions. But I’ll leave no stone unturned to walk away with the national championship in Women’s Open category. Just hoping for the best for myself tomorrow”.
The proceedings of the Men’s Open Category continued from last day and 28 surfers battled it out to enter the knock out rounds where Srikanth D (13.00), Kishore Kumar (11.66), Surya P (8.20), Maninkandan I (7.36), Manivannan T (7.33), Manikandan M (7.03), Raghul Paneerselvam(6.97) Selvam M (6.76), Dinesh Selvamani(6.63), Sathish Sarvanan(6.47) SanjaiKumar S(6.37), , Ruban V(6.04), Santosh M(5.77), Subramani M(4.64) were amongst the surfers who outshone their competitors to book their quarterfinal berths.
Later in the day, the quarterfinals saw Sanjaikumar S, Srikanth D, Raghul Paneerselvam, Sathhish Sarvanan, Manikandan M, Kishore Kumar, Santhosh M and Surya P advancing to the semis which are scheduled to be played tomorrow early morning.
The Groms Boys (U16) category semifinals today saw Tamil boys rocking the show as 3 out of 4 surfers who have made it into the finals belong to Tamil Nadu. Kishore emerged as the highest scorer in his category for a second consecutive day (11.67) as he stunned everyone with his stellar performance. Tayin Arun with 9.17 score and Harish P with 6.33 score were other boys from Tamil Nadu to book their final berths. Karnataka’s only hope Pradeep Pujar earned 4.30 to reach to the finals.