Surf News from Hawaii

ANSEN'S ENERGY PRO
Presented by Billabong
$75,000 4-Star ASP WQS Event

Dosland's Day In Epic Hansen's Energy Pro Finale
Australia's Shaun Cansdell the Top International Finisher With 5th

Honolulu, HAWAII - (Sunday, February 22, 2004) – Banzai Pipeline broke all the records today when it delivered an epic fourth consecutive day of 8-12 foot surf (12-20 foot faces) for the final action of the Hansen's Energy Pro. Never before has a professional surfing event at Pipeline received four straight days of such perfect, large surf. For 19-year-old up-and-coming outer-island surfer Tom Dosland (Haiku, Maui), the rest of his career may pale in significance after today. His experience of surfing and competing at perfect Pipeline this week will not likely be equaled.

Dosland's win of the all-Hawaiian tube-fest final earned him $10,000 and 1500 points towards his Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Qualifying Series (WQS) rating. Ranked at 153rd in the world coming into the event, Dosland shot to 9th on the WQS today and will next travel to Australia in March in a bid to qualify for the elite level World Championship Tour (WCT) that crowns the world champion each year.

Second place today was Oahu's Mikey Bruneau (Haleiwa), followed by Pancho Sullivan (Haleiwa) third, and Fred Patacchia (Haleiwa) fourth. They received $5,000, $3,000 and $2,400 respectively. Bruneau is now ranked 19th on the WQS, Sullivan 22nd, and Patacchia 34th.

The highest placed international surfer was Australia's Shaun Cansdell (Coff's Harbour, NSW), who narrowly missed out on the final to finish equal fifth overall. His result earned him $2,000 and moved him up to 12th on the WQS rankings.

But without a doubt, it was Dosland's day at the Pipe. Like fellow finalist Bruneau, Dosland had surfed all the way from the very first round of competition four days ago - a total of seven rounds for the win. Patacchia and Sullivan had been seeded into later rounds.

"I was just hoping to make it as far as the third round, 'cause that's where the prize-money starts," Dosland told the crowd. "I'm baffled. Oh, and I need a surfboard sponsor. I'm going to Australia next month to compete and I need a surfboard sponsor.

While Tom was hard-pressed to express himself on land, he had no trouble out in the water. A regular-foot surfer (riding with his back to the Banzai Pipeline wave), he was not favored to win the 40-minute final, given that it's far more difficult to surf such large, critical waves on your backhand. But Dosland charged some huge, highly difficult tube-rides with little regard for the odds. Riding a total of six waves in the heat, he came up with two top-scoring rides of 8.5 and 8.33 points, each out of 10, for a winning total of 16.83. A testament to the high performance level of every finalist, just three points separated first and fourth. Bruneau had the top single score of the final - 8.83, and a total of 15.5 points, Sullivan had a total of 14.97 and Patacchia 13.66.