Kai Barger Wins Macy's E-Series Pro Junior in Hawaii

HONOLULU, Hawaii (August 18, 2008) - Maui’s Kai Barger, 18, of Haiku, scored the first major ASP Pro Junior victory of his career at Waikiki Beach today in the $5,000 Macy’s E-Series Pro Junior presented by ASP Hawaii.

Against an all-star lineup of Hawaii’s hottest juniors, Barger surfed through five rounds to take the honors, winning $2,000 and accounting for top names the likes of Clay Marzo (Maui), Casey Brown (Big Island), and Ha’a Aikau (Oahu) along the way.

Second place today was Sebastian Zietz (Kilauea, Kauai), 20 third was 15-year-old Keanu Asing (Ewa, Oahu) and fourth was Albee Layer (Haiku, Maui).

Surf for this one-day event was highly contestable in the two-to-three foot (1.5 metre) range. However, the afternoon’s high tide brought with it inconsistent conditions that emphasized the importance of a solid start to the 30-minute final. Just 13 waves total were ridden during the final heat all but one were posted in the first 15 minutes before the high tide slowed conditions to a virtual standstill.

With so little surf on offer for the all-important heat of the day and with the carbon copy wave nature of the Queen’s surf break, the playing field was so level and the calibre of surfers so close that the win came down to a countback between Barger and Zietz. In the end, Barger won with 12.5 points out of 20 (individiual wave scores of 7.25 and 5.25) to Zietz’s 11.9 (7.5 and 4.4).

The critical edge turned out to be Barger’s more vertical backhand attack over that of his three regular-footed rivals.

"The thought of winning a pro junior for me was a dream," said Barger. "I’ve never made a pro junior final. I’ve watched all my friends win, and finally... I’ve been hurting for one. I think I might have had the slight advantage being backside. When it’s so small, you can kind of just throw it up there and it might look a little better to the judges. I was surprized, actually. I thought I didn’t win."

The Macy’s E-Series Pro Junior is one of three ASP Pro Junior events to be held in Hawaii this year and is a qualifier for the prestigious Billabong ASP World Junior Championships in Australia in January of 2009.

The Macy’s E-Series Pro Junior was the third and final event of the 2008 Macy’s E-Series, staged this summer. The first two events were ASP World Qualifying Series (WQS)1-Star events as part of the ASP World Tour.

ASP Hawaii and Macy’s collaborated to produce the Macy’s E-Series, giving Hawaii’s pro surfing community a much needed opportunity to win valuable ASP ratings points and prize money at home breaks.

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matt

I just got back from Nicaragua, it was sick. I stayed 5 nights for a total cost of $125, which included all my beers, drinks, food and my room.

I saw Nano down here last month, i guess he was headed to pavones.

when ever you want to come to Costa Rica or go to Nicaragua let me know. Ill send you in the right direction

anyways here are a few shots from the trip

adrian

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New Kazuma Surfboard models.

What a great ending to the year. The NSSA Nationals was a huge success for my riders and now we have a month off from competition to fine tune the surfboard models and shapes. Here is a little info what the Kazuma team is up to.

Right now I am working with Ola Eleogram on his new wqs model, I expect to have the final tweaks finished and tested within a week. We will be offering the Ola Milkman model as a standard model kazuma. It will certainly be my most popular design in the near future.

Tanner Hendrickson made the finals in the Jr men's and open mens at the NSSA Nationals and we have his new designs dialed in. Tanner is leading the pack with his blend of power and tricks. His new board design reflects his unique wave riding approach.

Kai Barger has his grovler model Milkman that has been working MAGIC. We have had such good success that I may introduce it as a Main Kazuma Model. I think it is a board design that will work great for just about anyone. Kai is one of the most most amazing surfers in the world, Kai is 5'8" 165 lbs His Grovler Milkman is 6'0" x 18.5" x 2.31" with a nice diamond tail.

Matt Meola is the future of surfing. Yes, I said it here. Quote me on that. Matt has been riding his custom Milkman model for 2 years now and it is time that we do a little R&D with him to take his surfing to the next level. Matt's Milkman has the most complicated curves which makes it very sensitive to the riders input and wave conditions. I plan on revising Matt's board model to made it a little easier to ride in the typical WQS contest waves. Matt's Milkman model is for experts only.

Melanie Bartels has finished testing her new Milkman woman's model which have been riding magic. We improved a few key points on the boards. First and most important, Melanie's new boards ride much better in the smallest waves. We added more planning surface area and thinned down the rails to increase the "rail set". This makes the boards faster, but can hit harder turns without sliding out. Melanie is off to compete in 12 days and has here new quiver of Magic boards.

I have Tai Vandyke and Kai Henry models that will be introduced soon. Both of these models have more than 6 years of R&D in them so they are nearly perfect. The need for boards for the over 200lb surfers is so strong that I need to offer these as mainstream board designs. No longer will the 'big boys' have to ride boards made for the 175 pounders.

Last is the Mike Crowe Quad. All of you who know me know that I was never a fan of quads. Not any more, with the help of Mike Crowe we have come up with a quad that really improves the small wave fish. Mike is a professional level surfer but is 230 lbs and is a power surfer. His new quad design is 6'3" x 20.5" x 2.75" double wing swallow and is a quad. For Mike to put away his thruster says something. This board has put the stoke back in his small wave surfing. Next week it will be a standard board to compliment the superfish.

It is crazy how far board design has come in the last 3 years, lucky for my customers that I can offer the future of board designs now.

Anna win's Volcom competition !

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Chaz Kinoshita

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Kai Barger

Matt and the Kazuma team at the NSSA National Championships in California

6/20 Long day at the NSSA nationals, the Maui crew had a tough time in the 4 to 6 foot surf. during the Menehune Explorer division, Chaz, Joao Marco and Imai got caught in a crazy fog storm that almost stopped the competition. It was nearly impossible to see the competitors and The boys got caught inside during a uge set. All three were left a wave short to advance. Ian, Kai, Matt, Taylor, Kain and Monyca, Tanner Advanced. Matt Meola and Monyca both advanced to the finals setfor later this week. We have a few days off from the competition before the main event starts at Tresles on the 24th.

6/19 This was our first full day of competition. The Maui crew surfed well and ended the day with a 70%advance rate. The standout was Matt Meola in the Airshow division. Tomorrow will be a long day as we start at 6:15 am

6/18 1pm Bad News, Justice Laidman got a big cut on his foot that ended his session. Justice said he was just happy to surf with slater. The waves actually came up as we finished surfing, it was the biggest surf I have seen at Trestles in more than 10 years. What a score for the kids.

6/18 12am We are at epic 5 foot (Hawaiian size) Trestles. It is insane.... Chaz,Tosh,Ian,Joao Marco, and the rest of the Maui boys are having a great time surfing with Kelly Slater. Slater is tearing Trestles apart and is by far the most impressive surfer out. Other Hawaiian surfers that just paddled out, Megan Abubo and Rochelle Ballard are killing it. The kids are lucky to be able to practice with such high caliber surfers. Justis Laidman formally from Maui just showed up and is paddling out to join Chaz. What an exciting day, you just wouldn't believe the performance that Kelly Slater is putting on.

6/17 12am The waves at Salt Creek were the best yet. 3 to 4 feet and glassy. The lefts were 50 yards long ending in a pounding shorebreak barrel. The kids were killing it. At about 10:30 Matt Meola and Kai Barger paddled out and took over. In the last 3 days of practice, this was by far the best surfing I have seen. Matt was pulling off the impossible, slamming sections that even the locals would avoid. Kai was his usual powerful, polished self. Kai owns it everywhere he surfs. Dege, Albee and Billy were also on fire. I am glad to say that the Maui kids are the standout surfers.


6/16 10pm We had two epic sessions at Salt Creek today, the waves were crazy good and all the Hawaiians were killing it. I think the team is about ready for the contest to start, I say they are at 80 percent of their performance potential. Thursday is our first day of contest surfing so after tomorrow's practice, we should be able to give a 90 percent performance. In between practice heats, we had a hard core Guitar Hero session. Joao Marco smoked everyone. Naturally the kids were starving after the jam session so we found this sushi bar, Maki Maki and it had the best sushi. The kids ordered everything on the menu, I think we will go back tomorrow. Tomorrow we will surf early and do our usual video coaching and finish our contest preparations.

Aloha,
Matt Kinoshita

6/16 7am Good morning, again the waves are firing at Salt Creek. The Kazuma team is here with Rainos Hayes and the rest of the Hawaiian competitors. The waves are 3 to 4 feet and pure glass. All the Hawaiian kids are killing it, we are doing our usual video training and mock heats. The kids are stoked.

6/15 7pm We just finished our 2nd session at Salt Creek and the kids surfed a hundred percent better. They are fine with the full suits and cold water now but it Helps that the waves were so big. Ian Gentil just won the Rip Curl grom search contest at Hunting Beach. Another big win for the Maui boys. We are off to find a good restaurant to eat in. Tomorrow we will dawn patrol Salt Creek again.

Aloha,
Matt Kinoshita


6/15 12pm Salt Creek is firing, the team had an awesome warm up session. We ran 3 practice heats in perfect 3 to 4 foot, glassy surf. It took the kids some time to adjust to the cold water and full wetsuits. Kain and Taylor Daily were killing it when we left. Earlier we checked Trestles and it was perfect 4 feet but the Sunday crowd was too much. The room we have at the San Clemente Inn is quite nice and comfortable, we may test the restaurant tonight. Once I figure out how to upload the pictures, you will see some cool shots.

Aloha,
Matt Kinoshita

6/14 9:30pm We arrived safely at LAX. The service at American Airlines was awesome. Now we are off to our accomidations at the San Clamente Inn. Tomorrow morning it's dawn patroll at Trestles. Update and pictures then.

Here we go, we are on our way to California for the NSSA Nationals. if it is like all the years past, my All-Star team is sure to dominate the contest. Chaz, Imai, Tanner, Joao Marco, Kai, Makana,Monyca, Matt and the rest of the Kazuma team are ready for action. Starting tomorrow, I will be adding to this blog as the action happens. I will get into detail with my coaching secrets so all of you out there can see what it takes to compete at the championship level.If I can figure out how to upload my video's, you will get some near live action. Stay tuned, I have lots to share.

Aloha for today,
Matt Kinoshita

Anna Fry

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