After three days of competition in crumbly, two-foot waves, Myrtle Beach’s Cam Richards landed an aerial maneuver to beat Florida’s Evan Thompson in the pro final of the 11th annual O’Neill Sweetwater Pro-Am at Wrightsville Beach.
Hundreds of surfers of all ages took part in the competition, which started Friday, July 15 and wrapped up Sunday. Organizers erected a platform at Colombia Street to give the judges a clear view of the surfers over the spectators and sponsor tents that crowded the beach all weekend.
Many local surfers took part in the female and male amateur divisions, as well as the guppy division—a crowd-favorite category in which volunteers pushed the event’s youngest surfers into waves.
The pro division, with a prize of $15,000, drew local talent, too—up-and-coming names like Bo Raynor, Shane Burn, Gabe Morvil and Dylan Kowalski as well as Wrightsville’s highest-achieving competitive surfer, Ben Bourgeois. The locals took on pros from around the country, including top-ranked junior surfer Kei Kobayashi from San Clemente, California.
The weekend forecast—for both weather and surf—looked questionable, but each day, conditions were better than expected, contest director Brad Beach said.
When he arrived in Wrightsville Beach earlier in the week, the ocean was flat. He was pleasantly surprised to see a small swell appear for the weekend, he said, calling it either good luck or good karma.
Event winner Cam Richards agreed, saying, “It’s better than we expected. At least it was ridable, because there are plenty of times when it’s not physically possible to surf.”
Richards earned the win by adapting his surfing to both the swell size and the scoring format. In most contests, surfers’ heat total combines their top two wave scores, but in the O’Neill Sweetwater Pro-Am only their best wave counted. The format encourages progressive surfing, Beach said, and Richards delivered just that.
“The people I was surfing against are so good at doing a lot of turns on small waves, which I’m not really good at,” he said.
So instead of doing multiple turns on each wave, Richards went for one big aerial, speeding down the face of the wave and then launching his board into the air and rotating it. He landed two aerials on the final day of competition: one to advance him through his semifinal against Asher Nolan and the other to win both the final against 2008 event winner Evan Thompson and the contest’s Most Radical Maneuver award.
Progressive surfing was also on display in the Men’s 15 and Over amateur shortboard division. Another South Carolina surfer, Micha Cantor, won the final over Kobayashi, Raynor and Morvil.
“This is your next generation of pros,” Beach said during the final. “We’ll be seeing them in the finals of the pro division in the near future.”
Despite the inconsistent surf, spectators were on their feet Sunday afternoon during the finals, cheering on their favorite surfer. The competition was both fierce and friendly, with best friends often pitted against each other in heats. Richards said competing with his friends is one of his favorite parts of the contest.
He used to enter the contest every year when he was younger, he said, but he lives in California now, so he hasn’t done the contest or seen many of his east coast friends in a while.
“It was good to hang out with my family and friends I don’t get to see much,” he said, adding, “I love Wrightsville Beach. Everyone is super nice and they always make you feel welcome.”
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