Luana Silva, Alyssa Spencer, and Isabella Nichols Cut From the Championship Tour

Originally posted on SURFER | By Zander Morton | Last updated 4/18/24

For the second year in a row the WSL is getting unlucky with swell for its event windows.

Pumping waves just before and after the comps have been commonplace, and at Margaret River, it's the same story, different event. In fact, yesterday the WSL was forced to run heats at Southside (just around the corner from Main Break), because they're running out of time in their waiting period.

While the surf wasn't bad, it wasn't great, either. The days highest score (a 9.10) went to Caitlin Simmers for destroying a tricky left. Tyler Wright, Sally Fitzgibbons, and Sawyrer Lindblad also had highlight moments, and all of them booked a ticket to finals day.

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Unfortunately, lowlights abounded. There was simply no way around it on a day when three women were chopped from the CT in very non-dream-tour conditions. With their losses, Luana Silva, Alyssa Spencer, and Isabella Nichols all got the ax, and now have to go reset (and hopefully requalify) through the Challenger Series.

And the chop's not done yet.

On finals day, we'll see four women — India Robinson, Sally Fitzgibbons, Sawyer Lindblad, and Gabriela Bryan — fighting for two spots. Fitzgibbons and Lindblad are matched against one another, as are Robinson and Bryan.

Fortunately, the last day of the waiting period looks promising, so at least all four can fight for their careers at pumping Main Break, rather than a backup venue they'd likely never even heard of, much less surfed.

This article first appeared on SURFER and was syndicated with permission.

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