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Next of the nearly men
Photo courtesy of ibaworldtour.com
The sign of class in a sportsman is in the way they take their losses and Ryan Hardy is a gentleman of this game. Doubtless he must be disappointed but the universal admiration is easy to understand when you can see his skills in the water and his conduct on land. Movement: At the
wrap of another close title chase how do you assess your own performance on
this year's tour? Ryan Hardy: I feel
this year I went pretty good in results, got my first grand slam title at Pipe
and first runner-up grand slam at Sintra. Small events wise had pretty shocking
results, fifth being my best, so definitely room to improve there. Performance
wise I felt like I had a pretty average year in that the waves I got in my heats
weren't that extraordinary, it was only in Portugal funnily enough that I
really felt I was able to give everything physically as well as technically. Although
it is usually an average beachie it was solid and demanding this year. My man-on-man
semi against Benny was definitely my favourite heat of the year where I came
back from Benny’s combo lead and scored a 9.25 to progress through to my first
man-on-man final. Having a tight man-on-man heat like that is as intense as
competing gets - it's a huge rush! Movement: Has the
result inspired or deterred you from another year on the tour? Ryan Hardy: Definitely
inspired, being in the contenders game and not quite getting the dangling
carrot at the end just leaves me with the biggest itch to get right back there
and fight for it again. As far as I'm concerned there's nothing more exciting
or challenging than a title race at the end of a tour. So for sure I'll be back
in there next year battling it out and loving life! Movement: Do you
think the conditions in the Canaries hampered or improved your chances? Ryan Hardy: The
conditions were pretty sick, it was super lucky to get the waves we did. The
fact my heat with Tamega happened in a lull definitely hampered me personally!
But otherwise I felt good form in the waves and had things rolled my way a
little more then I feel for sure my chance at the title was solid in those
waves. And finally… Ryan
says, The single best
competitive performance of the year was .... Dave Hubb knocking Jeff Hubb in Chile
with a ten-point ride. The best new face
on tour this year was ... Aussie bias, Rigby. Overall, Guillermo Cobo. After Jeff the
most deserving winner would have been ... Wingy. The biggest competitive lesson I learned this year
was ... in man-on-man you HAVE to own the bombs.
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