Extreme Exposure: Shiffrin continues impressive season
In this week's edition of Extreme Exposure—a weekly column featuring news and photography from the world of action and outdoor sports—Bald Face Lodge hosts banked slalom event while Shiffrin dominates.
Rookies Rage at Bells Beach
While Australia’s Bells Beach was doing its typical weird thing—completely mushy one day, blown out and stormy the next—World Surf League competitors were at their best, especially the new generation of rookies, who ruled the day in Round 3 this weekend, upending seasoned vets right and left.
Santa Barbara, Calif., native Conner Coffin pulled off perhaps the most shocking of those upsets when he knocked Joel Parkinson out of the competition, showing patience beyond his years (a result, many say, of the uptick in competition at the Qualifying Series level). With time winding down, Coffin had priority and needed a big score. Parkinson, ever the wily veteran, did his best to bait the 22-year-old rookie into taking a poor wave but Coffin waited it out and with 1:50 on the clock found a wall that held up and put in his best effort, scoring an 8.17 to send “Parko” packing. Last year’s QS tour champ, Caio Ibelli then eliminated John John Florence from Bells and Australian rookie Davey Cathels bid Gabriel Medina adieu in the final heat of the day. In just the second event the rookie class is already making a serious impact on the 2016 World Tour.
