Top Surfers Head to Lower Trestles

Lower Trestles, arguably the best surfing break in Southern California, will host some of the world’s best professionals next week.

Hawaii’s Sunny Garcia, the current leader of the Assn. of Surfing Professionals World Championship Tour, will battle former U.S. champions Shane Beschen of San Clemente and Taylor Knox of Carlsbad. Oxnard’s Tim Curran is the defending champion of the Panasonic Shock Wave Tour event, renamed this year the MCD Defcon 4.

The competition, which has a record field of nearly 400 surfers in men’s, women’s, juniors, longboarding and body boarding divisions, starts Saturday with preliminary rounds at Church, a break just south of Lower Trestles.

The surfing at Lower Trestles starts Tuesday. The finals are scheduled for the afternoon of May 6.

Competition for top spots in the men’s event is expected to be especially fierce because the top three finishers will receive wild-card entry into this summer’s WCT stop in Huntington Beach, the Bluetorch Pro.

GARCIA STAYS ON TOP

Garcia continued to be the surfer of the moment Wednesday, winning the Rip Curl Pro at Great Ocean Road in Australia. Garcia, who defeated Brazil’s Flavio Padaratz, 23.05-21.0, in the final, has now won the first two events of the 16-event WCT schedule.

Beschen, who reached the quarterfinals before losing to Padaratz, 19.15-18.5, is tied for sixth in the WCT ratings.

BAKER TO VEGAS OR BUST

The Orange County Sheriff’s Department was the first county team to reach Las Vegas in the Baker to Vegas Challenge up Relay April 15. The 20-person relay team finished the 120-mile race sixth overall and fifth in the open division in 14 hours 3 minutes 35 seconds.

The Anaheim Police Department finished 13th in 14:41:25 and the Orange County Judges team was 26th over and third in the invitational division in 15:06:36.

BEACH VOLLEYBALL

Only the top two teams in the FIVB world beach volleyball rankings for each country will qualify for the 2000 Sydney Olympics, and there is a tight race for the two U.S. women’s berths.

Liz Masakayan and Elaine Youngs (El Toro High) are top-ranked for the United States (third, 2,078 points) and Annett Davis and Jenny Johnson Jordan (fourth, 2,036) currently have the second spot. Lisa Arce and Barbra Fontana are right behind, fifth in the FIVB with 1,650 points.

Holly McPeak and former Newport Harbor High and Long Beach State standout Misty May have only played in two FIVB events, placing fifth and ninth, so they will need to play a number of FIVB events and do well to have any hopes of qualifying for the Olympics.

May won her first pro title April 16, teaming with McPeak to win the Olympic Challenge Series event in Deerfield Beach, Fla.

“We are long shots [to make the Olympics],” McPeak said. “But we believe in our chances. If we play the way we did [at Deerfield Beach], I mean, I think we are only going to get better.

On the men’s side, Rob Heidger and Kevin Wong are the top-ranked U.S. team (eighth, 1,660), but don’t have an Olympic berth locked up. Dain Blanton (Laguna Beach High) and Eric Fonoimoana (11th, 1,362), Karch Kiraly and Adam Johnson (12th, 1,346) and Sinjin Smith and Karl Henkel (14th, 1,252) are within in striking distance.

The FIVB Olympic qualification rankings are based on a team’s best eight FIVB tournament finishes since January 1, 1999. Ten men’s and nine women’s events remain prior to the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

* The Assn. of Volleyball Professionals (AVP) men’s tour kicks off Friday-Sunday in Delray Beach, Fla., with the Tournament of Champions. The AVP has stops in Huntington Beach (June 16-18) and Seal Beach (Aug. 18-20) for the U.S. Open.

Beach Volleyball America, a women’s pro tour, will debut this year with seven stops in California, beginning May 13-14 in Oceanside. But there will be no Orange County BVA events.

“The [Olympic Challenge Series] originally had an event scheduled in Huntington Beach,” said Chris Podraza, the BVA’s vice president of operations. “But when they canceled it, we had already set our schedule. It’s unfortunate that it fell through like that, but I’m confident we’ll be back there in 2001.”