12.5.07 MAKUA KAI ROTHMAN WINS BIG AT SUNSET
Growing up at Sunset Point pays, as Makua Kai Rothman wins big in the last few minutes of the O’Neill World Cup Of Surfing.
In a week filled with crazy conditions, the O’Neill World Cup Of Surfing will go down as one of the most challenging and dangerous contests of the year. Wild ten to twelve foot surf with howling winds and warping tubes greeted the competitors who call came to Sunset for one reason, to win. But in the end, only one man could take the prize and that man was Sunset Local and big wave standout, Makua Kai Rothman. Here’s what aspworldtour.com had to say about Makua’s big win and get the whole scoop on the Vans Triple Crown, and the WCT qualifiers.
Sunset Beach, Hawaii (Tuesday, Dec. 5, 2007) A childhood dream came true for Sunset Beach resident Makua Kai Rothman today, when he won the biggest professional surfing event of his career-the $125,000 O’Neill World Cup of Surfing - at the beach he was born and raised on. The O’Neill World Cup is the second jewel of the prestigious Vans Triple Crown of Surfing series that draws the closing curtain on the ASP World Surfing Tour each year. In the dying two minutes of the O’Neill World Cup final, Rothman secured the highest scoring ride of the 35-minute heat to edge out Brazilian Leonardo Neves. Neves had dominated the four-man, 35-minute final from the outset and the local Brazilian contingent were starting to celebrate when the wave of the final peaked up and Rothman took off. Needing a near-perfect score of 9.2 points, Rothman found his way into the tube, earning 9.5 points to turn the tables and seal the victory. World champion-elect Mick Fanning, from Australia, took third place, and O’Neill World Cup giant-killer Daniel Ross, also from Australia, placed fourth in the final. Reaching the final was especially sweet for Ross, who has won his way onto the elite ASP World Championship Tour for 2008 with this result.
