Megan Abubo’s Journal

So the Roxy Pro Gold Coast came to an end.  Steph Gilmore and Melanie Bartels started off right where they left off.  Steph surfed her homebreak of snapper rocks finally and defeated the amazing Hawaiian.  Mel Bartels is a good friend of mine and it is so good to see her get the financial, emotional, and mental support that she has needed for a long time.  She really stepped up her game this event.  It was so cool to see the whole womens tour has gone up a couple of levels and really putting some flare and mixing it up this year.  The top 18 on the Asp Woimens World Tour are all capable of winning a world title and their all looking at the top of their game.

After Steph won the comp we had a whole lotta fun down at the contest competition site.  There were free Coronas to go round, one of the best rights in the world in the background and celebration to be had!  It was pretty great to have beers with 3 champs like Lisa , Wendy, and Steph.  And what not a better day than Lisa’s birthday!  So we were all cheersing her and Steph.  I would also just like to note that the girls are looking so fit and even the soberest and most focused of them all, Jackie Silva came down and celebrated! Haha.  That was a sight.  I was trying to teach Billabong team manager how to drink a cold corona but she wasn’t having it, sad excuse for an aussie I say. Just joking,  it was cool to get to know some of the different people involved in the surfing industry.  The different people behind the scenes you don’t see.  Like the team managers, the photographers, the coaches, the significant others.  It is a chance when everyone has their hair down and likes to mingle.  It was nice to catch up with Chelsea as well.  She managed to get a baby sitter for the evening and we got to catch up and have a nice view of the sunset.  She seems focused and I hope she does well this year.

It is so weird competing just a little because I don’t have the same expectations on myself as the other girls.  I don’t have to chase points.  I can sit back when its all done, watch the whole thing go down.  i guess when you don’t have certain expectations on yourself it is so different looking at the big picture.  Leaving Australia I just reflected back on the people I hung out with and met and the waves I got.  I didn’t think about what I didn’t do but rather what I gained out of this trip.  And I gained a sense of respect for these women and what their doing.  Some of them sponsorless, some of them with their whole lives in front of them, and some of them ten years deep with that small curiosity of what their gonna do next.  It is a changing of the guard, it is a changing of a sport that when I entered went through the same thing.  I was excited to come home.  I was ready to get away from the noise of the contest scene and to the mellows of my happy place.  I was leaving a cyclone only to find out it was just as bad at home.  Who cares , the only thing I like to do is sit on my couch and read the news paper. Quiet simplicity alone.

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