Yesterday, a few things happened that will never happen for the first time again: John John Florence won his first Pipe Masters and Tyler Wright won the first women’s CT event at Pipeline. Both are things that probably should have happened a long time ago, but hey, it’s 2020 and weirder things are happening.
It was a shaky start to the WSL season — the Billabong Pipe Masters was put on a brief hiatus after a handful of staffers tested positive for Coronavirus and the Maui Pro at Honolua Bay was moved to Pipeline after a shark attack claimed the life of a surfer — but now that it’s in the books, John John Florence and Tyler Wright are on the page titled “Historic.”
Florence, who has been the guy who everyone knows is a Pipe Master for years, somehow never actually managed to nail down the title. “It feels so good to win,” he said. “Especially from that heat, that was a really hard heat.”
He came up against Gabriel Medina in the final. “I’m stoked to win against Gabe,” Florence said. “I feel like competing against him is why I want to compete. Winning the Pipe Masters has been a dream of mine since I was a little kid. I’ve grown up watching this event. I’ve made a couple of finals and never quite got it. I’m super stoked. I don’t know what else to say.”
Tyler Wright, who can now officially lay claim to the title of the first woman to win a CT event at Pipe, came up against Carissa Moore in the finals of the Maui Pro presented by ROXY. It wasn’t the first women’s surfing event at Pipeline — the WSL has held Women’s Invitational events four times in the past six years there — it was the first world tour event at the famed break on Oahu’s North Shore. The World Surf League stitched together a highlight reel of the finals day… and it was one to be remembered.