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Playing the waiting gameReigning Sound: Ian Walsh on his Xcel Pro title defense

By Eric Johnson

(Nov. 4th 09:12:25 AM)With the 23rd Annual Xcel Pro presented by No Fear called off for the third consecutive day and Round 4, the Quarterfinals, Semifinals and Finals yet to be run, today, Friday, was yet another hard day of nothing. However, at least the rains left and the sun came out, which helped get everyone out of the deep grey funk. With some time on his hands, reigning Xcel Pro champion Ian Walsh let us in on what he was up to.

“I’m just cruising and hanging out with my friends and waiting for the waves to come up,” said the 23 year-old from Maui. “At least it stopped raining and we finally got a nice day.”

On Monday, October 30, the conditions at Sunset Beach improved dramatically, the waves ratcheting up to 10’ at times. Still, the sets were tricky and wave choice was tantamount to success in the heat-by-heat natural selection elimination process.

“It went good for me,” offered Walsh of making it out of his heat in one piece, and making it further along. “The waves were weird so you had to be lucky and get a good wave. Luck had a lot to do with it and I got lucky. I made it through my first heat, so it’s just three more heats to the final.

“It’ll probably finish on Monday,” he continued, speaking to the better conditions anticipated in three day’s time. “That’ll probably be the last day to get it in. The waves are supposed to come up on Monday and then get small afterwards, so I think they’re going to try and run it and finish it up.”

Currently number 168 in the ASP WQS rankings, Walsh’s career was accelerated dramatically last October when he beat out 132 other surfers to face Hank Gaskell, and Sunset regulars Raymond Reichle and Nathan Carroll in the finals of the 22nd Annual Xcel pro. When all was said and done and the points tallied, Walsh had the most with 16.0.

“That was probably the biggest moment of my career,” Walsh offered. “You look at the list of guys who have won the Xcel — Derek Ho, Michael Ho, Pancho Sullivan, Andy Irons — and it’s awesome. Winning the Xcel gave me a lot of confidence and made me realize I could make it to the finals of a contests and win.”

Still mulling over following the long and winding yellow brick road of the WQS, Walsh, as far as contest surfing is concerned, plans to have a masterplan in place relatively soon. “In the short term I want to do good in the contests and give it everything I have. In the long term? I don’t know… Possibly, I’d like to get to the WCT. I’m trying to decide when I want to do all the WQS contests. Right now, I’m not sure. I’ll probably figure that out in the next month. It’s 50/50. We’ll see. Right now I want to do the best at what I’m doing and have fun surfing.”

But first and foremost, Ian Walsh hopes to be Top Eliminator come Monday and what will very likely be the final day of the Xcel Pro. “I know the waves won’t be that big, but I’m confident in my board and in my surfing,” he said before heading off. “It’s a little early to tell. There’s a lot of good surfers that respect the contests a lot still in it, so anyone can win. I guess we’ll just have to see what happens.”