Surfing: Northland fourth at National Scholastics Championships

Bassie Waldron shreds his way to a silver medal in the longboard division. Photo/Supplied

The Northland Scholastics Surfing Team had some success in Gisborne at the National Surf Champs which were held in the second week of the school holidays.

The team surfed to a fourth place finish which equals Northland's best ever previous result in the 27 years the championships have been running.

The championships are contested by the cream of New Zealand's secondary school surfers representing their regions.

The competition was taken out by Taranaki, followed by Auckland and Canterbury.

Ten regional teams competed including Waikato, Coromandel, Bay of Plenty, Gisborne, Wellington and Otago.

The Northland team ,comprising the region's elite junior surfers, had been selected after a series of competitions earlier in the year at sandy Bay and Ahipara run by the Northland Surfing Association.

The team consisted of Jamahl Moselem, Kalani Hansen (under-18 boys), Billie Scott (under-18 girls), Nubby Critchfield, Tom Norton, Max Brunker, Tom Parker (under-16 boys), Grace Pevats (under 16 girls), Cory Vercoe, Taj Broughton, Jake Buckle (under-14 boys), longboarder Bassie Waldron and travelling reserve Billy Gilbert.

The team was coached by Jaimie Scott.

These surfers represented the extremities of the region, from Kaitaia in the north to Mangawhai in the south.

The first two days of the competition saw great waves around one metre hitting Makarori Beach, with extremely clean morning conditions and light afternoon sea breezes that really only effected the waves late in the afternoon.

With a decreasing swell forecast for the Gisborne beaches, the organisers made an early call to power through two massive days of surfing so the event could be completed on the Wednesday rather than the scheduled Friday.

This proved to be the correct call unfortunately as Wednesday produced much smaller waves for the semis and finals.

Bassie Wldron surfed extremely well in his first national event to get silver in the longboard and, in the U18 Girls division, Billie Scott took bronze.

Max Brunker and Grace Pevats both capped off strong showings by reaching the semifinals in the competitive U16 divisions and both ended with a fifth place finish overall in the division.

Kalani Hansen (U18 Boys) and Nubby Critchfield with Tom Norton (U16 Boys) were all narrowly eliminated in their respective quarter-finals.

Manager Mark Pevats said the team did really well and are looking good going forward.

"Fourth was a very successful result for the team which looks as if it will form a strong nucleus for next year's competition," he said.

"We are very hopeful of a medal finish next year as the team is likely to include Thomas Robinson, who is the national primary schools champion."