Profiles

Beachley Returns for Snapper Rocks

Surfersvillage Global Surf News, 22 February, 2006 : - - After a four-month hiatus, six-time world champion Layne Beachley will return to competition at the Roxy Pro, starting next week on the Gold Coast. Beachley, 33, missed the climax to the world title race in 2005, after withdrawing from the final two events with a herniated disc in her neck.

After consultation with specialists, it was recommended she cease surfing immediately and rest. Her neurosurgeon has given her the green light to compete at the Roxy Pro, but she will have to continue treatment.

"I haven't prepared as much I would like to but it will be fun to get out there again. I have nothing left to prove in surfing but still have the desire to keep going," Beachley said. 

Beachley speaks with enthusiasm when talking about a seventh world title. "I want to be on par with Kelly (Slater)," she said. "I knew he was capable of a seventh world title."

Yesterday's Roxy Pro draw produced some quality match-ups in the first round. World champion Chelsea Georgeson, from Tweed Heads in NSW, has drawn the short straw by facing the event's defending champion Stephanie Gilmore (Kingscliff, NSW).

Local knowledge of the Snapper Rocks break took Gilmore from last year's trials to a main event victory, becoming the youngest female to win a World Championship Tour event at the age of the 17, as a wild-card.

"The match-up with Chelsea will be hard but I am looking forward to it, we surf together all the time. Hopefully we will go wave for wave and get barrelled," Gilmore said

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Courtesy Cassandra Murnieks / The Australian

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