Fiji can’t come soon enough. Seeing those gorgeous waves being torn apart by the women this week has truly whet our appetite for clear, warm water, heaving barrels and elite surfing.

Conditions

There are two options for the Fiji contest; Restaurants and Cloudbreak. If you want a concise-yet-knowledgeable break-down of the two spots, read Nick Carroll’s article from 2015. If you don’t care for that level of detail, then just think left-hand reefs. It ranges from a smaller performance canvas to a massive big-wave proving ground, so the forecast will be important. Regardless, you’ll be wanting a team who know their way through the belly of a barrelling left, but also – given the judges’ love of big turns this year – who can lay down some rail work when the time calls.

The official forecast calls for a lully 4-6′ swell to run over the first two days of the contest window. Expect similar conditions to that of the women’s event. There isn’t much else on offer for the rest of the week, so for now it looks like lots of fishing and maybe some bar sessions after Monday. Hopefully the long-range models offering a possible pulse towards the end of the contest window will prove correct.

As far as a history of success at this event goes, we’ve made up a new table on our sortable data page that shows the results of 14 surfers over the past 4 Fiji events. Check it out (bottom of page) and see who has been the most consistent in these particular conditions over the past few years. Below are also the detailed results from R5 onwards in this event from 2012-2015 (courtesy of aspwedge.com).

Based on the forecast, the break and the surfers’ past results, here are our nominations for strong ‘conditions’ surfers for this event:

Kelly Slater

Slater is a maestro out here. We know he has struggled this year, we know he has had board issues, and we know that his mojo is waning, but this is Cloudbreak, and Slater owns Cloudbreak. If we are talking conditions picks for Fiji, then the 5-time winner is at the top of the list.

Gabriel Medina

Gabe came out at the top of our projections list for this event, but it’s why he is there that puts him among our conditions recommendations: he ranked 1^st in reef breaks, 1^st in lefts, 1^st in 8-10’+ conditions, 1^st in AHS for this event and 1^st for average total points for this event. He has been a bit rocks-and-diamonds here in the past with a 2^nd / 25^th / 1^st / 13^th pattern, but if you’re into that kind of thing you would be justified in predicting that this would be one of his ‘good’ years.

Mick Fanning

Mick was 2^nd only to Slater when it came to our ‘event history’ data, with a 3^rd / 2^nd / 5^th / 9^th history over the past 4 years. Mick also comes fairly ‘cheap’ after having sat out the past 2 events.

John John Florence

Do we really need data to convince you that JJF surfs ‘well’ in barrelling lefts? He was injured last year, but before that he went 5^th / 3^rd / 5^th. John John would probably be more favoured in waves of consequence, but he’s still a solid pick in the smaller conditions regardless.

Conditions Warnings

Matt Wilkinson

The caveat here is that the 2016 Wilko is vastly different to the pre-2016 Wilko, but – that said – history doesn’t bode well for the tour leader. Wilko has gone 25^th / 25^th / 13^th / 25^th in the past 4 Fiji events, and he ranks lowest overall in reef conditions. It’s a brave player who selects Wilko as one of their top seeds at this event.

Keanu Asing

Keanu’s reef, lefts, big wave (hey – it could happen) and AHS numbers are all warning us to steer clear of him.

A Wildcard (Gukilau)

Last year saw 2 local wildcards in the Fiji event, with Nakalevu and Ravulo both bombing out in R2 with 25^ths. Tokovou suffered the same fate in 2014. Ravulo did it again in 2013. And in 2012 Tokovou didn’t get a 25^th; he got a 33^rd. Do you see the pattern? Local wildcard surfers haven’t won heats in Fiji. Having said that, Stu Johnson believes that this year could be different. Your call.

Form

Form is a fickle thing, especially this year. Let’s have a look anyway:

John John Florence

The winner of the previous event is always going to score well in our form guide. He also has the 2^nd highest AHS for the year (behind Mick) and he’s looking hungry. We picked JJF as a form surfer for Rio and claimed that he would win at least one event this year; this could be his second.

Italo Ferreira

Italo’s 9^th in Rio surprised a few people; they expected more. This is pretty incredible seeing as it’s only his 2^nd year on tour. Ferreira already feels like a contender, and he has been quietly proving his credentials all year.

Caio Ibelli

The 2015 QS champ is certainly not surfing like a rookie. He has finished 9^th or better in all 4 events this year and, with Italo getting a 13^th in Cooly, Caio has the title of the most consistent surfer so far this year.

Gabriel Medina

Medina is building. He has been pumping out solid AHS numbers this year (3^rd overall), and gaining momentum after a slow start. Our money is on Medina to launch himself front-and-centre towards a second title tilt at this very event.

Form Warnings

Keanu and Ribeiro

Raoni Monteiro was the last surfer to go a whole season without a single heat win in 2014 (although he missed Fiji because of injury, so he didn’t bomb every event). Alex and Keanu are the only two surfers left who can ‘do a Raoni’; will they maintain consistency?

Kelly Slater

Some say that Kelly has been distracted by his business ventures and wave pool dealings, which is entirely possible. If Kelly can’t get focused in beautiful Fijian tubes with one other guy out, then it may be time to think about retirement.

Matt Wilkinson

Matt’s flavour-of-the-month seems to be turning sour. With a 9^th and a 25^th in his past 2 outings, Wilko could lose his yellow jersey if he can’t snap out of his funk.

Heat Draw (updated)

*In case you missed it, Joel Parkinson has withdrawn due to a suspected ruptured MCL. He has been replaced in the draw by Dusty Payne*

While much less important than conditions and form, the draw should still be a partial consideration. Having 3 surfers in a R1 heat, or even 2 surfers facing off in R2, can be a bad omen. It should be noted that, because of the slightly complex WSL system of seeding, the fantasy tiers do not match the surfer’s seeding rank (for Fiji, they have 20% of their total still associated with their 2015 rank). Knowing seedings can lessen (but never guarantee) the chance of clashes down the track.

If you want to play around with heat win outcomes and possibilities, we recommend wslbracket.com as a fun way of predicting possible result match-ups. Be aware though that a single change from your projections can alter the following round entirely.

Here’s what happened when we put our projections through the draw:

Sleeper Picks

We like to offer a few suggestions that may not be on everyone’s radar. Any success that involves deviating from the popular vote will provide a huge advantage for players willing to take the risk. Since the % owned feature has been removed from the WSL game and the FS numbers are invisible until lock-out, we are simply predicting who will be low in the popularity stakes.

Top

We actually believe that a few of the top 8 could struggle in Fiji, and we wouldn’t be surprised to see the JJF/Italo double popping up in a majority of teams. Jordy actually has a decent AHS for this event, and – because we don’t think he’ll be super-popular – he’s our dark horse amongst the top surfers.

Mids

We’re going to suggest Conner as our mid-range dark horse, only because we know he’s put in a lot of hours at this place and he knows the break well. Since he’s not really going to be that underpicked, we’re also going to give a shout-out to Melling – he could surprise a few and sneak his way into the later rounds.

Low

The lower-ranked options are teeming with quality options for this event: Kelly, Flores, Ottz, Taj? The 4 of them will probably make 90% of team’s lower-tiered selections. We think Ryan Callinan could be a reasonably good darkhorse option here, especially if there are smaller waves with softer ramps and tight barrels that favour the forehand surfers.

Teams

WSL surf-stats team (updated)

We are in a ‘money’ club with friends for this contest, and it may have resulted in some conservative selections. We’ve ignored history and taken a punt on the wildcard, we’ve backed Conner and we are keeping the faith for Slater’s natural instinct to override his mental fragility. *Joel has been dropped for the rocks-and-diamonds risk of Julian.

WSL numbers team (updated)

This would have been a very solid team in any other year than 2016, however Julian, Kelly and Flores have been shaky on form. Joel’s withdrawal has interestingly put Kanoa in the Tier B frame, slightly above Conner and Nat based on projections.

Fantasy Surfer surf-stats team (updated)

Similar to our WSL team, but with Freestone and Flores getting a run. We have taken a punt against the numbers in replacing Joel, adding Wilko (based purely on an unjustifiable gut-instinct and because we’ll probably want him in J-Bay anyway).

Fantasy Surfer numbers team (updated)

JJF and Medina’s cheaper prices allowed us to get Mick instead of Italo and Taj over Seabass. Pretty solid, but admittedly more suited to bigger surf. Joel was replaced by Kolohe, who was then next best option within the price limit.

The Outliers

For each event in 2016, we will produce a list of ‘outliers’ that represent some kind of anomaly within our selection analyses. Maybe there are factors that a spreadsheet can’t detect, maybe all of the numbers point a god-awful result at this event, or maybe their recent form simply contradicts their previous averages.

Here are our outliers for Fiji 2016:

Kelly Slater

We have been saying ‘no Kelly until Fiji’. Now that we’re here, we are wondering if he’s going to live up to our expectations. A 9^th or better would certainly justify his place on our team, especially since he’s not a top ranked surfer, but he’ll have a harder draw and he’ll need a massive momentum swing.

Wilko

Our data keeps saying to avoid him, but if there are reports of him arriving early, looking focused and putting in some solid practice hours, then he could be a tidy little sleeper pick.

Rookies

We don’t have left-hander data on these guys, and our reef conditions are all drawn from Margaret River, which is entirely different. There will definitely be at least one rookie bucking the data and putting up some solid numbers, but we’re still trying to figure out who…

Taj Burrow

Taj has good projections and a solid history at Fiji. What’s the problem then? This is his farewell event; he could just as easily party the week through as make a parting statement through his surfing. He won the QS event a few weeks back, so he hasn’t clocked off completely, but just be wary.

The Fantasy Market

We like to have a little fun with our numbers from time-to-time, inventing betting odds for imaginary markets. Our latest analysis is: Taj will use his wildcard spot in Fiji to…

1000–1. Announce his own secret wave-pool technology – 15 years in the making – that makes Slater’s look like the wave pool from North Shore

250-1. Announce that he was only kidding about his retirement, and that he had only told people he was quitting so that he didn’t have to surf in Rio

20-1. Ignore all distractions, win the event, and mic drop the ceremony with “Taj out!”

12-1. Miss his R1 heat because he went fishing with Parko

8-1. Miss the event because he’s at the bar drinking heavily and watching Montaj on repeat

4-1. Surf well, win a few heats and taste moderate success; pretty much like the rest of his career

Surf-stats Clubhouses

Now that you know the team break-downs, it’s time for you to create a team that will hold our selections to account. Sign up to our WSL Surf-Stats group (password – SS) or the Fantasy Surfer Surf-Stats clubhouse (password – SS) and challenge yourself against us and our readers. We will give a shout-out to each winner and analyse their team.

As always, feel free to comment or leave your own team selections below.

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