Chesser Doesn’t Mind Working Overtime : Surfer Keeps Busy During Early Rounds of San Clemente Competition

Todd Chesser of San Diego continued his pattern of success this year when he won his second-round heat Wednesday in the $35,000 Del Taco/Naugles surf tournament near the San Clemente pier.

Chesser showed great balance while winning on the high waves.

Other highly ranked Professional Surfing Assn. of America competitors received byes through the first four rounds. But Chesser, who is ranked second in the overall PSAA standings behind Bud Llamas of Huntington Beach, was forced to compete Wednesday, instead of Saturday as the rest of the PSAA elite is doing, because he competed in only one tour event last year. He finished 13th at Oceanside.

That performance gave him enough points to make him the 97th-seeded surfer in the San Clemente event and enabled him to draw a first-round bye because the seedings were based on the previous year’s PSAA overall standings.

“I don’t really mind the fact that I have to surf so many heats because each heat provides me the momentum I need to compete well in the heats that come up,” Chesser said.

“The only drawback that I have experienced in surfing so many heats per competition is that by the time the quarterfinals of a contest start, I feel pretty much spent physically because of the pressure of surfing in so many heats. I then have to rely on a high adrenaline flow to carry me through the rest of the contest.”

Chesser, who started competing full time in the PSAA this season, began his year by finishing fourth in Isabela, Puerto Rico, in February and Haleiwa, Hawaii in March.

Chesser failed to advance past the first round of the PSAA’s Santa Cruz event on May 21, but came in second behind Vinnie De La Pena of Laguna Niguel in the June 4 Oceanside contest.

“That’ll be great,” said Chesser about the day when he won’t have to compete in so many heats. “I’ll be able to have even better results than I do now because of the rest I’d be getting.”

Notes

Orange County competitors who survived the first two rounds were Craig Bechtloff of Huntington Beach, who won the fourth second-round heat after drawing a bye in the first round; Gary Clisby, of Huntington Beach, who won the second heats of both rounds; Justin Cook of Irvine, who won the sixth heat in the first round and finished second in the sixth heat of the second round; Mark Lindblad of San Clemente, who came in second in the fourth heats of the first and second rounds; and Josh Palmateer of Huntington Beach, who finished second in the seventh heats of both rounds. Six other area surfers--brothers Bill and Bob Baum of Corona del Mar, Scott Desiderio of El Toro, Andy McKay of Costa Mesa and Mark Moreno and Casey Wheat, both of Huntington Beach, qualified out of the first round but won’t have their second-round heats until competition starts at 7 this morning.