ROXY PRO SCORES PERFECT WAVES FOR THE WORLD’S BEST FEMALE SURFERS

Surfersvillage Global Surf News, 24 April, 2006 : – - Two-time defending event champion Sofia Mulanovich (PER) made her intentions to remain atop the Roxy Pro podium crystal clear when she reached the quarter-finals of the US$78,300 event today.

Mulanovich, the 2004 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) Women’s World Champion, was in dynamic form in the perfect 4-6 foot (1.2 – 2 meter) waves at Cloudbreak Reef, off the islands of Tavarua and Namotu, Fiji.

She earned the day’s highest heat score with a brilliant round three heat against South Africa’s Heather Clark, scoring 19.10 out of 20 possible points with a 9.5 and a 9.6 ride.

“I just love this place! Plus I feel way more comfortable after that win,” Mulanovich said after the victory. “I was pretty nervous in my first heat and not really surfing top to bottom, but then I said to myself: ‘If you can’t surf top to bottom, maybe you don’t deserve to win this contest.’ So I gave it everything I had in that heat and I am feeling really confident now.”

Mulanovich, like reigning world champion Chelsea Georgeson (AUS), needs to post a solid result here if she wants to factor into the 2006 world title race. Both Georgeson and Mulanovich, numbers one and two in the world respectively last year, fell victim to early exits in the first event of the year, the Roxy Pro on Australia’s Gold Coast.