Santa Barbara’s Lakey Peterson and Parker Coffin conquered several heats to reach the finals of Surfing America’s USA Championships on Monday, where they were finally stopped just short of national championships.
Coffin ended up in second place in the boys-16 Division, finishing just behind champion Kolohe Andino. Coffin’s two-wave heat score of 13.26 was beat out by Andino’s 14.90. Andino came as close as could be to pulling off back-to-back victories, falling by a fraction of a point to Evan Geiselman in the Boys-18 final.
Peterson was also looking for the double win on the girls side but had to pull out of the 16s competition on Sunday because of cramps. She recovered in time to qualify for the final of the 18s, along with Courtney Conlogue, Kaleigh Gilchrist and Nage Melamed.
Gilchrist and Conlogue went on to go No. 1 and No. 2 in the final, followed by Melamed, then Peterson. It was a relatively wave-starved final at Lower Trestles after a weekend of pumping swell, as Gilchrist and Peterson only caught three waves each.
Conner Coffin also surfed on Monday, bowing out in a Boys 18 semifinal. His two-wave score of 12.17 was topped by Andino and Tanner Hendrikson.
The NSSA Nationals are next up for the junior surfers, to be decided this coming weekend in Huntington Beach.
