Kanoa Igarashi is in the process of blowing up. With the upcoming Olympic games, he’s already huge in Japan. His face is on billboards and he’s a bonafide star. It seems that he’s found a new gear and he’s owning it unapologetically. At the 2019 Corona Bali Protected, he finally took the top spot at an event, and it looked as though he knew it was the first of many to come.
But even though he moved into the Margaret River event with a head full of confidence and steam, he fell victim in the round of 16 to Ryan Callinan and was eliminated in ninth place. Still, though, he’s not letting up on the gas. After a quarterfinal loss in Rio to Filipe Toledo, he’s currently sitting in the fifth spot in the rankings—and if he’s got anything to say about it, he’s going to be moving up quickly. “So your eyes are on the yellow jersey now?” he guesses at a question likely posed at the press conference. “Uh no, I’d rather just stay in red, actually.” Can you taste the sarcasm?
