Maui’s Jackson Bunch clinches final CT spot in World Surf League
On Wednesday in Brazil, Maui’s own Jackson Bunch became the last surfer to make the cut for the World Surf League’s 2025 Championship Tour, as Marco Mignot eliminated Levi Slawson in the quarterfinals at the Corona Saquarema Pro presented by Banco do Brasil.
“After a consistent year, the 20-year-old Jackson Bunch is ready to face the world’s best, showing everything he learned back home in Maui,” the World Surf League wrote on X.
Teetering on the edge of exultation at the end of his sophomore season in the Challenger Series, Bunch mustered up massive back-to-back performances in the Ballito Pro and Lexus US Open of Surfing to propel him up the rankings. To end the season, just 330 points — or a few high-scoring waves — separated him from his competitors, as he solidified the 10th and final spot for a chance to face the world’s best and head to Pipeline in 2025.
Born and raised in Pāʻia, Bunch trained at local breaks on Maui’s North Shore, becoming a legend and earning several state and national titles plus a spot on Freesurf magazine, all by the age of 12. Bunch started surfing by himself at 4 years old, but his father brought him out on a surfboard as a baby.
Bunch’s first heat in the World Surf League’s (WSL) Men’s Qualifying Series (QS) in 2015 was as a 15-year-old ‘grom.’ His breakout season in 2020 saw him winning the Papara Pro Junior Tahiti.
Nerves piled up for Bunch watching from the beach in Saquarema, east of Rio De Janero, this morning. He was competing in the last event of his third WSL Challenger Series (CS), which is the launching pad to make the Championship Tour (CT). But the result was out of his hands, enduring two eye infections and losing in the round of 64, so all of the stars had to align to make it in.
The result came down to the final seconds of a quarterfinals heat with French surfer Marco Mignot and American surfer Levi Slawson. As the horns sounded and Mignot took the win, Bunch sprinted into the Saquarema water. His friends celebrated with him, as they had during his best heats of the year in South Africa.
“I can’t believe it. I’m at a loss for words,” said Bunch after the heat. “It’s just incredible to be here with all of my friends […] I can’t wait to go into pipe wearing my name on my back.”
Bunch will join the WSL Championship Tour as a rookie this year, along with another Maui surfer, 26-year-old Imaikalani DeVault.
The season will kick off at Banzai Pipeline on the North Shore of Oʻahu, where Maui surfers shined last year — DeVault nearly making it to the quarterfinals only to be knocked out by fellow Mauian Ian Gentil, who placed third in the event. The 2025 Lexus Pipe Pro takes place between Jan. 27 and Feb. 8, 2025.
The CT is the top level of competitive surfing, and features the world’s top surfers competing in events around the world. The season begins with 36 men and 18 women, and the field will be reduced to 22 men and 10 women halfway through the season.
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