Jack Van Wagoner and Natalia Wunderlich won the 2023 Surfing For Hope Longboard Classic, a North America Regional Longboard Qualifying Series 1,000, in pristine, two-to-three foot conditions at Morro Rock over heavily-contested fields. This marks both Wunderlich and Van Wagoner’s maiden WSL wins, pushing Van Wagoner atop the North America rankings as Wunderlich competes out of the Hawaii/Tahiti Nui region and did not gain points. Valuable runner-up finishes from Star D’Elia, now North America No. 1, and reigning North America Longboard Regional victor Richie Cravey kickstarted their season alongside fellow finalists Chase Lieder, Noah Shimabukuro, Indie Hoffman, and Chloe Coleman, respectively.
The men’s Final got underway with reigning North America Longboard Regional victor Richie Cravey taking on 2023 standouts Chase Lieder and Jack Van Wagoner along with event threat Noah Shimabukuro. Van Wagoner took the best of the opening exchange, earning a 7.50 and backing it up quickly to gain an early advantage. But, Lieder, Cravey, and Shimabukuru all were right behind him with a solid score of their own. Cravey’s sensational form carried into the Final to take the lead from Van Wagoner. But, the dying minutes provided Van Wagoner one last opportunity to strike and he capitalized to earn a near-perfect 9.25 for his maiden WSL victory.
“I’m super stoked, I definitely want to give my mom a shout out since she said she wanted me to win for her birthday so I delivered, happy birthday mom (laughs),” said Van Wagoner. “All the boys were ripping. Richie’s 10 in the Semifinals was insane. I can’t believe it and I’m just so stoked. ”
With Jack and his sister Reid featured as our Making Waves exhibit we are proud to have such a ripper featured in our museum!
