In the helter skelter race for WCT qualification a single moment can change the course of your life. Surfing in the Vans World Cup at Sunset, Ryan Callinan was on course to qualify for the world tour on his own steam. Ryan had led his round 3 heat for most of the way but in the gasping seconds Gabriel Medina tiled the roof of an inside bowl at Sunset, pulled the hail-mary free-fall and simultaneously shattered the dreams of Ryan Callinan and fellow Australian, Connor O’Leary. It was the cruelest of moments, as if the kid with everything had come to the playground to rip off everyone else’s lunch. Medina’s Houdini floater set Callinan up for one of the most nerve-wracking days of his life. On the final day of competition Ryan had to grind nails on the sidelines, his destiny tied up in the hands of three other surfers and the whims of Sunset. To qualify Connor Coffin needed to reach third in his semi-final, Dusty Payne required the same result, while Ryan’s compatriot Stu Kennedy was chasing a fourth in the final. If two of these guys did what they needed to do Ryan was back to beach-break bopping on the WQS. On the morning of that fateful day Callinan surfed early and then watched the first heat in which his good friend Frederico Morais had been drawn against Connor Coffin, John John Florence and Italo Ferreira. “I was kind of hoping that Frederico could have almost single-handedly helped me qualify by beating Connor,” recalls Ryan. When Coffin progressed, Ryan initially resigned himself to not watching any further heats. “Then I thought, I’ll just watch from the quarters because that’s when all the action will happen.” By this stage Ryan was at the Billabong Pipe house, where two big couches had been set up around the TV so that all present could watch the qualification drama unfold. Pretty soon Ryan found himself flanked by his girlfriend, Joel Parkinson, Taj Burrow, Craig Anderson, Sean Doherty and photographer, Duncan Macfarlane. The scene was a bit like watching your team play a football grand-final with the injured captain standing next to you in the room. While Dusty Payne dropped out of the equation in the quarters, Stu Kennedy and Connor Coffin continued their march through the rounds. When Coffin finished third in his semi, the Californian’s place on the CT was … Read more