It's down to eight surfers in the O'Neill Cold Water Classic surf competition currently underway in Tofino and hometown pro Pete Devries is one of them. Devries won his heat Friday afternoon against Joan Duru of France with a score of 12.67 to Duru's 8.44 and will now surf in the quarter finals Saturday morning - something no other Canadian has done in an Association of Surfing Professionals event.

The contest moved back to North Chesterman for the end of the round of 16. Despite strong winds out of the south (gusting to 26 knots), conditions were an improvement over yesterday, contest announcer Dom Domic told the cheering crowd that came out to support Devries.

With only two surfers in each heat, the competition is now "man on man," which means that priority sequencing comes into play. Whichever surfer is in the priority position has the first pick of the waves and the other has to yield. Devries has never surfed this format, but he said after the heat that although his inexperience did come into play, it did not have a huge impact because of the beach break conditions.

"I made some mistakes," he said. "I knew I would make some mistakes and I made some serious mistakes. But it didn't really matter because we were kind of surfing different peaks and there was little peaks that pop up all over the place. "It's not like you're surfing a point [break] - you know if you miss a wave and... or you paddle for a wave and it's not good and the next guy's on a bomb out the back."

The strong south wind did have an effect on the right-handed waves, Devries said.

"I felt like I was going backwards on those rights," he said. "I wanted to find lefts out there because I saw Glenn [Hall] in that last heat catching lefts and getting nines so I figured I'd look for those but all I found was rights."

Hall, from Ireland, scored a 9.5 on a wave in the previous heat (10 is the highest score). Devries will face Hall in his quarter final heat Saturday morning. Duru said he had trouble finding a good wave during the heat. "It's a big challenge to get a good one," he said.

Duru is currently ranked 8th on the World Qualifying Series tour and is hoping to qualify for the World Championship Tour next season (the top 15 surfers from the WQS move on to the WCT). Devries expressed regret that he might stand in Duru's way of scoring points because he himself doesn't need them.

"I feel bad in a way almost," he said. "Hopefully [Duru] gets a good result in the Canaries [Islands] and he can secure a spot for next year." Devries will join Cory Lopez (USA), Dusty Payne (HAW), Glenn Hall (IRL), Mark Matthews (AUS), Brandon Jackson (ZAF), Jay Thompson (AUS), and Nathan Hedge (AUS) in the round of eight tomorrow.

The Cold Water Classic is an Association of Surfing Professionals six-star event, the first ever ASP sanctioned event to be held in Canada. Surfers compete on the World Qualifying Series in order to qualify for the World Championship Tour. Prize money for the CWC totals $144,000 and the top surfer will receive $20,000 in prize money.