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| What's New |  Who's Hot:Sunny Garcia: 2000 WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP TOUR SEASON FINISHES SUNNY SIDE UP North Shore, Hawaii – Long considered one of the greatest surfers on the World Championship Tour (WCT), Vincent "Sunny" Garcia now has the title to prove it. After 15 years on the WCT, Sunny finally earned the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Title that has eluded him for so many years. Sunny’s journey to the top of the surfing world has been anything but easy. Growing up in Waianae, on Oahu’s West Side, was dangerous, even for a local. The product of a broken home, Sunny was raised by extended family and found surfing to be a refuge from poverty and violence. Still, the daily struggles that Sunny had to face growing up have not tempered the perpetually cheerful disposition that earned him his nickname "Sunny". At age 17, Sunny debuted in the 1986 Gotcha Pro at Sandy Beach. After defeating the then world champion, Tom Carrol, Sunny exclaimed that he was out to kick some top 16 butt. Early success, however, hindered Garcia’s rise to greatness. Money and fame fueled a drug addiction and a lack of focus that kept Sunny off track. It wasn’t until the early ‘90s that his true potential began to show. Sunny has been ranked in the top 10 surfers in the world every year since 1990 and has had several close calls. In 1995, Sunny was one heat away from winning the world title at Pipeline, but, as fate would have it, he was knocked out of contention in the first round and Kelly Slater earned another World Championship. It is ironic that perhaps his greatest defeat should have occurred at the North Shore, as it is the one place that Sunny has dominated more than any other surfer in history. |
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Last year, in his quest to become the number 1 ranked surfer in the world, Sunny Garcia did something that no other surfer has ever done before: he won the coveted Vans Triple Crown of Surfing for a record fifth time. Sunny’s performance in this year’s Triple Crown was nearly identical of the rest of his entire season in that he won the first two events and never looked back, never gave anybody a chance to catch up. Today, Sunny Garcia lives in Kauai with his wife Raina, daughter of surfing legend Joey Cabel, and his three children from a previous marriage: Kaila, Logan and Stone. He credits much of his success to his spouse’s encouragement. For the 2001 season, Sunny has a different kind of mission: to defend his newly won World Champion status from the myriad of other dreamers on the WCT who won’t back down until they have surmounted every obstacle, defeated every challenger, and are declared the best surfer in the world. Fast Facts –
Sunny Garcia Birth Date: January 14, 1970 Birth Place: Honolulu, HI Current Residence: Kauai, HI Years on Tour: 15 2000 WCT Rating: 1st Highest Previous WCT Rating: 3rd - ’92, ‘94, ’95, ‘96 |
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