QUEENSLAND is in the box seat to take out surfing’s official ‘State of Origin’ showdown after surfing away with a narrow lead over NSW in the opening round of the second-annual Oakley State Challenge on Sydney’s northern beaches today.

In its second year, the innovative tournament pits New South Wales and Queensland against each other in a state-on-state style face-off.

Sydney’s Curl Curl Beach provided competitors with near-perfect 1-1.5 metre beach break conditions today as Australia’s next generation of surf stars fought it out across the opening round of singles, doubles, tandem and expression period formats. The total team scores from day one of action saw Queensland power into the lead with 109 points, 5 clear of NSW.

Coolum surfing ace Julian Wilson set the pace for the day in the morning’s ‘singles’ format heats, utilising his incredible competition repertoire to setup a formidable lead for the maroons.

18-year-old Wilson was in a league of his own; picking off a set wave before unleashing a series of futuristic manouevres to net the morning’s highest wave score, a excellent scoring 8.5 out of a possible 10. He backed it up with a solid scoring 6.5 to finish with a two-wave total of 15.00.

The maroons continued to up-the-ante in the doubles division with Coolangatta’s Brent Dorrington and Maroochydore’s Mitch Coleborn trouncing the NSW pairing of Nick Riley (Fairlight) and Leigh McMahon (Curl Curl) with a polished display of high performance surfing.

Qld team coach Gary Elkerton was in high praise for his troops. “It was mind boggling some of the surfing that the boys were doing today,” said Elkerton, who was a multiple world championship runner-up.

“The boys went into the round with a plan and they really stuck to their guns. The four different heat formats really worked well for us today.”

Not to be totally outdone, the blues kept their aspirations of back-to-back titles alive with a determined win in today’s tandem heats. Heath Joske (Nambucca Heads) and McMahon were clearly in sync with the day’s favourable conditions, surfing on the same wave simultaneously to snare a massive 9.00 out of a possible 10.

The blues continued to peg back Queensland’s lead via the aerial antics of Culburra’s Owen Wright. Behind the eight ball after breaking his board in the opening stages of the heat, Wright bounced back to post the event’s first perfect 10 for a massive backside aerial 360 maneouvre.

“I can’t believe that I pulled that maneouvre off,” said Wright.

“We were something like 10 points down, so I new I had to go big. The judges were rewarding big scores all day.”

The NSW team proved too strong in ’06 defeating Queensland in the inaugural Oakley State Team Challenge at Avalon Beach. The lead alternated several times throughout the two-day event but it was NSW sealing the victory in the final minutes.

The Oakley State Challenge 2007 continues tomorrow with the second round of singles, doubles, tandem and expression format heats. Contest organisers are expected to reconvene at 8.30am tomorrow for a 9am start. Finals are likely to wrap-up by 1.30pm.

The Oakley State Challenge 2007 is proudly supported by Waves magazine.