Taj Burrow's world surfing title ambitions took a hit on Thursday when eliminated from the Quiksilver Pro France by current ratings leader Mick Fanning.
The twice world champion won with a paltry 10.17 points to Burrow's 5.94 in inconsistent one-metre waves at the primary venue of La Graviere.
Fanning acknowledged the importance of his win over fourth-ranked Burrow, the winner of the previous event in California, who is mathematically still in contention for a maiden world title.
"I woke up today and sort of thought, if you win that first heat it could potentially knock somebody out of the race, but you know you just have to take it heat by heat," Fanning said.
"I'm just stoked to get through another tight one, I've had so many of those this year, I'm just trying to play cool under pressure."
The waves were best in the morning when fellow Australian Kai Otton enjoyed the day's best score of 19.17 out of 20 in beating Burrow and Joel Parkinson in the non-elimination fourth round.
While Burrow failed to make it beyond the next round, Parkinson recovered to win his fifth round heat and progress to the quarter-finals with Julian Wilson.
The biggest upset came from 18-year-old Brazilian Filipe Toledo who eliminated current world No.3 Jordy Smith of South Africa 14.73 to 13.64 in their fifth-round encounter.
Otton takes on Parkinson in the quarter-finals while Fanning is up against young Hawaiian John John Florence, Wilson takes on Brazil's Gabriel Medina and Toledo encounters 11-time champion Kelly Slater, currently second in the title chase.
Defending event champion Slater won the lowest-scoring non-elimination round 4 heat with a total of just ten points in the shifting conditions.
"The waves were not really good, it's a bummer but there's not much we can do about it, with the tide pretty low it's just closing out.
"So it's just a flip of a coin and hoping that something happens out there for you."
AAP gjw
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