Kai Barger gets third at the Oakley Pro Junior in Bali despite his wounded knee

"An inspiring performance was also put on by Hawaii’s Kai Barger today.

Barger suffered a knee injury sustained free surfing two days ago and this morning hobbled to the water’s edge fully braced around his knee to surf his semi-final.

Early in the semi-final he could barely turn on two extremely low scoring rides and most wondered why he even bothered to paddle out.

Half way through the semi on a good clean medium sized wave, Barger pushed his performance hard, clearly uncomfortable but still showing signs of his renown power and he scored a very worthy 6 point ride putting him in contention.

His following ride was simply amazing, taking one of the largest set waves, Barger unleashed a massive opening bottom-to-top turn and followed up with three more powerful controlled turns, scoring an excellent 8.5 and looked set to take an incredible semi win.

Barger’s injury clearly made it very tough for him in the final 5 minutes and a priority mistake saw Wrench claim the semi final but Barger’s remarkable performance was applauded by all at the event as limped from the water.

With an iced bracing around  his knee after the event Barger spoke of the semi-final performance saying 'It was good to get through it and get an excellent score but I feel disappointed now as it was also a missed opportunity, I was so close and it’s frustrating for me right now.'

'The knee was painful throughout each turn and it’s difficult to surf fully braced.'"

Kai Barger wins the "Terminator Award" for never saying "die." Here's to a quick recovery for the reigning world junior champ.

Congratulations to Aussie Sam Wrench for the win and Oakley for putting on such a solid Junior event. For more, go to http://oakleyprojunior.com/.