Volcom/CareyKauai's Stephen Koehne, done for the day ... and possibly the winter. A knee to the reeef would require more than 20 stitches to close up.

It was the kind of day you absolutely dread when your name gets called to check in and get your jersey. Pipe is scary enough at six to eight feet, but when the Volcom Pipe Pro was called off at around 10:30 a.m. after consistent third reef bombs began washing through and smashing "warriors" like little ants as they unloaded on the first reef, the fear level reached new heights. Ultimately, only a handful of heats would be run in the trying conditions.

"The conditions became uncontestable and unsafe. We had to call it," said Contest Director Marty Thomas, who made the right call with the swell building much faster and bigger than anticipated."

By mid day people were surfing small Waimea and other outer reefs with sets up to 15 feet Hawaiian scale. Don't ask me what that means. Probably 20 foot faces? When the waves reach this size on the North Shore it shrinks the number of surf spot that are actually ridable to two or three. Pipe gets unruly at the 12-foot mark and with all the energy of a building swell behind it, the spot gets down right ugly.

The wipeout of the day -- or at least injury of the day -- went to Stephan Koehne with a nasty puncture to his left thigh, which would require two dozen stitches to close up. Miraculously, Koehne still managed to make his heat and advance to the round of 112, picking off some nice barrels in between the wash throughs -- which was no bargain with the heats only being 20 minutes long.

Volcom/BielmannMark Healey's not afraid of much, but this wipeout got the blood going a little.

Other standouts were North Shore lifeguard Dave Wassel and California's Parker Coffin.

"It's huge surf and it's non-stop," explained Wassel, who's seen it all out at Pipe. "It's too much surf for Pipeline now and it's supposed to pick up for the next four hours. We were expecting about an eight-foot swell -- it's double that and still increasing which makes me wonder how big the swell on Monday is going to be. Good call to call it off. Safety is our number one concern."

Meanwhile, Coffin put on an impressive performance, knifing a couple of late drops and getting properly pitted -- no easy feat for an up-and-comer from California.

As for the outlook, expect Sunday to clean up and be considerably more contestable.

"I got a heat in the morning. It's looking way better than today. I'm psyched," said competitor Sean Moody.

Time will tell, but stay tuned and we'll bring you the latest from the beach ... it's bound to be interesting.