Australia's Olympic bronze medallist Owen Wright has been eliminated from the WSL event at Sunset Beach while Kelly Slater was among those to advance.

World No.1 Kelly Slater has staved off an early elimination by the skin of his teeth but Olympic bronze medallist Owen Wright wasn't so lucky at the WSL event at Sunset Beach in Hawaii.

Slater was thrust into the elimination second round after finishing third in his opening round heat.

The 50-year-old, who won the season-opening event at Pipeline last week, led for long parts of the three-man elimination heat after putting together a two-wave total of 13.0.

Slater slipped to second when South African Matthew McGillivray pulled off a 7.67 ride, but the American was still in front of Koa Smith.

Smith needed a 5.90 to pip Slater into second spot and secure a berth in the third round, and he took off on a wave with just 38 seconds remaining on the clock.

The 26-year-old thought he might have done enough to get the score he needed, and both he and Slater waited nervously on the shore while the judges handed down their decision.

The score was a 5.67, meaning Slater progressed by the margin of 0.23.

"When he got on the beach people were giving him knuckles and patting him on the back," Slater told the WSL broadcast.

"I thought, 'Oh man, that's it'. I was just thinking it's a tale of two weeks. But it went my way."

Wright appeared on his way to the third round before being slapped with a priority interference for taking off on a wave and cutting across his opponent when he didn't have priority.

It meant that only one of Wright's waves would count on his total, and his single-wave score of 5.67 was no match for the two-wave totals of Billy Kemper (11.66) and Australian young gun Morgan Cibilic (6.43).

Australian Jordan Lawler and Brazilian Miguel Pupo were the other two surfers eliminated in the second round.

John John Florence, Jordy Smith, Conner Coffin, Italo Ferreira, and Filipe Toledo were among the big names to progress straight to round three.

Slater struggled in his opening-round heat on the way to a two-wave total of 8.94, but a self-prescribed pep talk helped turn around his fortunes in the elimination round.

"I would say I was not in good shape this morning," Slater said.

"I didn't feel relaxed, I didn't feel calm at all. My blood sugar felt wrong.

"The whole energy of the heat felt wrong for me, I just didn't feel like it was my day.

"So I had to go home and reset, and just give myself a little mantra and tell myself to enjoy it.

"I told myself that no matter what, just enjoy myself."