Historically a late-season stop, the European leg of this year’s Championship Tour was this year brought forward to March and cut to just one event after Hossegor was given the flick. That meant that after weeks of enjoying idyllic weather and warm seas, the world’s best surfers were thrown into 13oC Portuguese water, but the waves they were lucky enough to surf and we were lucky enough to witness throughout the course of the contest would have quickly dispelled any concerns about the chilly waters. This is how both the men’s and the women’s events went down.
The Women
The MEO Pro Portugal kicked off in modest conditions with the women’s Opening Round, through which most of the major title contenders got through unscathed. Tyler Wright was the notable exception, finishing last in the fifth heat of the contest, while India Robinson – who has enjoyed a great start to the season – was the unlucky loser of the final heat of the round, a tough match-up against Sally Fitzgibbons and Lakey Peterson.
Within an hour, however, both of those two women were safely through to the Round of 16 having comfortably accounted for Tia Blanco in the first of two Elimination Round heats. Hawaii’s Bettylou Sakura Johnson, an impressive semi-finalist at Sunset Beach just a couple of weeks ago, was given the boot in the next heat, a disappointing result which sent her tumbling down the world rankings from sixth to 14th.
Day 2 of the women’s event saw similar conditions and a relatively predictable set of results in the Round of 16, albeit with a couple of notable eliminations. The second heat of the round saw experienced Aussie duo Steph Gilmore and Sally Fitzgibbons pitted against one another, a match-up which most Australian fans would have preferred to be reserved for much later in the event. Alas, Heat 2 of the Round of 16 it was, and Gilmore snuck past her countrywoman in a close and relatively low-scoring heat. In the next, yellow jersey wearer and Sunset Beach winner Brisa Hennessy was sent packing at the hands of Courtney Conlogue, but thereafter the top seeds just kept winning. Lakey Peterson went through to the quarters in the fourth heat, before Carissa Moore, Tyler Wright and Tatiana Weston-Webb followed in the subsequent three, all winning without too much trouble.
With most of the big names safely through to the final eight, it was always going to be an intriguing quarterfinals, and some of the best Supertubos conditions imaginable on the fourth day of the event helped to amplify that even further. Barrels were available on tap, and though the men spent most of the day in the water and were given the chance to enjoy the bulk of them, the women’s quarterfinalists still got their fair share. Gilmore crept over the line against France’s Johanne Defay in the first of them, cementing her spot in the semis in what was her first decent result of the season, before Peterson beat Conlogue in another tight one straight after. It was Moore, however, who stole the show in the third heat, tucking into two terrific waves to end with a 16.17 heat total and demolish long-time rival Wright in the process. Weston-Webb kicked off the last with an 8.83, a wave which helped her to a total of 14.66 and a comfortable entry into a star-studded semi-finals round.
Unfortunately, conditions on finals day didn’t quite live up to the very high standards set by the previous day, with the swell dropping considerably overnight. As though to compensate for that fact, however, both semis were decided by less than a point, with Peterson opening things up by sending Gilmore packing 12.34-12.00. Weston-Webb was given the tough task of facing Moore in the next in a repeat of last year’s WSL Finals, but on this occasion the Brazilian was able to turn the tide, winning 10.76-10.17.
Which left us with what loomed as a tight final between Peterson and Weston-Webb, and it certainly didn’t fail to live up to expectations. Both women must have been exhausted by the end of it; Peterson took no less than 13 waves in the heat while Weston-Webb took 10, and though the former managed a huge eight waves which scored in excess of 5.00 and four over 6.00, an 8.00 and a 7.33 for Weston-Webb were enough to see her take it out 15.33-14.27.
The very top of the women’s leaderboard didn’t change as a result of the tournament, with Hennessy hanging onto the yellow jersey despite her disappointing showing in Portugal. Elsewhere, however, it got a real shake-up. Weston-Webb was the big mover, jumping from 14th to 4th, while Moore and Peterson solidified their spots up top (they’re second and third respectively) and Gilmore moved to within striking distance of the cut line. Just two tournaments remain until that cut comes into effect, and with Bells and Margaret River the next two events to come, the Australian leg of the tour has taken on a whole new level of importance.
The Men
The men’s version of the event kicked off a day after the women’s, and like their female counterparts, the boys were able to ease their way into Supertubos with modest conditions concealing what was to come in the ensuing days. Few surfers were able to excel in the Opening Round with the exception of Italo Ferreira and John John Florence, who scored 16.17 and 17.57 respectively in a round in which numerous heats failed to see anyone finish in double figures. A number of notable names failed to escape through to the Round of 32; the most notable of them all was Kelly Slater, who was sent to the dreaded Elimination Round alongside Conner Coffin and Kolohe Andino.
They were all placed in separate heats and were fortunately able to make their way through pretty easily; Slater and Andino winning their heats, and Coffin finishing second in a very low-scoring affair. The first two sent home were the Portuguese pair of Afonso Antunes and Vasco Ribeiro, much to the disappointment of the crowd, while South Africa’s Matthew McGillivray and Brazil’s Deivid Silva followed not far behind.
The Round of 32 began in clean but unremarkable conditions on the third day of the event, with yellow jersey wearer Barron Mamiya the first major casualty at the hands of Jordy Smith in the third heat of the round. Morgan Cibilic’s shocking start to the season continued as he was narrowly beaten by fellow Aussie Connor O’Leary in the next heat, before another Australian in Owen Wright bit the dust in a heat dominated by Filipe Toledo. Jack Robinson was the final big loss of the day, before the tournament took an overnight pause about halfway through the round; a pause which would conclude with some of the best conditions we’ve seen at Supertubos. Come Monday morning, the waves were glassy, double overhead and about as perfect as we could have hoped for, and the boys were getting barrelled like they were shelling peas. Nat Young was arguably the performer of the morning, spending more time in the green room in a half-hour period than he probably ever has, before Florence, Jackson Baker, Andino, Griffin Colapinto and Slater all won their heats with totals in excess of 14.
The fun continued in the Round of 16, in which no winner finished with a heat total of less than 13.5. Ferreira kicked things off by getting rid of fellow Brazilian Miguel Pupo 14.17-12.84, before the big South African in Jordy Smith put in his best performance in a while with a 17.34 heat total against O’Leary. Toledo continued his good form with a 15.33, Coffin won through with a 13.5, before Kanoa Igarashi kept his great start to the season going with a big win over the locals’ last remaining hope in Frederico Morais. In the sixth heat of the round, Young couldn’t continue his great form from earlier in the morning and was put to the sword by Florence, before Andino won easily against Baker, and Slater was sent packing by Colapinto.
Ferreira, Toledo and Florence had looked as good as anyone throughout the course of the event to this point, and sure enough they won their way through to the semis in the first three quarterfinals, each beating big names in Smith, Coffin and Igarashi respectively. They did so with solid scores, but it was Colapinto who put in the performance of the round in heat four; he beat Andino 17.83-10.34, and included within his mammoth score was a 10-point ride which came courtesy of a flawless air reverse late in the heat.
Despite that ride, he probably looked the least likely to take out the event heading into the semis. The other three were all surfing like men possessed, and it was invariably going to take a high-quality performance to beat any of them, let alone two in a row. His chance would come in the second heat when he was matched up against John John, but first we were treated to a Brazilian showdown between Toledo and Ferreira. And while it was Ferreira who top-scored in the heat with an 8.83, he was unable to back that up with any decent score, meaning Toledo’s 7.50 and 6.17 were enough to see him advance into the final. In the second heat, both Colapinto and Florence took their time working into the heat. Colapinto’s two best scores came on his last two waves and saw him put together a 13.76, and while Florence had ample opportunities to get the 7.6 he needed to win, he fell uncharacteristically on his last four waves and was resigned to a semi-final defeat.
Toledo was probably the deserved favourite heading into the final given how he’d surfed, but the opportunity for the ever-smiling Colapinto to finally break his CT duck made it hard not to root for him. And though conditions had, by this stage, eased significantly from the day prior, our two finalists made the best of what were realistically very average waves by putting together a high-scoring and agonisingly close finale. When the final buzzer sounded they were split by just 0.14 points; either could easily have won with the waves they surfed, but it was the Cheshire cat Colapinto who came out on top, 14.34-14.20.
The win was just reward for the 23-year-old, who, despite finishing sixth last year, still hadn’t yet claimed a CT win. This victory, momentous enough in and of itself, also saw him fly up the leaderboard after a slow start to the season, jumping 20 spots from 27th to 7th. Ferreira also jumped up significantly as did Coffin, both of them removing themselves from the immediate danger of the cut line, while at the top end of the leaderboard we have a new yellow jersey wearer. Mamiya dropped a couple of spots, with Igarashi jumping ahead of him into first and Slater slotting in just behind in equal second. With the season nearing the halfway point and the cut line getting ominously close, most of the big names are beginning to work their way to the top, but names like Robinson, Morais and even Coffin are still in danger, and will need to perform in Australia if they’re to have a chance of surfing the second half of the season.
After three events in relatively quick succession, the tour will now take a month-long hiatus before heading down under. When it returns, it will do so with one of the most anticipated events in recent times, particularly in Australia, with Bells returning to the calendar after missing out in 2020 and 2021. The event window for the historic Rip Curl Pro Bells Beach opens up on the 10th of April, and will hopefully kick off over a week of quality surf at one of the world’s most iconic breaks.
