The Hawaiian leg of the 2023 Championship Tour is now complete, with both Jack Robinson and Filipe Toledo saluting at the Billabong Pro Pipeline and Hurley Pro Sunset Beach respectively as they begin their hunt for this year’s world title. Now, we head to Europe. This is the second event in the first three of the season in which barrels will be the focus, and after Pipeline failed to provide the pits we know it’s capable of, hopefully Supertubos delivers on its name. With the event window set to open up on the 8th of March, let’s take a look at the best chances for the men’s MEO Rip Curl Pro Portugal.
The Favourites
Jack Robinson has well and truly established himself as one of the best surfers in the world, if not the best, and he’ll wear the yellow jersey in Portugal after a win and a third place to start the season. As he showed at Pipeline, he’s very comfortable in the green room, and though he’s only surfed in this contest once – last year – and didn’t have a whole lot of success on that occasion, he’s primed to turn things around this time around. He excels in bigger surf and so will be hoping for a big swell to come through, but regardless of what conditions he faces he will be a major threat at this event.
Sticking with the theme of surfers who are good at Pipeline, let’s talk John John Florence. He’s pretty good at his home break – you might say he’s the best to have ever surfed there – and unsurprisingly that translates to him being fairly comfortable at Supertubos. John John finished third here last year in what was his first time competing at the event since 2017, but that time around he finished fifth and prior to that he won in 2016, and finished third in 2014. His start to the season has been subpar by his standards, failing to advance past the quarter-finals at either Hawaiian event, but he’s arguably the best surfer in the world for a reason and could easily pull out a victory here.
For the past few years, the man who has been Florence’s major competitor for the title of best surfer in the world (when everyone is fully fit, of course) has been Gabriel Medina, and he too has a penchant for pits. His five finals in the past eight Pipes speaks for itself, but while he hasn’t quite enjoyed that level of success at Supertubos, a win, a second, a third and a fifth in nine appearances there isn’t too shabby. Like Florence, he’s had an underwhelming start to the year – he was knocked out in the Round of 16 at both Hawaiian events – but when he’s on he’s as good as anybody, and a win here certainly wouldn’t come as a surprise.
The Next Tier
Medina isn’t the only Brazilian world title hope who hasn’t quite started the year as he would have hoped. Italo Ferreira’s beginning to 2023 has been even worse, with an Elimination Round exit and a Round of 16 defeat to his name so far, but his record here means he has to be considered a legitimate chance. In six appearances at the contest, he’s won it twice (in 2018 and 2019), finished second another time, while last year he finished third. In other words, only twice in the six times Ferreira has competed here has he failed to make at least the semi-finals. His form so far this year might be pretty average, but count him out at your own peril.
One man whose form is not average, or at least it wasn’t at Sunset Beach, is Griffin Colapinto. After a disappointing showing at Pipeline he made his way through to the final of the second event of the season, and given that he won at Supertubos last year he has to be considered a big chance again in 2023. In that win here last year, he was phenomenal; after an 11.67 in the opening round, he scored 14.33, 13.57, 17.83, 13.76 and then 14.34 in the final, winning each of those heats with aplomb with the exception of the tightly contested final against Filipe Toledo. With good form behind him both this year and at this break in the past, no one will want to come up against Colapinto in Portugal.
The man Colapinto beat in that final, Toledo, could probably have come in a little earlier in this list too, given he enters the event on the back of a win at Sunset Beach and has performed well here in the past. That final which he lost at Supertubos last year was the second time he’s made the MEO Rip Curl Pro final, the other coming in 2015; on that occasion he won. He hasn’t enjoyed a great deal of consistency at the event though, with two other fifths his best results in six other appearances, and the rest all ending in a 13th or worse. For Toledo, smaller conditions are best; that’s what he got last year, and as the fastest and probably best small-mid wave surfer in the world he tore them to shreds. He’s improved in heavier conditions, but nonetheless he will much prefer it if the waves don’t get too big.
The Roughie
He’s progressively becoming a little less of a roughie, but given Joao Chianca is still in just his second season on the Championship Tour and until this year, had only once made it past the Round of 32, he can slot into this category for a little while longer. Last year, Chianca showed his talent but was repeatedly knocked out in high-scoring heats. That run of bad luck seems to have ended this year, and he’s kicked the season off with consecutive semi-final appearances, finding himself in third place in the world rankings as a result. Last year, he was knocked out in the Round of 32 at Supertubos, but that result was indicative of his season; he won his Opening Round heat with an impressive score of 14.17, before managing a solid 12.50 in the Round of 32. Unfortunately, he came up against Conner Coffin, who scored 13.17. He has shown that he is capable of matching it with the best in all conditions, so while he may not have the accolades to his name of the above names, he’s more than capable of going toe to toe with them.
Our Prediction
He might not have had the ideal start to the year, but Medina is going to win a contest at some point, and his form at Supertubos in the past suggests there’s a good chance that he’ll do it at the MEO Rip Curl Pro. With guys like Robinson and Toledo in great form and Florence a constant threat, the three-time world champ will need to surf at a high level to get the result he’s after. If he’s at his best, however, there are very few in the world who can stop him.
