On the fourth day of competition in Barra do Cunhau perfect wind conditions welcomed the best freestylers in the world for the start of the double eliminations. Two Brazilians Madson (BRA) and Teixeira (BRA, RRD) together with Hebert (FRA, Airush) and Rondina (ITA, Cabrinha) came out of the pack and get to the 7th place position. They will be the ones to fight for the top 4 places tomorrow.
The first highlight of the day was the heat pairing Kevin Langeree (NED, Naish) and Michael Schitzhofer (AUT, Best) who wanted his revenge from the last event in Germany where he lost in the doubles. Michael, who is normally pretty relaxed and tries to secure his heat in the first place, was on fire today and went directly for power and intensity surprising even Kevin who admitted after his heat that he wasn’t ready yet to be fully back on tour after his knee surgery when he saw the level that the riders have reached now.
Michael won the heat landing an impressive blind judge 5 closing the decision by 5-0 in the judge tower. Kevin commented that it gave him a real motivation to go full on for his training this winter and is going to be on the water as much as he can to get back to the top.
Youri Zoon (NED, Slingshot) sitting in first place was watching the double elimination and commented that Ariel Corniel (DOM, Ozone), eliminated early in the singles, probably had the toughest mission to get back in the doubles. Ariel saw the same scenario that happened to Youri by beating two of the best Brazilian riders: Evandro Da silva (BRA, RRD) and Eudazio Da Silva (BRA, RRD). Those two heats were definitely some of the most spectacular of the event as the riders went for double passes and mobes combined with kite loops in order to score instead of securing their heat with basic maneuvers. Overall the judges recognized that the heats were very close with the same kind of execution but that Ariel went for more variety, as he is known for sticking an important number of tricks during all his heats. All of these riders also being very good showman, they didn’t hesitate to throw some of their best moves very close to the beach and often ended riding directly on the beach or landing their kite close to the public. Fortunately there was more fear than damages and we saw some of the biggest crashes going down today for the spectator enjoyment.
Tom Hebert (FRA, Airush) said that the conditions were much stronger today and therefore admitted that it was much harder to land all the usual tricks so he was impressed by the overall level of this double eliminations. He really liked to see the heats opposing the Brazilians riders since he didn’t know what their level was. Each trick was a discovery and a nice surprise. Tomas Teixeira (BRA, RRD) who have been doing a few PKRA tour stops in the past, comes out with a win in this first round.
Tom also added that Christopher Tack (BEL, Liquid Force) did a nice performance as he started his heat against Stefan Spiessberger (AUT, North) by mostly crashing and then progressively came back by landing some very powerful maneuvers. Stefan has been coming to a few of the last PKRA events and made a good impression. This heat resulted in a very close heat but Tack took the win as he had more speed and a better kite position.
The next highlight was a full Brazilian heat once again with Reno Romeu (BRA, North) versus Carlos Madson (BRA, RRD), the best Brazilian on tour against the current Brazilian champion title holder. Reno commented that he didn’t fear the Brazilians but the general level of the riders on the PKRA this year as we asked his impressions on the overall level of the Brazilian riders.
Each athelete chose a different strategy, Reno going for security and variety, landing most of his tricks and Madson going for speed and power, which paid off as he won the heat in a 5-0 decision. If you happened to be in the judges tower when Madson landed his kite loop slim chance you could also understand one of the last judges criteria’s: the “wow” factor!
We met with Madson after his heat and he commented that he loved these strong wind conditions and hopes to go a lot further tomorrow during the end of the doubles.
Up next was Mario Rodwald (GER, North) who was followed by the Media team to host the video of the day had to verse his team mate Tom Hebert (FRA, North). Both riding on a 7 meter kite, Mario was confident going into this heat as he won the first two rounds landing a few massive tricks such as a downloop slim chance against Rafael Da Costa Souza (BRA).
Tom decided to concentrate on a few tricks to make the difference and managed to land a perfect NIS grab and a very powered kite loop handle pass. His tricks were so powered that he managed to break his board, for the second one in this event! On the other side Mario couldn’t match the power and risk that Tom put into his moves, he crashed a couple of moves mainly due to the chop. Tom was very excited about his win and is now very motivated to meet Madson tomorrow for what promises to be a nice heat to start the day.
Two of the best Brazilians went out completely over powered on a 9 meter when the rest of the riders went out in 7’s: Tomas Teixeira and Romario De Souza. Judge Antoine Jaubert commented that :They had a hard time landing their tricks but when they did, it was very clean. Teixeira landed some tricks with power and when he landed a trick you couldn’t do it more powerful than that today”. Teixeira won the heat with a 5-0 decision.
The last heat of the day was Alberto Rondina (ITA, Cabrinha) against Ariel Corniel (DOM, Ozone). There was a clear difference with Rondina’s riding, much more powerful and clean than Ariel who was more disorganized trying a lot of tricks but crashing very often. Alberto advances into the next round against Tomas Teixeira.
In order: Garat (FRA, RRD), Jacobs (NZL, Switch), Pastor (ESP, Airush) and Zoon (NED, Slingshot) are waiting for the winners of today to get back to them tomorrow in what should be a very exciting day of action in Barra do Cunhau Brazil.
We only ran on heat of the girls, won by Argentinean rider Agustina Cerutti (ARG, F-ONE) against Polish rider Helena Brochocka.
Tomorrow for the finals, Kajiya (BRA, Flexifoil) in first , Litwin (POL, Nobile) in second and Lennartsson (SWE, Ozone) are waiting for the rest of pack to get back to them.
This is event is organized by Dream Factory with the PKRA. The Kitesurf Wind Riders is sponsored by Volkswagen, co sponsored by the Kitesurf and Surf Association of Rio Grande de Norte (AKSRN), Viva Barra Association, the Ministry of Tourism, the State of Rio Grande do Norte, the secretary of Tourism of Rio Grande do Norte and Emprotur.
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