Cam Richards Wins 2025 Capítulo Perfeito, Powered By Billabong
And pockets a quick 25 gees.
Wind travels clockwise around high-pressure systems in the Northern Hemisphere.
Which means we can say two things regarding the morning’s conditions at the 2025 Capítulo Perfeito, powered by Billabong:
-The high-pressure system responsible for the local winds was sitting too far southwest.
-The wind was fucked.
The first sounds a bit more romantic, but we won’t sugarcoat the rest.
The morning rounds were tough. You didn’t have to crack the double digits to make most of the heats. There was plenty of swell, but it struggled to produce reliably good waves. Now there were good ones, and it was easy enough to see them — but much harder to find them. However, as the morning trucked on, competitors seemed to find more and more of them. And, eventually, it turned on.
Even through the morning’s rough patch, the vibe amongst competitors was soaring. It doesn’t feel that much like a comp for something that consists of jerseys, scores, and 30-minute heats. And they seem to enjoy such a straightforward brief from the judges: Get tubbed.
Noah Beschen said that if he had come upon these waves on his own, he’d be looking for air sections instead of barrels. In that context, it’s kinda funny to paddle out with eyes for cylinders only. The consensus was that it simplifies things and takes a bit of the pressure off. There’s no wondering what you’d need to do to get an 8 — either find the wave, or don’t.
By mid-day, we saw the busiest heat of the comp from Craig Anderson, Miguel Blanco, and Bruno Santos. Each of them got a proper good wave, though Craig’s attempted to murk him when he attempted to exit via the doggie door. Miguel ended up winning Best Barrel for a wave in that heat, while Pedro won the Attitude Award in memory of Ricardo dos Santos. Yolanda Hopkins also took out a low-scoring women’s heat.
Cam Richards and Balaram Stack were def the day’s most consistent surfers, which brought them to the final with Pedro Calado and Noah Beschen. Fun fact: Every finalist other than Pedro was on the same flight to Lisbon. The heat started slow, but with less than 10 minutes left, Noah, Cam, and Bal all had mid-range scores and a shot at the crown. Then, an exchange: Noah got a wave that would have been the score had Cam not hooked into the wave of the heat shortly thereafter. And that’ll do it.
Cam got the call-up two days ago, and it was his first time at the event — the wave he got at Supertubes about a month ago must’ve helped secure his spot.
Two sleeps later, he was out for a night in Lisbon with 25 gees in his pocket and a five-star hotel to sleep in for the next few nights (Note: this, incredibly, is provided to all competitors for free. They also get a minimum of 600 EUR prize money for showing up).
Not a bad turn of events for the Stab Highway star.
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