Filipe Toledo wins Moche Rip Curl Pro, Portugal!

Filipe Toledo wins the Moche Rip Curl Pro, Portugal! Over fellow countryman Italo Ferreira. In junky waves, the Brazilians found form. In the opening minutes Filipe got busy, he foam climbed into a nose pick one his second wave. He hit the next section with a tail high rotation then finished it off with another floater and closing hit for a perfect ten. Setting the bar high, early in the heat. Every time Filipe makes a final he wins and also drops a ten, that’s a pretty unbelievable track record. In the tenth minute Italo came back with a massive air reverse for an almost perfect 9.93, “that’s the highest air we’ve seen,” Pottz said. After a mostly lackluster competition, the final did not disappoint. Filipe answered back with a huge straight air and topped it off with another big reverse for a 7.83. Filipe finds himself in the top five heading into Pipe.

Filipe was looking good all day. In semis Simpo just couldn’t quite get the scores he needed. In the final seconds he had a shot, one more section on the wave and we may have seen Brett in his first final.
“I physically felt great, my surfing feels like it’s there. This event I was finding a way to win, but Filipe’s crazy good in these waves and I think he’s underrated in the barrel. I’ll be rooting for Filipe from here on out.”

Gabs and Italo squared off in the quarters. Italo stayed busy and put up the highest total heat score of the day, a 18.27. He knifed a foamy left hand barrel to a heavy finish on the end section. Then took to his back hand pumping a huge rotation and capitalizing with a carve on another grinding end section. Italo’s floaters are some of the best in the biz. Vasco Ribeiro beat Italo in the World Juniors last year, sweet revenge for the soon-to-be rookie of the year took place in the semis and Italo headed into his first CT final. Local knowledge continued to prevail today. Vasco Ribeiro carved his way into a really respectable finish. “It’s amazing, you can’t be sad with your first wildcard CT finish being in the semis.”

Finals results:
F Toledo 17.83, I Ferreira 17.13

Semifinal results:
Heat 1: F. Toledo 14.60, B. Simpson 12.94
Heat 2: I. Ferreira 13.37, V. Ribeiro 9.10

Quarterfinal results:
Heat 1: F. Toledo 10.37, J. Parkinson 8.67
Heat 2: B. Simpson 10.54, F. Morais 10.46
Heat 3: V. Ribeiro 13.34, J. Flores 8.17
Heat 4: I. Ferreira 18.27, G. Medina Interference