Wiggolly’s Rail Wins The Volcom Pipe Pro

Wiggolly from Ubatuba. He just won the 2020 Volcom Pipe Pro. 

On a turbulent Saturday at the Banzai, he endured.

After a week-long flurry of Grade A Pipeline, the man who’s hands feel like sandpaper when you shake them, who’s neck veins pop when he smiles, who Eddie Rothman invites over for Thanksgiving, endeared himself to the judges and earned himself a victory a longtime in the making.

Getting the work done early in the final, Wiggolly put up eight points on his rail to jump out front. Seth Moniz, Yago Dora, Joao Chianca, savvy and hungry, none could muster more than a four-point ride throughout.   

The scramble was on in the dying minutes as a mid-range score could have won the thing, but Wiggolly’s meager two-point backup was enough to seal the deal. A ten-point total was enough to take it all.

“Wiggolly from Ubatuba”…I wrote those lines about him for Surfer Magazine’s Hot 100 sometime around 2006. It seemed so lyrical. Made me want to dance.

The kid’s power and good nature set him apart even when he was scratching to rise up. 

Charging through puberty, around 2007/08, he got swept up in a Red Bull Surfing program that looked to foster aspiring “international” surfers—Michel Bourez among them. It worked.

Wiggolly jumped on the QS in 2008, winning two comps that year. By 2015 he was on the CT. 

But as the high-flying Brazilian Storm gained altitude, his power game was left behind. In 2017 he was off the CT. 

The last time Wiggolly won a QS was in 2014…the Quiksilver Saquarema Prime. 

But Wiggolly, and brother Wesley, are fixtures on the North Shore during the winter. They’re the kind of guys who’s gritty humility and love of any and all conditions endears them to the saltier side of the island. 

And because of that, with three Brazilians and one Hawaiian in the final, the party would have been undoubtedly raging if Seth had won. But even the locals are having a good time tonight with Wiggolly’s win. Because he earned it. And all the boys know how hard he’s worked for this moment. 

Besides, who collects two of the day’s three highest scores, at Pipe, doing turns?