Watch Now: We Scored Mainland Italy With Leonardo Fioravanti 

2023 has been the best year of Leonardo Fioravanti’s career, thus far. 

Leo — who turns 26 this week — finished 9th in the world. He started the WSL season with a final at Pipeline and finished with a semi at Teahupo’o. He booked his ticket to the 2024 Olympics. He also signed with a new sponsor, K-Way. The apparel brand was born in Paris in 1965 and is now headquartered in Italy. 

Which brought us here. In a roundabout way. 

If all had gone according to plan, we’d now present you with a lovely little film of Leo in Ireland backed by K-Way. But the forecast wasn’t having it. Two storms named Ciarán and Domingos made our lives difficult. We ended up chasing waves further south — and, more surprisingly, much further east. 

Ireland turned into Italy. We boarded flights to Milan, drove two hours to Varraze, tucked into a 4-day run of Mediterranean swell, and swapped Guinness for Chianti. 

The driving force behind this decision was Roby D’Amico. Roby is one of Leo’s best friends (remember No Contest, Italy?). He’s also quite good at reading the charts, and scoring and exploring in his home country. 

We lucked into some of the largest surf Italy has ever seen — at least according to everyone we talked to’s memory. Thanks, Roby. 

Photos circulated on social media, but we kept the clips on ice. Now, the edit is here (watch above). It features Leo, Roby, Edoardo Papa, and a handful of Italian core lords. Revisit the Full Frame here for the deets on what it was like on the ground. 

A day after a trip, Leo jetted off to Hawaii, where he spends winters with his long-term girlfriend and North Shore native, Sophia. He’s working closely with Adriano de Souza and is coming into 2024 with a level of focus that might be akin to a laser beam. 

Don’t sleep on him this year.