2015 EFPT Lanzarote – Day 3

by EFPT on 11 Jul 2015 At day number three of the EFPT Lanzarote 2015, the spot at Costa Teguise could prove its full potential and delivered amazing conditions for the whole competition. With an early start at 9.30am the first double elimination could be finished as well as the second single elimination, but first things first…

Already at the start of the double in the morning the riders could take their 4.4s for a spin. The first few rounds didn’t hold many surprises yet provided some very close heats and good battles, just as the one between Mattia Fabrizi (North/Fanatic) from Italy against UK sailor Adam Sims (Sailloft/Patrik) who could win in the end due to his cleaner execution of the moves that both riders had on their sheets. Sims then had to give way to Davy Scheffers in the next round who one more time impressed with a high diversity and style and some big maneuvers like a pushloop, forwards both ways and big shakas on the way in and out.

Yentel Caers (JP/Neilpryde) from Belgium was sending big moves the whole day and went for backloops, pushloops, shakas, paskos as well as funnells, burner and culo combinations. He took out Davy Scheffers as well as Brasilian rider Hugo de Sousa (RRD/RRD) who threw some big moves on his side, yet didn’t look too happy with the conditions. Caers was climbing up the ladder in the double elimination and managed to maintain his fifth place as he couldn’t go past Amado Vrieswijk (JP/Severne).

Vrieswijk was the one to throw the first double loop in this freestyle competition in the heat against Caers, which let the remaining riders and crowd on the beach go mental. He set a trend with this and in the ongoing competition we also saw double loops by Tonky Frans and Antony Ruenes.

The final heats between Ruenes/Vrieswijk and Frans/Ruenes were something else. Ruenes was throwing huge tweaked pushloops and landed the first ever shifty in an EFPT competition. This motivated the riders just like the double loop by Amado to go bigger, higher and more radical. From then on things got a bit crazy on the water.

The battle between the Frenchie and the rider from Bonaire was well worth to be called a final. Since Antony managed to win over Tonky the riders were sent out again for the super final that should decide it all. Ruenes was riding like he was from another planet with one handed burner 360s, super tweaked pushloops, air-funnell-funnells, super high clean shakas, an air-funnell-burner, an air-chachoo and a superclean no-handed burner with his signature style. Even though Frans could land some big moves going out, Ruenes could also win the super-final and therefor the first double elimination.

After a short lunch break we started the second single elimination straight away with some riders craving to improve their positions. Beginning from the second round it became already obvious how high the level at this event was. Most of the riders were throwing big jumps like pushloops, backies, stalled forwards, air chachoos, bonkas and paskos whilst Amado Vrieswijk, Tonky Frans and Antony Ruenes were even going for shifties and double forwards. With the strong wind and the wavy conditions the sailors knew that a combination of freestyle power moves and wave maneuvers would give them the best chances to win their heats.

Just before the competition started Frenchie Adrien Bosson stated that he was hoping for strong wind and waves – his favorite conditions. He then sailed very strong heats with a powerful and clean style and could even take out Vrieswijk in the quater-final. In the semi-finals a very close decision favored his opponent Tonky Frans. Bosson then started fully motivated into the loser’s final against Canadian Phil Soltysiak (Starboard) who has been pretty much walking through the eliminations with very impressive and consistent sailing. Even though Phil pulled a nice bonka and move combinations like a spock-culo it wasn’t enough to stop Bosson and he therefore could secure his place on the podium.

The final was one more time a fight between team-mates and good friends Antony Ruenes and Tonky Frans. In the final Tonky showed some amazing moves including a bonka, a very clean pushloop, a backloop, a shifty, a full planing toad coming in as well as a big stalled forward and power move combinations on both tacks. Also Ruenes sailing was unreal and he was filling his sheet with a super nice pasko off one wave and a backloop straight afterwards taking the next wave. His repertoire of moves also included a massive shaka on the way out and a kabikuchi coming in just mark down a few maneuvers in this outstanding performance. In the end Frans won the second single elimination by a 3:2 decision.

The start of the second double elimination is scheduled for 10.30 tomorrow. With a very strong forecast and a motivated fleet of riders we can expect a great show and maybe some more changes in the top five positions.