Bosson wins the Toro Andaluz 2017

by EFPT on 22 May 2017 The ultimate day here at the Toro Andaluz in Tarifa, the most southerly city of Europe, started off easy with the skippers meeting at 12.00 o’clock. With the Levante that has been blowing relentlessly strong through the whole night and with no improvement in the morning, the start was postponed to see if the conditions would change a little.

Since there was no real decrease in the wind speed and the riders looked in control on their 3.8s and 4.0s, the second double elimination was launched at 2.00pm, promising an exciting race for the overall event win. Not only winner of the first double elimination Adrien Bosson (North/Fanatic) and winner of the second single elimination Sam Esteve (JP/Neilpryde) but also Italian pro rider Jacopo Testa (RRD/RRD) still had the chance of taking the lead.

Looking at the remaining fleet, it seemed like some of the riders had a lot of determination to improve their positions. One of them has definitely been Tonky Frans (RRD/RRD), who had a bad start into the whole competition and seemed to have problems recovering from that. What we saw today though, was Frans how we know him- effortless in his moves, stylish and technical. Frans was landing clean no handed burners in his heats against Antoine Albert (Goya/Goya) and Davy Scheffers, as well as switch flakas, skopu 360s, spock culos and burner 360s.

Scheffers was on form in the crazy flat and stormy conditions of today and proved that his winter training in Egypt paid off. The Dutchie was landing massive air skopu 360s, air funnell funnells, kabikuchis, flaka shakas and spock culos just to name a few big moves. Scheffers took out Frans and Jacopo Testa (RRD/RRD) in the run for third place.

Max Matissek (North/Fanatic) was sailing solid heats today in the pumping wind, landing nice air funnell funnells, fast one handed burners, skopus and forwards in his heats against Tony Mottus (JP/Neilpryde) and Tonky Frans. The Austrian sailor could advance over Mottus, but had to let Frans pass through to the next round.

Antoine Albert performed impressive heats against Francesco Cappuzzo (RRD/RRD) and Giovanni Passani from Italy. Both of the sailors were putting on a great fight against the New Caledonian rider, yet couldn’t match his spock konos, spock culos and kabikuchis on both tacks. Again it was Frans who ended his run through.

When Scheffers was approaching the battles for the top two positions, the wind constantly seemed to increase. Adrien Bosson was a force of his own today, sailed 100% focused and could win over Scheffers in a more than solid heat. Bosson landed a spock culo, spock kono, kono, shove-it spock and shaka on port and a skopu 360, burner 360, air funnell into double funnell, triple puneta and skopu funnell on starboard tack. By winning over Scheffers and Testa, Bosson therefore became the overall winner of the event.

The battle for the first place in the second double elimination was still up for grabs though and Bosson had to face the young and highly talented freestyler Sam Esteve. Esteve stated, that he loved the conditions and was more than keen to finally get out onto the water. The young Frenchie was putting on a great show, especially on his starboard tack, could succeed over Bosson and took victory in the second double elimination in front of Bosson and Scheffers.

Counting together the points for both of the double eliminations, the final result put Adrien Bosson in the lead, followed by Sam Esteve (2nd) and Jacopo Testa (3rd).

We are looking back at four days full of high class, flat water freestyle action like never seen in a competition before. There was only a handful of events in the past, where the conditions were almost too extreme to run the heats and the Toro Andaluz will go down in history, to be one of those memorable events. We are more than looking forwards to work with the local team, to make this event happen again in the upcoming season.

EFPT Overall Ranking

After the first two EFPT events of the season, Jacopo Testa is leading the ranking in front of Sam Esteve and Amado Vrieswijk (Severne/JP). Adrien Bosson is currently placed fourth, but is determined to fight his way up in the upcoming events. The crew and riders are now released until the fifth of July, when the EFPT Lanzarote 2017 will go down and the hunt for the EFPT title 2017 will continue!