Day 1: Ponta Preta Produces a Few Golden Moments as the Single Elimination Begins
The decision to call an early skippers’ meeting for the opening day of the 2022 SOMWR 10x Cabo Verde PWA World Cup paid dividends with the Single Elimination starting almost immediately. With a long time between sets the sailors were given 45 minutes to produce their best two waves, so patience and wave selection were imperative in order to be successful. Wave size ranged anywhere between waist to the occasional logo high set as Ponta Preta showed glimpses of just how good it can be and with its perfect shape, there was plenty of spectacular action with rail turns and massive punts being the order of the day.
2022 SOMWR 10x Cabo Verde PWA World Cup | Video DAY 1
What happened on day 1
Eight heats got completed on day one! Advancing from the first four heats were Thomas Traversa, Camille Juban, Ricardo Campello, Josh Angulo, Graham Ezzy, Robby Swift, Marcilio Brown & Morgan Noireaux. All of them are experienced down the line wave windsurfers. They showed great skills in not perfect conditions. The third heat got cancelled because of the too inconsistent waves and re-sailed.
Later heat 5 was cancelled with 8 minutes to go only by Duncan Coombs. Marino Gil and Victor Fernandez were in qualifying position. The competition was on hold. When the competition continued with heat 6 Antoine Martin and Boujmaa Guilloul showed a great wave selection and set their turns in the steepest sections of the waves. It paid off and they went through into round 2.
The tide went down and better swell kicked in during the afternoon. Clean sets ran at Ponta Preta. The young guns Jake Schettewi and Liam Dunkerbeck showed extremely nice wave selection and landed big Aerials in the re-sail of heat 5. Both qualified for the top 16 fleet. Victor Fernandez, the 3 times PWA Wave World Champion (2010/2016/2018) and Marino Gil, the young talented rider from Pozo Izquierdo didn’t advance to the next round.
Young talented rider Baptiste Cloarec from northern France showed incredible wavering skills combined with a firework of massive Aerials. He advanced with the total wave score (two rides count) of 14.62 points into the second round. His fellow countryman Jules Denel showed great experience at Pont Preta and worked up his points through the heat – he overtook a strong performing Julian Salmonn – making it in 2nd place with smooth riding.
Heat 8 was the final heat of the day. It got darker and darker, the wind dropped, but very clean set waves arrived at Ho’okipa. That’s exactly the magic mix “Samurai” Bernd Roediger was looking for. He showed smoothest wave sailing and was one of the three riders with the high score for a single wave ride on day 1 with 8.12 points. Ricardo Campello in Heat 2 and Jules Denel in Heat 7 managed to create the same score. Thumbs up! The second rider qualifying in heat 8 was Japanese hot shot Takuma Sugi. He was so much connected with the wave and landed all his Aerials off the lip. 5 times PWA Wave World Champion Philip Köster (2011/2012/2015/2017/2019) showed solid wave sailing, but wasn’t able to collect enough points to advance into round 2.
PWA Cabo Verde – The Elimination ladder (first round completed)
