July 11, 2015
The final competition day at the EFPT event in Lanzarote started with very moody skies but sailable conditions from the morning onwards.
The horn of the first heat of the double elimination went off just before 11.00am and we were able to run the whole competition through with the sailors on their 4.8’s in the beginning but soon chaning down to 4.4’s.
One of the riders of the day has definitely been 17-years old Sam Esteve (JP/Neilpryde) from France who impressed with a very high level landing big shakas, burner 360s, air skopus, paskos, culos, no-handed burners and clean air-funnell-funnells. In the challenging conditions with high waves and strong winds he managed to take out Sebastijan Jancovich (Patrik) from Slovenia, Rafa de Windt (F2) from Curacao and was eventually stopped by Jeremy Plüss from Switzerland who was throwing big forwards and shakas as well as stylish konos and funnell combinations in his heats. Esteve worked his way up to a 15th place.
The event-site at Costa Teguise
Mattia Fabrizi (North/Fanatic) from Italy who is always a top ten contender but couldn’t quite get the result in that he was wishing for in the first round, marched his way up in the double taking out routined sailor from Germany Adrian Beholz (Fanatic/Sailloft) and Loick Spicher (North/JP) in the following heat. The Italian could not get past Yentel Caers from Belgium though who has been sailing an incredible competition with double culos, double burners, futures, paskos, as well as pushloops, backies and stalled forwards.
Showing a very solid perfomance was also UK freestyler Adam Sims (Sailloft/Patrik) who injured his foot in the single elimination yesterday and mentioned that he was especially struggling with switch moves as well as shakas. Nevertheless, the Brit sailed a strong heat against Marco Vinante (JP) from Italy landing a tweaked shove-it, a planing forward coming in as well as a backloop, a pushloop and a supernice burner 360 to name some of the highlights. The Sailloft/Patrik team-rider could also take down Marco Lufen (Neilpryde/JP) from Germany and Brasilian Hugo de Sousa (RRD/RRD) who was ranked 2nd by the start of this event. The Brasilian struggled with the conditions and Sims could pull most of his moves and the decision of the judges favored him in the end. He was eventually stopped by Yentel Caers which left him in 7th place in the second double elimination.
Adam Sims in his heat against Yentel Caers
Amado Vrieswijk (JP/Severne) from Bonaire who is one of the strongest competitors on this tour sailed six heats in a row today taking down Antoine Albert, Davy Scheffers, Yentel Caers, Phil Soltysiak (Starboard) and Adrien Bosson (North/Fanatic), yet he had no chance to pass Antony Ruenes whose sailing level has been off the scale at this event. Even though Amado landed double culos on the way in and very clean culos also on the way out, pushloops, paskos, air-funnell combos and kabis he couldn’t defeat the Frenchie. Yet (and we have to give him that) he proved to be really painfree by going for a shifty in his heat against Ruenes and even went for a double shifty attempt which was absolutely massive.
Pushloop by Amado Vrieswijk
Move of the day though was definitely the shifty of Antony Ruenes in the first final against Tonky Frans. The French sailor launched it off a wave and landed it the cleanest we have seen in this event, which even saw off the judges jump off their seats. The level in the final was unreal with both riders going for huge pushloops, clean backloops, burner and funnell combinations and konos. Tonky even launched a double forward but unfortunately couldn’t stick it in the end.
Since Ruenes took the win in the first final the riders were sent out to the water again for the superfinal and the heat that should decide it all. Once again Ruenes proved that it is well deserved for him to be up there on top with all the other pro riders. On one port-tack run he landed a backie, a huge shifty and clean pasko. Also Tonky Frans was putting together a great heat with spock-culo and funnell-combos as well as big jumps, yet he couldn’t out do Antony’s performance. The superfinal was decided 5:0 favoring the French sailor.
After also winning the first double elimination Antony Ruenes is the winner of the EFPT Lanzarote 2015, with Tonky Frans in second and Amado Vrieswijk in third place. Antony stated how stoked he was to win this event especially because he was also competing against other strong sailors who were pushing the level to the maximum. This motivated him to also try more radical stuff in the big waves and strong wind that he clearly enjoyed.
The prize-giving will take place tonight at 8.00pm and tomorrow we will see a big-move supersession on Sunday-funday.
Top 3 of the event
