Day three of the GWA Wingfoil World Cup Leucate began with a bright and early start for the riders, who awoke to nuking 40+ knot winds rattling through the Viglamo village. The judges decided to proceed straight ahead with the Surf-Freestyle discipline as conditions were optimal to witness riders perform some exciting wingfoil maneuvers.
In the initial rounds, the riders had seven trick attempts, with three attempts counting towards their final scores. The riders had between 10-20 minutes for each heat, depending on how many riders were in the heat. To illustrate just how windy the conditions were, the female riders were on wings as small as 1.8 meters.
Noe Cuyala (FRA) and Tomas Acherer (AUT) were the stand out riders of the day. Hot on Cuyala’s heels was the reigning world champion Chris MacDonald (USA). MacDonald managed to bag himself the highest trick score of the day with a whopping 9.33 on a perfectly executed Frontside 1080. He also showcased some new innovative combos which did not fail to impress the judges.
On the first day of competition, Suardiaz once again demonstrated her superiority, securing the highest scores of the day and being the first woman to land a backflip to 360 combo in her quarterfinals heat.
Mar De Arce Sanchez from Spain also put on an excellent performance in her heat, almost matching Suardiaz trick for trick. Sanchez pulled off a perfectly executed frontside 360 with great height and speed in and out of the trick. Sanchez also managed to secure her spot in the semis alongside her Spanish teammate.
We are expecting even stronger winds today to finish the semi-finals and the finals of the Surf-Freestyle discipline and to commence the FreeFly-Slalom competition.
Stay updated on the GWA Wingfoil World Cup in Leucate, by following the live ticker and live scoring on the GWA website. For all the competition updates and behind-the-scenes moments, check out our Instagram.
