PWA Freestyle World Cup

Lennart Neubauer and Sarah-Quita Offringa win the freestyle contest, Sarah-Quita Offringa also secures the world championship title

28 July 2024 - The top 5 women and top 6 men battled it out for the freestyle title on Fuerteventura today. After it had even rained during the night, the wind took until the early afternoon to freshen up to the required strength for a freestyle contest.

Then it was once again a case of performing different tricks in a maximum of seven attempts in each direction within eight minutes, with the best three of these tricks counting towards the final score.

There was just enough wind and the riders used their large sails. Balz Müller picked up where he left off the previous day and continued his race to catch up. He defeated Youp Schmit in the first heat of the day, followed shortly afterwards by Sam Esteve. Only the reigning freestyle champion Yentel Caers was able to stop the Swiss rider's run.

Fourth place for Balz, now Yentel was able to make a run at the top places. But the Belgian battled hard against Lennart Neubauer, losing by a narrow margin of one point. So third place on the podium for Yentel Caers. Now it was up to Lennart Neubauer to do his best against Adrien Bosson, the winner of the first round.

Lennart was focussed and had studied his opponents' scores a lot on the previous days to find the right recipe for the final duel. And it worked, as Lennart won the second-round battle against the Frenchman by more than 10 points.

So once again, a play-off had to decide the outcome. Lennart got off to a good start again, but Adrien Bosson held his own in this heat and took the lead for a while. In the end, one point difference decided victory or defeat in this World Cup final.

And it was Lennart Neubauer who was able to celebrate his first victory at a PWA World Cup.

There was also reason to celebrate in the women's event, as Sarah-Quita Offringa not only defended her first-round victory in the doubles final against Oda Johanne, but also secured the world title in this discipline by winning the only women's freestyle World Cup in 2024.

And this is actually the 15th in freestyle. If you include slalom and wave, then there are even 23 world championship titles. Maaike Huvermann took third place behind Sarah-Quita and Oda Johanne.

The Dutchwoman first defended her fourth place against Elena Dominick and also won against Lisa Kloster in the next heat. She just couldn't get past Oda Johanne today. After today's finals, all the podium places were finalised.

Adrien Bosson wins the single elimination, Lennart Neubauer and Yentel Caers follow in second and third place

26 July 2024 - On Friday, the trade winds again blew cross-offshore along Sotavento Beach. With low tide in the morning, many sandbanks were exposed, so the heats had to take place a little further away from the beach.

This didn't bother the riders and the single elimination was carried through to the semi-finals. Then clouds started to affect the wind system in the south of Fuerteventura and the lunch break was called forward without further ado.

At this point, four riders were still in the race: Lennart Neubauer was to face Yentel Caers in the semi-final, Adrien Bosson Sam Esteve.

The wind returned with the sun and the rising water finally brought small waves onto the sandbanks. These were gratefully accepted and used as ramps for Shifty, Pasko and co. Lennart Neubauer defeated Yentel Caers with a score of 40.2 to 37.6 points, while Adrien Bosson won the other duel by a margin of 6.6 points.

The final was tighter, Lennart Neubauer was unable to perform all of his standard moves cleanly and missed out on points, especially on the spock culo. In the end, Adrien Bosson won by 0.7 points, also thanks to a clean bongka and double burner.

The single is followed by the double elimination - the results are therefore only an interim result, as this final is likely to be repeated in the remaining three days, unless another candidate can work their way up to the top in the second round and oust Lennart Neubauer from second place or even beat Adrien Bosson.

Sarah-Quita Offringa wins the freestyle single elimination ahead of Oda Johanne and Lisa Kloster

25 July 2024 - The first day of the Windsurf World Cup on Fuerteventura was a blast. Challenging flat water conditions is what you could call what 32 freestylers and 8 female freestylers found at Sotavento beach today.

Smooth water under land, choppy further out and no swells for miles around. Airtime had to be worked hard for, but slide moves under land went really well.

The women took to the water first and completed a full single elimination in eight heats due to the small field of participants.

Sarah-Quita Offringa came out on top after a fairly close final. Her opponent Oda Johanne surfed outstandingly today and had already beaten Maaike Huvermann in the semi-final. The Norwegian finished in second place just 0.4 points behind.

It was also close in the small final, where Lisa Kloster beat Maaike Huvermann by 0.7 points. The young German freestyler was delighted with her first podium finish in a World Cup elimination.

Elena Dominick, the second German participant, was eliminated in the first round against Oda Johanne, who later came second. The two Austrians Lina Schmied and Bijou Shahmirian were also knocked out in round one.

But these results are of course only half the battle, as there will be a second round in the remaining four days of the competition - only then will the final result be known.

After the women, the men took to the water, including freestyle legend Gollito Estredo. The 9-time PWA Freestyle World Champion surprisingly competed with borrowed equipment after a long break, as he had travelled to Fuerteventura to take part in the Wingfoil World Cup.

He showed a good heat against Steven van Broeckhoven, but his training deficit was too great. Kiri Thode also competed on Fuerteventura and was narrowly beaten by his Bonaire buddy Youp Schmit.

Of the three German participants, Niclas Nebelung made it through to round two. His brother Lucas and Sebastian Gux were defeated by Balz Müller and Adrien Bosson.

Antoine Albert took the cake in the truest sense of the word. A drone pilot from the livestream crew ventured too close to the rotating sail during a move - the drone collided, lost a few feathers and crashed into the water (but was fished out again a minute later).

16 heats of the first round were held for the men, then it was over for the first day. Stay tuned...