The 16 riders who will fight for the 10th Islas Canarias Ocean & Earth Pro by Gran Canaria title announced

In the image, Australian Jayme Trigolne, one of the riders to qualify.

Six Canarian surfers went on to the third round: Jonathan González, Félix Ortega, young José Román Grau, Javi Medina, Carlos Marqués and José Casillas.

YDay one already showed great promise and expectations were confirmed: El Confital’s right, in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, displayed all its power once more, being one of Europe’s best right waves, and favouring throughout the eight legs of the second round of the Islas Canarias Ocean & Earth Pro by Gran Canaria one of the greatest sports shows that can be watched in the Canary Islands.

On the morning of this Thursday, 22 of September, the names of the 16 surfers who will fight for the title of this two star category ASP World Tour event were announced. Among them were six riders from the Canary Islands who have shown the good level of local surfing. Jonathan González, Javier Medina, José Román Grau, Félix Ortega, Carlos Marqués and Luciano José Casillas will be the Canarian representatives in the last sixteen.

Joining them will be top-level surfers such as Adrien Toyon, from Reunion Island, French brothers Nelson and Tom Cloarec, Moroccan Abdel El Harim, Ian Fontaine, also from France, or Tahitian Steven Pierson. All of them will certainly make the final phase of the championship a spectacular sight.

Battle of generations first thing in the morning

At 7:30 a.m. judges, organisers and surfers were already at El Confital to make the most of the tide’s good conditions early in the morning. In the first heat of the day, Reunion Island’s surfer Adrien Toyon witnessed a generational battle between surfers from Gran Canaria.

Veteran riders Félix Ortega and Eduardo Acosta fought for second place, after Toyon, against one of the Canarian young surfers showing great promise, junior Kai García, who finally saw how four times champion of the Canarian Tour Félix Ortega went on to the next round.

After this fine start at 8:00 a.m., the rest of heats of the second round took place throughout the morning and brought several surprises. In the fourth heat there was a double Canarian-Basque confrontation, which ended with one contestant from each community qualifying for the next round, José Luciano Casillas from Fuerteventura for the Canary Islands and Norman Landa for the Basque Country.

Javi Medina made the audience at El Confital rise to its feet

Javier Medina, from Gran Canaria, gave one of the best performances of the day in the fifth heat, triumphing against all odds with a 9.25 wave, the best of the championship until now, thanks to a spectacular tube, and brilliant rivals such as Leandro Usuna (Arg), Jaymes Trigione (Aus) and Davey Will (Gbr).

From then on, worthy of mention were the victory of two of the favourites to win the 10th Islas Canarias Ocean & Earth Pro by Gran Canaira title: Jonathan González from Tenerife, and Frenchman Romain Laulhe. The day had another surprise in store, young rider José Ramón Grau, who shows a lot of promise and finished second in the fifth heat of the day.

This Friday the competition will resume at 10:00 a.m. with the four heats of the last sixteen, where the eight surfers who will go on to quarter finals will be announced. This time the confrontations will be man to man, with one of the contestants qualifying and the other one being left out from the semifinals.