Round five is alive as the KSWT Sotavento sessions begin
by Jim Gaunt 21 Jul 2018 04:46 BST
20 July- 4 August 2018
Matchu Lopes floats by Tom Brendt's lens during the warm-up © Tom Brendt / Tillmanns
The pumping thermals that this southern corner of Fuerteventura island in the Canaries is famous for were in effect from early this morning. By the afternoon, the 24 registered riders (including two women) for this fifth event in what is now a seven event 2018 World Tour season, hit the water for a demonstration to show the Hotel Melia Gorriones / Rene Egli Kitesurfing Centre crowds, a little of what's to come over the next five days.
This is the third year that the GKA Kite-Surf World Tour has visited Sotavento and is part of the Fuerteventura Windsurfing and Kitesurfing World Cup – a two week extravaganza run by Rene Egli and the Melia Gorriones Hotel.
Airton Cozzolino is undefeated here and shooting for his hat trick in Sotavento, which would give him four wins from five events this season, and a dominant lead heading into the last two events, which have recently been announced as Prea in Brazil in November, and Torquay in Australia in December. Both of those will be mixed events though, and as we've seen in the past Airton is 'beatable' in waves, so he'll be determined to claim maximum points here.
Check out the 24 registered riders here.
Find the full 2018 GKA KSWT World Tour rankings here.
All the riders put on a superb afternoon warm-up show as they really enjoy riding here because the Sotavento crowds love to get involved and cheer their heroes on to go higher and higher.
We expect many more people to the beach tomorrow and the performances to shift up a gear as the main event begins.