Moona Whyte and Mitu Monteiro dominate at the Cabo Verde World Cup

James has been a man on fire here at the GKA Cabo Verde. The Australian managed to unseat Airton Cozzolino in the quarter finals (on Airton’s home break no less) in a nail-biting quarter final heat. Airton was leading for much of it with solid aerials off the lip and super-powered hacks but James kept answering back with his muscular, surf-influenced style.

In the last minute, James caught a huge bomb and was able to rack up turn after vertical turn to take the lead with seconds left on the clock. James would go on to face Mitu in the final and, had he not been up against the most experienced Ponta Preta local in existence, he could well have topped the single elimination podium.

Mitu didn’t have the event he might have hoped for last year in Cape Verde but right now he’s looking pretty much untouchable. He opened his account on day two with the highest score of the event up to that point – 9.87 – in his opening heat but in the final he went one better notching up a perfect 10, combining faultless top-to-bottom turns with a barrel (his second of the heat) to take the win against James.

Moona missed the latter part of last year’s tour due to a back injury but she’s back with a bang here in Cabo Verde. Her ability to seek out the critical sections on the bigger faces was unsurpassable and she was the only female rider who managed to get covered-up and ride away from it.

She’s so relaxed out on the water too, never flustered by what her opponents are doing. She finished day two at the top of the women’s division and, at this 100% wave-focused event, she’s going to be very hard to beat when the double eliminations continue.

Yesterday Francesco Cappuzzo put in his best performance since joining the tour. He took one of the biggest waves of the day in his heat against Carew and was stacking up solid rides on both his front and backhand. He wasn’t going for aerials and he didn’t get barrelled, but his backside hacks were something else and his capacity for getting good and vertical off the lip in challenging offshore conditions was seriously impressive.

Matchu was ultra-consistent. He has this wave so well dialled, expertly reading the different sections and methodically seeking out barrels on his backhand. He nearly stuck the best floater of the event so far, and he’s looking very strong ahead of the double eliminations.

MEN

1: Mitu Monteiro – CV

2: James Carew – AUS

3: Matchu Lopes – CV / ESP

4: Francesco Cappuzzo – ITA

1: Moona Whyte – USA

2: Johanna Catharina Edin – SE

3: Charlotte Carpentier – FRA

4: Frances Kelly – CA
After the single elimination finals it was on to the doubles and the men made it through the first round before the conditions began to deteriorate and the heats were halted.
The riders are back into the double elimination today with everything to play for. Tune into the livestream here.

Look out for the day two highlight video coming soon on our YouTube channel.

Flick through a gallery of images from the event so far shot by Ydwer van der Heide here! 

First possible start  for Wednesday: 8:30am (GMT -1)