A win that fired up Ibelli’s competitive juices. Photo: 2026 Surfing Champions Trophy
Caio Ibelli can count on one hand how many times he’d surfed in the past three months before getting a last-minute invitation to the Maldives. The invitation: a chance to compete in the Four Seasons Maldives Surfing Champions Trophy. His competition: names that include other former Championship Tour pros Bede Durbidge, Travis Logie, and one of the world’s most popular freesurfers, Mason Ho, to name a few. Oh, and those four sessions he had in the past 90 days? They were with a mid-length twin fin, not exactly the kind of high-performance equipment you’d expect to see an eight-year CT vet on still in his early 30s.
But you don’t turn down an invitation to the Maldives. And coincidentally, Ibelli says he’d dreamt of a spot in “the world’s most luxurious surf contest” the entire time he was on tour. When the invitation didn’t come in recent years, he just assumed he’d never get one.
Knowing now that Ibelli went on to win the contest this year — his first heats since stepping away from the Challenger Series and, ultimately, the pursuit of a return to the Championship Tour — makes the whole thing incredibly ironic.
“I actually paid two extra nights at the Four Seasons (before the event) just so I could surf,” Ibelli says. He paddled right out with Mark Winson, who owns Tropic Surf. “He was ripping. And I could read his mind, watching me like, ‘Man, why did I invite this guy?'” he jokes.
Caio Ibelli in the single fin division of the Four Season Maldives 2026 Surfing Champions Trophy.
The surf-less lifestyle is the product of several circumstances that seem unlikely for any ex-tour pro to accept, let alone take in stride and embrace the way Ibelli has. He’s living about 2,000 kilometers from the ocean in a mining town deep in the Australian Outback. Mount Isa, in northwest Queensland, has about 19,000 people, a golf course he visits every day with his one-year-old son in tow, and a wait for Amazon deliveries that would be tough for almost anybody to comprehend in the 21st century. Life is different in Australia’s rodeo capital. At least in every way he explains it.
“It’s really remote. There’s the mines, and then the city around the mines, and then red dirt everywhere else. Just desert,” he says, before adding the twist you’d least expect. “It was just the perfect timing for this to happen.”
Ibelli’s wife, Talie, a Resident Medical Officer (doctor), had begun a long job search around the time he stepped away from competing. He says at first they tried to find jobs that would keep them close to the ocean, and eventually the search went on long enough that they decided they couldn’t “pick” anymore. When she finally got an offer, it was one that would bring them to the small mining town.
He’s telling me about all of this fresh off the flight home from the Maldives, and while the conversation covers a range of topics — post-tour life, small talk about California, realities of the CT, a renewed excitement to compete again — this is the part of the story where Ibelli genuinely lights up. I don’t think it’s intentional. But it’s noticeable.
It’s a brief story of a 21-hour solo drive bringing all their belongings out to Mount Isa.
“I told my wife to fly with my son, so they didn’t need to do the drive. I did it in three days, and by the time I got here, I’m like trying to clean up the apartment really quick so it looks half decent for when she got here,” he says. “It’s those things that feel like in my career would have been a step back. But it’s actually really cool. I’m reliving the early days of my career through her eyes, because now it’s the beginning of her career. We grow together now as a family, you know? And it’s gonna feel even more sweet when we move back to the beach and have my son playing on the sand.”
Between uprooting to the Australian Outback and raising their 14-month-old son, Ibelli says he’s embracing dad duty these days. He plays golf twice a day and brings his son with him to the local course — the only patch of grass he can find in Mount Isa.
Mount Isa, where Caio currently calls home. Photo: Visit Queensland
”I wouldn’t spend half of the time with my son,” he admits, comparing this current reality to his old life on tour. Instead, the two are together 24 hours a day. It’s easy to understand how he’d say in so many ways throughout our conversation that he’s grateful for the way things turned out. Newly married. First-time dad. And soaking up the days until the family does make a move back to the ocean somewhere.
“Towards the end, I feel like the tour was making me a grumpy, sad, disappointed person, because it disturbed everything that I thought the tour was going to be,” he admits. “People don’t really hang together. People don’t really want to see you doing good.”
But his win in the Maldives ignited his competitive drive. Or at least it reminded him it never left. Caio lights up all over again, but not about going back to the QS grind or pursuing a spot back on the CT.
“I spoke to Bede (Durbidge) as we’re getting out of the water from the finals. I’m like, ‘Hey man, I really enjoyed this. I wasn’t expecting I would be so competitive, like trying to get two waves in the heat really quick,'” he says, sharing details of how he’d approached his heats in his heyday. “It kind of gives me the anxious feeling that I don’t know when it’s gonna be the next time. If there ever will be a next time?”
Caio brings up the Rip Curl Cup Padang Padang. He mentions the Surfing Super League, a new Australian professional surf league set to launch in 2028. He’s antsy to get back in a jersey.
“I want to get invited to everything because I love this feeling. I know that if I surf for a couple of days, I can get it back,” which, he just did, using quick warm-up surfs to propel him through the contest. “If I’m on the beach, if I’m in the desert, it’s (happiness), something that comes from me. So I can easily find happiness wherever I am, and I can find that through golf because that’s the only thing I have here that I can exercise,” he says.
Either way, there’s more dad duty to attend to. At least for the time being. And Caio Ibelli’s loving every minute of it right now.
