The 30th Championship Tour win for Carissa Moore, and the first for Leo Fioravanti. Photo: Oscar Jimenez//WSL
The El Salvador Pro storylines nearly finished according to script: new mother Carissa Moore wins back-to-back events in her return to the tour, and Italo Ferreira, Olympic gold medalist, facing the adversity of stitches in his knee, perseveres to win. While Moore did her end of the work to win her second event in a row, Leo Fioravanti took down Ferreira and wrote his own ending.
Fioravanti’s first Championship Tour victory was no fluke; he had been one of the sharpest surfers all week at Punta Roca. He kicked off the final with an 8.33 that immediately put Ferreira on the ropes, and, throughout the event, owned three of the top-five wave scores, including the only nine-point ride. Despite receiving eight stitches in his knee after getting run over by a longboard two days before the event, Ferreira didn’t appear to skip a beat, taking down Gabriel Medina in the semifinals. But the storybook run came up short in the final when he couldn’t find a solid back-up score to pair with a 7.5.
It was Fioravanti’s first-ever CT win — and the first for an Italian — after losing in his two other final appearances, both at Pipeline. During his post-final interview, Fioravanti was fighting through tears.
“It doesn’t feel real. It’s (been) so many years of believing, never giving up,” Fioravanti said. “That final last year (at Pipeline) really broke my heart, but at the same time, I never gave up. I think it hurt the people around me more than it did me, because I just tried to keep going ahead and keep thinking positive.”
“When you say your moment will come, I just kept believing that, and I did feel like my surfing was here,” he added. “But one thing is to surf good, one thing is to be the best in the world.”
The win catapulted Fioravanti up six spots in the ranking to number three overall, breaking the Brazilian goofy-foot blockade of Ferreira, Medina, Yago Dora, and Miguel Pupo, who topped the rankings coming into El Salvador.
Fioravanti’s best overall tour finishes were ninths in 2023 and 2025. Now he finds himself in the midst of a title race, still with a long season ahead. He earned one more believer in the WSL’s announcer booth, as Chris Cote declared he’s added the 28-year-old Italian to his list of title contenders. It might not be as crazy as it sounds, given that Pipeline is weighted 1.5 times as much as the other events and Fioravanti has had success on the North Shore.
Leo Fioravanti is flying the Italian flag, ranked third on the tour. Photo: Aaron Hughes//WSL
The end-of-the-year bonus points at Pipeline also bode well for Moore in her quest for a sixth title. She won Pipeline in 2023 and was runner-up in 2022.
By defeating Tyler Wright in the final, Moore jumped four spots into the runner-up position behind rankings leader Gabriela Bryan. Moore, who got off to a slow start to the season (by her standards) after taking a two-year sabbatical to give birth and raise her daughter, has made a loud statement that the old guard of women’s surfing isn’t ready to pack it in just yet.
Coming off a win at the New Zealand Pro, El Salvador was Moore’s 30th victory on the CT — the sixth time she’s won back-to-back. Moore and fellow tour veterans Tyler Wright, Lakey Peterson, and Stephanie Gilmore have gleefully crushed the momentum of the young female generation on the CT. Aside from Bryan’s win to open the season at Bells Beach, the events have all been won by the 30-plus club. Caroline Marks, Caity Simmers, and Erin Brooks have all slid down the rankings to make room for their resurgence.
“It’s really cool to see the veterans make another push this year and take some finals and some wins,” Moore said. “I’m just inspired by both my generation and the new generation. I think it’s a really good combo for women’s surfing right now.”
Championship Tour surfers won’t even get a week off before they’re back at it for the Rio Pro in Brazil, June 19 to 27. Fioravanti will look to build off his historic performance and maintain his top-five position, while Moore has the chance to do the unthinkable and win her third consecutive CT event.
