Ornella Pellizzari and Sarah Baum survive Round 3 of Estoril Surf & Music Billabong Girls Pro
Argentina’s Ornella Pellizzari emerged triumphant in the fourth heat of Estoril Surf & Music Billabong Girls Pro’s third round that was held at the Praia do Guincho in Estoril, Portugal, on Saturday, June 11th.
South Africa’s Sarah Baum extended her life in the competition as well by securing the second position. Peru’s Anali Gomez finished third, while America’s Erica Hosseini rounded out the fourth position. This put both the surfers out of contention for the
event title.
As the heat kicked off, the Argentinean surfer, Pellizzari, made it evident that she had no intentions of letting mother-nature bring her down and responded to the challenge impressively. After hunting for a good score for almost half the heat, she eventually
got rewarded for her persistence.
Catching a wave almost half-way through the heat, Pellizzari scored 6.25 points off it to move into the lead and later capped her heat with a 7.80-point wave to finish with a two-wave total of 14.05 points. The score ended up sealing the fate of the heat
with her as the winner. The result also cemented her place in the fourth round.
Baum struggled to adjust to the conditions during the heat and only managed to score a 3.25 off her first wave. However, she then pulled a rabbit out of a hat in the final stages, locking a wave to thrown down a set of spectacular tricks to score an impressive
8.00 points. Even though she failed to go all the way to the top, getting to second place was not any less satisfactory as she successfully qualified for the next round.
Baum’s sudden rampage pushed Gomez out of the safe zone and into third place. Scoring 4.10 points off her first wave and 4.90 off her second, it seemed the Peruvian had survived the heat, but it turned out that the bets had been placed too early and Gomez’s
fate had not been decided yet. However, the end result marked her ejection from the event.
Hosseini was also eliminated from the competition after scoring merely 7.05 points off her two waves and finishing in fourth place. It seemed that she had been outdone by the demanding surfing conditions.
Estoril Surf & Music Billabong Girls Pro is the fifth of seven stops on Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) Women’s Star Tour and second of four stops on ASP Women’s European Tour.
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