Sofia Mulanovich defeats Cannelle Bulard in first quarter-final of Estoril Surf & Music Billabong Girls Pro
The first quarter of Estoril Surf & Music Billabong Girls Pro went down at Praia do Guincho beach in Estoril, Portugal, on Saturday afternoon, June 11th.
After what turned out to be a low scoring, but nail-biting contest, Peruvian Sofia Mulanovich walked away with the top honours by defeating Reunion’s Cannelle Bulard.
Both ladies had remained pretty impressive in previous rounds of the competition. Mulanovich, however, had an edge over her rival due to her better form which had allowed her to consistently collect victories in the event so far. She is also a competitor
in the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) Women’s World Tour where she has been competing against the best surfers from all around the world. She even made it to the final in one of the World Tour event last month, though she was unable to go the distance,
losing to Hawaii’s Carissa Moore
Facing Bulard in the quarter-final on Saturday, Mulanovich was expected to more-or-less dominate the heat. However, the demanding surfing conditions turned out to make a huge impact on the heat, making it difficult for the ladies to catch waves and earn
good scores.
As the heat kicked off, Mulanovich locked a wave to earn 4.75 points off it to enjoy an early lead. Almost half-way through the heat, Bulard responded with a 4.40-point wave to close in on her rival.
In the final minutes, the Peruvian surfer added another 4.70 points to her account to move to a two-wave total of 9.45 points. This presented her Reunion rival with a huge opportunity of clinching the win if she could only manage a 5.06 wave. Time was running
out and so was Bulard’s chance of making it into the semi-finals and proving the speculations wrong. However, she only managed to get a score of 4.70 off her second wave, finishing 0.36 points short of beating Mulanovich’s score and consequently surrendering
victory.
The successful result for Mulanovich confirmed her place in the semi-finals. Bulard’s fight was unarguably a commendable one and at one point it seemed that she might even make it through and prove the speculations wrong.
Regardless of the end result, the showdown between the two ladies surely turned out to be a thrilling one.
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