The first PKRA tour stop of this season in Leucate / France during the Mondial du Vent was held in strong wind conditions. Many riders used their smalles kites with wind gusts up to 40 knots in cold conditions with temperatures around 10 degrees Celsius with some rain mixed in. Nevertheless, we saw some great action on the water.
In the men's single elimination, the crowd at the beach saw great action by all riders and escpecially world champion Aaron Hadlow (UK) and his strongest competitor Kevin Langeree (Netherlands). After some exciting heats, a strong Youri Zoon (Netherlands) who made his way back in the PKRA after a long injury, came into the finals agains Aaron Hadlow (UK). Zoon fought strong with a lot of power, but Hadlow won due to more technical tricks.
With good wind conditions, the judges decided to start the double elimination right after the single elimination finals. During the doubles, Langeree climbed up the ladder to ride against Youri Zoon, but he crashed too many important moves so the finals was again Zoon against Hadlow. Hadlow outperformed Zoon with many wakestyle tricks performed in great style, so he won the first event of the season.
The women's competition also saw a battle between three riders, Gisela Pulido (Spain), Bruna Kajiya (Brazil) and Angela Peral (Spain). In the single elimination, Peral beat Kajiya to fight against Pulido in the finals. There the current world champ Gisela Pulido proved that she is one of the best riders in the world, defeating Peral with more powered tricks. In the double elimination, a very motivated Bruna Kajiya (Brazil) climbed up the ladder, first defeating Peral to meet Pulido again in the finals. In the first heat, she defeated the young spanish champ with more power and greater variety in her tricks. In the second and deciding heat, she proved again that she was better than Gisela Pulido at that day, showing more technical tricks and thus won the women's competition.
After the double elimination, there was also a "Best trick" competition. The
men had to perform a double airpass and a board off trick while the
women had to perform a single airpass and a one-foot air. The winners for the airpass tricks were Youri Zoon and Bruja Kajiya, while Sebastian Garat and Gisela Pulido won the boardoff tricks.
To give you some visual impressions about this event, you can view the event video from extremeelements.tv:
Windfinder congratulates Kajiya and Hadlow for winning the first tour stop in this year! The next tour stop will be in Cabarete / Dominican Republic from June 9 to 14.
