Three-time world champion Gabriel Medina called for “clarity” and “justice” when judging surfing in the CT stages, in a letter published on his Instagram.

He addressed the letter to the institution and said: “Please understand the importance of this discussion. Surfing is my life and my love for the sport is unconditional. I surf with passion and I intend to leave a good legacy when I look back one day.”

“The surfing community, especially the Brazilian one, has been horrified by the lack of clarity and inconsistency in the definition of the scores for some years now, but lately it has been even more shocking,” Gabriel begins.

He added: “It is clear that the judging is now rewarding very simple surfing, incomplete transitions and progression and variety are being left out of the equation. This is very frustrating and threatens the growth of the sport.”

Fans and sponsors will not accept this continuing and will eventually leave in the near future, because they expect equal and fair judging for the sport.

It is also important to note that many coaches had the opportunity to speak to the WSL after heats/stages to discuss progression and variety in criteria and the lack of valorisation of manoeuvres. The feedback received is always quite defensive, with bad examples to illustrate their arguments.

The WSL urgently needs to clarify its criteria for applying fair judging in order to preserve the evolution of the sport,” the Brazilian concludes.

The comments of support for Medina were overwhelming, from Italo Ferreira himself to Chumbo and Chumbinho Chianca, passing by Jeremy Flores, Julian Wilson and Albee Layer.

CBS President Teco Padaratz proposed doing the same as in Brazil, where surfers sit down with judges to evaluate the different levels of difficulty of the maneuvers.

The wave pool event caused some controversy, especially in the grand final between Ferreira and Colapinto and also in the quarterfinals where Medina lost in a tie against Ethan Ewing.

In recent years there has been a change in judging where transitional surfing and a variety of powerful maneuvers in the crit are given more consideration than waves with a single progressive maneuver.