Brazilian Gabriel Medina put himself in contention for his third world championship title yesterday after winning the eighth stage of the CT, the Freshwater Pro held at the Kelly Slater wave pool in Lemoore, California.

Medina maintained the same form with which he started the championship, combining good maneuvers and taking risks at the beginning or middle of the course.

In his best left in the final round he did 9,93 and in his best right 8,93, it was not necessary for him to use his two extra waves because neither Filipe Toledo (second), nor Owen Wright nor Griffin Colapinto (third) reached the 18,86 that he had achieved.

“It feels great and it’s been a long three days for me but it’s great to win against all these guys, they are the best in the world (…) Now I hope to maintain my results until the end. I’m very happy with my performance and these points are very important,” Medina told the WSL after leaving the final.

Toledo made a historic effort to turn his result around, showing a glimpse of what could happen in the future of surfing with wave pools: On his left, knowing that the big scores come with risking throughout the wave, he combined some maneuvers, did an aerial 360 and then a shove it that left him looking goofy for the last section of the tube, he went frontside and rode quite a bit but didn't make it out. If he made it out, the score would surely have put him in first place.

Surfing that wave probably left more people thinking about that than about Medina's victory.

The result allowed him to overtake Toledo by 295 points, Medina has 44695 and his compatriot 44400. They are followed by Jordy Smith, Kolohe Andino and Italo Ferreira in that order but with a greater distance.

Among the ladies, Lakey Peterson turned the final series around against Johanne Defay who was the favorite in the event and with this she added her second victory of the season.

Carissa Moore came in third and Caroline Marks in fourth.

Now Moore is in first place but with a gap of less than 4000 points, Peterson follows, 47260 to 43850. Then, not so far away is Sally Fitzgibbons and with a little more distance, Steph Gilmore and Caroline Marks.

Johanne Defay's good performance resulted in bad news for Costa Rican Brisa Hennessy, who, ranked 15th in the tournament, fell to 10th in the ranking, the last one to reclassify for the 2020 tour.

The world tour now continues in Hossegor, France, where Quik Pro will take place from October 3-13.

This is the top 10 of each ranking: