John John Florence. Photo: Daniel Smorigo//World Surf League
By the end of this month, the roster for the fourth edition of the WSL Finals will be set. And while plenty of fans go out of their way to share a disdain for the winner-take-all event, and mid-season cut introduced four years ago, even the haters can’t claim injecting a race for the top five made things boring. By all accounts, more people are tuning in than ever. It’s not crazy to guess that might have something to do with the fact that five surfers will be guaranteed a shot at the world title and at least three more have a shot at leapfrogging into the single-day tournament by the time we finish in Fiji (August 20-29).
Love it or hate it, high stakes equal drama, and drama equals intrigue.
I still haven’t decided whether I love or hate the format. I will say that this month’s Fiji Pro has my attention specifically because qualification for Finals Day is on the line for several surfers. So, who’s in, who’s currently in the Top 5 (for now), and who’s banging on the door with a sliver of hope for a world title?
Who’s in?
John John Florence
How long have we all been saying “Yeah, but if John John could stay healthy for a full year”…?
If I had to throw out a random guess, I’d say the surf world has been using this analysis of Double John since 2018, the year his knees decided to step in between Florence and a run of dominance. After winning back-to-back world titles, JJF started 2018 with a chance to accomplish something that hadn’t been done since Andy Irons: a three peat (2002-2004). Instead, he missed six of that year’s 11 events. He came back in 2019 at the top of the game, winning at Bells and Margaret River then sitting out the next six events once more. Florence missed more events than he surfed once again in 2021 and four more in 2022. Who knows how many world titles John John Florence would have right now had his knees not forced him to miss a total of 20 contests over four years?
Well, Florence has stayed healthy this season and worn the yellow jersey for most of 2024. He’s back. And he’s the only surfer on the men’s tour who’s mathematically locked in for the WSL Finals.
Who’s In the Top 5 Currently?
Griffin Colapinto
Remember how wild San Clemente got when Griffin Colapinto made his first WSL Finals appearance last year? I’d expect more of that in September, especially if he can hold off Jack Robinson in the rankings. He only needs to make one heat to get into the world title event. That would be a scene at Lowers.
Random fact: Jack and Griff have just one head-to-head elimination heat as full-time members of the Championship Tour. Colapinto won that semifinal heat at Sunset Beach in 2023.
Another random fact: the second-ranked surfer is 0-3 at the WSL Finals so far. We may be only four years in but so far, two isn’t a lucky number when hunting for world titles.
Jack Robinson
Outside of a poor start at Pipe this year, Jack Robinson has been one of the most consistent surfers on tour. His ranking has never dropped out of the top five after his equal 17th to start the 2024 campaign. He’ll be one of the obvious favorites for a win in Fiji but the highest he can climb is a second-place ranking for the WSL Finals. His record in two appearances at that event, however, isn’t so inspiring. Robinson’s been one and done at the WSL Finals in consecutive years now, falling to João Chianca in 2023 and Italo Ferreira in 2022, when he was the world number two and a fan favorite to upset Filipe Toledo during Toledo’s first world-title run.
Italo Ferreira
Speak of the devil. If there’s one athlete who could be responsible for the existence of the WSL Finals, it’s Italo Ferreira. His 2019 world title came on a finals day at Pipe in which five surfers started the morning with a mathematical chance to win it all. By the day’s epic end, Italo was the last man standing. He beat Gabriel Medina in a winner-take-all final at Pipe, gave fans one incredibly memorable (and tearful) celebration on the beach, and the league’s powers that be said, “Ok, how do we make that happen every year?”
Voila, here we are with the WSL Finals.
It’s worth noting Ferreira has the most experience at the WSL Finals. After losing his one and only heat in 2021, Ferreira went on a rampage in 2022 and mowed down Kanoa Igarashi (5), Ethan Ewing (3), and Jack Robinson (2). He then lost consecutive heats to Filipe Toledo in the best of three world title matchup.
Ethan Ewing
Like his countryman Jack Robinson, Ethan Ewing has been in the hunt all year. Ewing spent a matter of weeks outside of the top five after Sunset but hasn’t dropped lower than five since climbing back up in Portugal. Still, he’s only a few hundred points ahead of Yago Dora heading into Cloudbreak. He’s also fewer than 1,000 points ahead of Jordy Smith, so Ethan Ewing has virtually no wiggle room in the final regular season event.
Who’s Banging on the Door?
Yago Dora
As mentioned, Yago Dora is breathing down Ethan Ewing’s neck. That wasn’t the case too long ago when Dora barely squeaked in above the mid-season cut line. He was the 22nd ranked surfer on tour coming out of Margaret River but has skyrocketed through the rankings since. Dora made it into the quarterfinal in Tahiti, then lost to John John Florence and Italo Ferreira in back-to-back finals in El Salvador and then Rio. Italo Ferreira might be the only surfer on more of a heater in that stretch (wins in Tahiti and Rio).
Either way, Yago has been banging on this WSL Finals door for a while now with a top-10 ranking in 2021, and finishing within about two heats of making it last year. He’s at least in a position to finally break through this year.
Jordy Smith
There was a stretch of time when Jordy Smith was a perennial world title threat. Smith was a fixture inside the top 10 of the yearly rankings during his first decade on tour but that wasn’t the case in the past two years. Now that he’s back in the mix he feels like another athlete waiting to bust out something big and deliver some upsets.
The South African hasn’t won a world tour event since 2017 (Bells) but he doesn’t need to win in order to get into the lineup at Lowers. Only 940 points separate Smith from Ewing at that number five spot, and Yago Dora sits somewhere between them by just a few hundred points. These three could potentially make up the most exciting rankings race to keep an eye on in Fiji.
Gabriel Medina
If there’s one guy who could upend everything, it’s gotta be Gabriel Medina, right?
Mathematically, Medina’s chances of breaking into the top five aren’t great but he’s won the event twice in his career, he’s coming off of two solid results at another heavy left-hander (third at Teahupo’o in this year’s Tahiti Pro and the Olympics), and he holds the most world titles out of anybody on this list.
Like I said, if anybody is going to do something crazy and upend the rankings in this last event, Gabriel Medina is a decent bet.
Stay tuned for our women’s breakdown, coming Monday. The Fiji Pro runs August 20-29.
