Costa Rica's Federico Pilurzu Passes to Semi-Finals
Costa Rica’s Federico Pilurzu surfed his way to the Main Event—the sem-ifinals — of both the Open and the Longboard categories yesterday at the third day of the Reef Panamericano de Surf Peru 2006 Copa Motorola in Lima. In well-shaped 3 to 4-foot waves at Punta Rocas beach, Pilurzu beat Peruvian local hero and 2005 Latin Pro Surfing Champion Gabriel Villaran, but placed 2nd to Sebastián Alarcón, also of Peru.

In the next Round, however, Pilurzu risked some great backside maneuvers while attacking heavy waves and aced his Semifinal spot with 1st place to Peruvian Gabriel Aramburu in 2nd and Brazilian Caetano Vargas in 3rd.

In addition, the 22-year-old from Tamarindo is in the Semifinals for the Longboard division because of a Quarterfinals performance today that ironically placed him second above his own countryman Diego Naranjo at 3rd (who will do repercharge today), and behind Peruvian Felipe Becerra in 1st place. "In truth, I feel I am concentrating very hard on making the best performance I can here,” explained Pilurzu. “Friday, the level of the waves lowered a little. Nevertheless, I was quite calm with the purpose of having the best strategy to attack at the indicated moment.”

Today is crucial for Costa Rica in that all categories of the repercharge heats are currently in progress on the beach with seven out of the eight remaining Tico Team members still working towards Gold, Silver and Bronze individual and team medals in those second-chance contests. Along with Federico in the Open, Diego Naranjo and Luis Vindas, both from Playa Jaco, will have an opportunity to join him, should they pass today.

Both Diego and Luis joined the Pan-American Surfing Games from their previous weekend stint at the first date of the Latin Pro Tour 2006 of the Asociacion Latinoamericano de Surf’s (ALAS) in Mar del Plata in Argentina, and although they are in repercharge, their strong skills from their international competitions—which also include the Association of Profession Surfing’s World Qualifying Series tour—bode well still for the Costa Rican team’s position at the end of these Games.

Pilurzu added: “All of us in the group of Costa Ricans who arrived at this competition are demonstrating a great level of surfing in front of talented people such as the Brazilians or the Peruvians, and we are proud of what we are doing. For Saturday, I hope that all it comes out well and we will put the flag of Costa Rica very high.”

Jaco’s Lisbeth Vindas is also surfing repercharge today to obtain a consoloation space in the Womens Semifinals. Although Lisbeth is known internationally as the five-time Costa Rican National Women’s Surf Champion, at the Reef Panamericano de Surf Peru 2006 Copa Motorola she will also be competing in the Women’s Bodyboard category, and the Tica has already advanced all the way to the Semifinals.

The Costa Rican Juniors (under 18 years), including Jason Torres, Juan Carlos Naranjo and Jairo Perez of Jaco and Isaac Vega of Tamarindo still could proceed in the Pan American Surfing Games, subject to their skills today in their own repercharge heats. “All the Costa Rican surfers—with the exception of Andreina Samudio—still stay alive and can move on,” said Antonio Pilurzu, head of the Costa Rican Federacion de Surf by telephone from Peru. He added that when the competition began, the waves were close to three meters in height, were of great quality, and quite challenging—yet exciting—for the Team. “In view of the good performance which we will have made in summation at the end of the Games, it is possible that we will finish with a nice ranking in the participating nations.”

Some of those stand-out performances have included those made by Jason Torres, who on the first day of the Games in the Open, caused serious problems for another Peruvian champion, Javier Swayne, when Torres swept by him and three other Latin pros to take 1st place. Recalled Antonio Pilurzu: "Jason gave a surf lesson to Javier; our representative was brilliant. He was concentrating at every moment and with that strength he acted with an enormous serenity.” (Unfortunately, Jason ended up in repercharge the very next round, then out.) He also snaked his Juniors first heat to 1st place and is still rallying in repercharge, because in the water, he fights with his board.

Sunday will be the Finals of the Reef Panamericano de Surf Peru 2006 Copa Motorola, which has been organized by the Asociación Panamericana de Surf (APA) and the Federación Deportiva Peruana de Tabla (FEPTA). Participants include Dominican Republic, Brazil, Guadalupe, Jamaica, Barbados, Bahamas, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Guatemala, El Salvador, Panama, Colombia, Ecuador, Chile, Argentina, Peru and Costa Rica