Three-time world champion Gabriel Medina has won the Margaret River Pro surfing tournament in a razor-sharp performance that showed the Brazilian back in his best form after a difficult period competitively and personally.
Australia's Tyler Wright was unable to overcome her long-time rival Carissa Moore, from Hawaii, in the women's final as she attempted back-to-back wins following her victory at Bells Beach, Victoria, two weeks ago.
Moore is now equal second on the all-time event win list, with 27 victories alongside Australian legend Lane Beachley.
Medina celebrated his first win of the 2023 season after convincingly beating Griffin Colapinto, from the United States, in the final and moving into seventh place on the championship tour.
The 29-year-old declared he was back, following lacklustre competition results this year and earlier taking time off the championship tour for personal reasons.
"Amazing," he said while being interviewed from the water straight after his victory.
"It's a contest I always struggled to win. I was really focused on that one.
'It's a challenging wave, and I'm just happy to surf, you know. I've been struggling in a few events.
"It's been hard to get in the rhythm again and I feel like I'm back in competition mode, and yeah, it's amazing."
It is Medina's first ever win at Margaret River and the first time a goofy-foot surfer [right foot forward on the surfboard] has won the event since 1990.
Moore claims hat-trick at Margaret River
It is the third time Moore has won at Margaret River, beating Wright with a combined heat score of 11.19 to the Australian's 9.17.
Wright, a two-time world champion, caught a larger set wave close to the end of the heat but was unable to make up the points to overtake the five-time world champion.
"It's amazing," Moore said. "I think it's been nine years since the last time I won this event, and I was beginning to think I couldn't do it.
A storm had meant the finals of the event had been put off since Sunday, and Moore said she was relieved.
"A lot happens in those days. You're trying to stay on top of things but also trying to relax, but you can't," she said.
"It's a sigh of ok, it's done. Work's done, now we can go home and have a little reset."
Big win after break
Medina won his last world title in 2021 and he then took time off at the start of 2022 to focus on his mental health, missing the first five events of the season.
This is his best result since then, and marks a complete return to world title form, after posting ninth place finishes in the last four events.
"Just be patient. I knew it was going to come," Medina said.
"I had some tough losses, which puts you down a little bit. But I've been working, I've been enjoying my life and everything is paying off right now."
Medina took out Colapinto with a combined two-wave score of 17.50 compared with 12.27 for the US surfer.
Medina scored a 9.50 for an incredible right-hand wave, where he did an extremely quick, vertical backhand snap, sending a huge fan of spray off the back of the wave and then free falling to the bottom, with a critical finish over the shallow inside reef.
He now has a total of 17 career wins, equalling former world champions Barton Lynch and Mark Richards, both from Australia.
He is still a long way off the record 56 event wins held by eleven-time world champion Kelly Slater.
But Medina goes into the next event at the Surf Ranch wave pool in the US next month with momentum.
It's an event he has dominated in the past and he'll have his eyes set on breaking into the top five on the competitor's leaderboard.
Medina had beaten the world number one Joao Chianca in the semi-finals, despite a strong performance from the rising star of the next generation of Brazilian surfers.
Earlier on the women's side of the draw, Margaret River local Bronte Macaulay was eliminated by Moore.
