In the past few days, the beaches of the Portuguese town of Costa da Caparica near Lisbon hosted another edition of the Caparica Czech Surf Open, which was also the first stop of the Czech-Slovak Surfing Tour. A total of 42 competitors came to the venue, including the reigning Czech surfing champions and undefeated winners of last year's Cup, Jakub Michna and Jana Kašová. This year the competition was spiced up by the fact that the first two competitors in each category were to receive a nomination to the national team, which next year for the first time in history will represent the Czech Republic at the ISA World Surfing Games in El Salvador, which will also be a qualifying competition for the Olympic Games in Paris.
Men's competition
Jakub Michna, who currently lives and trains in Ireland, easily made it to the final of the men's competition where he was up against David Petr, Robert Vysloužil and Petr Skála. Jakub Michna did not let his current form be doubted throughout the final heat and this time he took the overall victory without any major problems. However, the big battle was fought for the second place, which secured the nomination to the national team. This was eventually won by the newcomer to the race, Robert Vysloužil, ahead of the favoured David Petr. "I am certainly not invincible. I am of course happy that I managed to win like this for the second time, but it's certainly not because of any training or anything. It just went well again today and I can't be angry, I'm happy about it!" said the champion after the competition.
Women's competition
Jana Kašová also went through the competition without any problems and in the final she was up against Anna Růtová and Paula Kutá, just like last year. The best Slovak competitor Michaela Holbová completed the final four. However, unlike her male counterpart, Jana Kašová had a problem with picking good waves in the final and the first place was held for a long time by Paula Kutá. However, the tactic of waiting for bigger set waves paid off for Anna Růtová, who with the best wave of the final jumped both competitors a few minutes before the end and quite unexpectedly managed to dethrone the undefeated Jana Kašová, who had to settle for third place and will have to fight for her nomination for the World Games. The second place and nomination to the national team was won by Paula Kuta, who after the competition did not hide her joy at having fulfilled her dream. The fourth place in the final went to Michaela Holbová. "I think I deserve it, the last wave was really great. I really felt that all the turns were the way they should be, the finishing turn was great too, so I think I deserve it." Růtová, the new representative of the Czech Republic, evaluated her surprise victory after the competition.
In addition to the main competition, a children's competition was also held, in which the Matěnovi siblings shared the top positions. Florentina Matěnová took the first place with ease, showing rides that even adult competitors would not be ashamed of. She was followed by her older sister Rebeka Matěnová in second place and third place went to the five-year-old Roderik Matěna. The prize for fourth place went to Jeremias Matěna, who unfortunately got injured just before the start of the race.
On the same day as the children's competition, the first ever longboard competition in the Czech-Slovak Cup took place - the Longboard Expression Session. In this discipline Kamila Mlčochová, who is mainly a longboarder, showed the best rides and won the first place. The second place went to the young talent Timon Matěna and the third place was shared by two competitors with the same number of points, namely the reigning Czech surfing champion Jana Kašová and Klára Kováříková.
The Czech and Slovak Surfing Tour continues in December with the Bali Big Wejf on the Indonesian island of Bali, where the remaining four nominations for the national team will be contested.