Surf competitions are decided in a matter of crucial seconds. The surfer waits for the wave, senses the tide, follows the current, then rises to their feet and takes off. They carve across the face of the wave, disappearing inside a barrel of water. It is the spectacular moment, the one that ends up in photographs and videos. But it reveals little of what happens beforehand. Behind every wave ridden are long training sessions, hours spent in the water waiting; weeks devoted to physical preparation; injuries and rehabilitation. The repetition of movements, the surfer as a craftsman of waves. In modern surfing, particularly at the highest level, talent alone is not what makes the difference. What matters is the ability to turn thousands of invisible details into a performance that, from the outside, appears effortless.
The first Italian to establish himself on the World Surf League Championship Tour, Leonardo Fioravanti is an Olympian and the world number three. In June 2026, he secured his first Championship Tour victory at the El Salvador event, defeating Brazilian Olympic champion Italo Ferreira and fulfilling one of his long-held ambitions: rewriting the history of Italian surfing. He often speaks about waves, the ocean and technique, but listening to him, what emerges above all is a form of quiet expertise, built over years and requiring no display. “I can say anything,” he explains. “I can say I want to win this or that, but in the end only my surfing speaks for me.”
In that simple sentence lies the essence of a demanding journey. Having reached the top of his sport at a very young age, Fioravanti learned early on that talent is never enough. “I realised it mainly because of an injury when I was seventeen,” he recalls. “I was out of the water for six months, had two operations and then spent a long time doing physiotherapy. That's when I understood that I had to commit fully and work on every aspect of my performance: nutrition, training, recovery, rest. Everything an athlete does, and everything I didn't really understand until then. Today, though, I feel I'm in the best shape of my life.”
It is almost an inevitable stage for those who reach the highest level so young. Fioravanti qualified for the world tour at just eighteen. “When I qualified, I was probably too young,” he says. “You suddenly find yourself competing against the best surfers in the world and reality gives you a few hard knocks. They're not easy to digest.”
From that point onwards, surfing became something more complex than a simple passion. Over the past ten to fifteen years, the standard on the world tour has changed radically, undergoing a rapid and largely unforeseen professionalization. Few athletes once approached surfing with the mindset seen in elite sport more broadly. “The athletes we see today simply didn't exist back then. Now, if you are not completely dedicated to surfing and living like a professional athlete, you might reach the top, but you won't stay there.”
And yet surfing retains an irreplaceable instinctive dimension, one that perhaps cannot be trained. It is a kind of knowledge that every surfer develops gradually, through time spent in the water and through learning to read something that can never be fully controlled. You need instinct that connection with the Ocean that you only develop by spending hours and hours in the water. You have to learn to read the sea,” says Fioravanti.
What is fascinating is that, over time, this reading of the ocean almost ceases to be conscious. “Sometimes you can feel a current shifting and you know you need to move a little further down the line. When a big wave approaches, you feel the power of the ocean beginning to pull you. You follow the currents, you follow your instinct. These are details you learn over a lifetime in the water, and eventually you make these decisions without even thinking about them.”
Even waiting is part of that process. Surfing is a sport of long stretches of silence. A blend of adrenaline and patience, carefully balanced through moments when, on the surface, nothing seems to be happening at all.
Managing pressure has also become a central part of Fioravanti's career, although only with time and experience. “Until 2021, speaking to a sports psychologist felt like something very strange,” he says. “A lot of people suggested it, and I didn't want to hear about it. Then I started working with a professional, and I genuinely believe it was one of the most important moments of my career. It helped me enormously in the water, but away from it as well.”
Time also helps in handling pressure during the most delicate moments. Like many athletes, Fioravanti's development has been a process of trial and error. “I've learned more from the waves I got wrong than from the ones I surfed well,” he says without hesitation. “When I was younger, I got frustrated much more easily. I was in a hurry to get where I wanted to be. Now I understand that every mistake teaches you something. The important thing is recognising it and not endlessly replaying it in your mind. You also have to learn to leave it behind and keep moving forward.”
It is an approach that reflects a broader understanding of surfing itself: a discipline in which total control simply does not exist. The ocean cannot be mastered. It can only be interpreted, each surfer in their own way. Surfing resists standardisation of style, even in an age when almost everything seems measurable.
“Style is very important to me. Maybe too important,” he admits candidly. “What's beautiful is that everyone has their own. There are incredibly talented surfers whose style might not appeal to me, yet technically they do extraordinary things. I think my style is elegant and fluid, and I'm proud of that. In terms of scoring, it isn't the most important factor because the judges are looking for other things. But it matters to me.”
It is the constant pursuit of perfection, certainly, but always accompanied by a personal and recognisable form. A signature written on the face of a wave.
