German Freestyle Battles: Freestyle spectacle at the surf festival, Leon Struppeck wins his first title, Elena Dominick triumphs in the women's category
SURF Redaktion
· 03.06.2025
The German freestyle season 2025 has begun. The Ascension weekend at the Fehmarn Surf Festival was used by the freestylers to launch the first Freestyle Battle of the 2025 season. This time even with the status of an FPT (Freestyle Pro Tour) Proving Ground event, meaning that the riders could also collect points for the international ranking. On Friday afternoon, the south beach offered the full range of conditions - from barely rideable to overpowered situations. In the end, however, a complete single elimination with considerable surprises was organised.
An up and down of emotions
The time window for the contest on this year's Ascension weekend was very limited due to the wind forecast, which only promised around half an event day of wind-driven action. During these five hours, it was an up and down of emotions, whether on the part of the 35 riders or the judges. From marginally rideable to overpowered, Fehmarn's south beach offered the entire spectrum on Friday afternoon, as is otherwise only known from mobile phone providers.
How it was possible to convince the Brazilian and big wave foiler/surfer Vinnicius Martins to take part in a battle in such conditions is still not clear even to us, but he had a very good time!
It was already clear in the first rounds that those who know how to deal with the conditions - choppy and gusty - have a clear advantage. It is obvious that the standard increases from year to year, but especially the one-handed Flaka Caña Brava of Benjamin Klokkers, who was competing in his first battle, showed that there was no easy way through from the preliminary rounds onwards. Thies Romig, co-organiser of the Rügen Island Games, was beaten by newcomer Ben Behrendt, who filled his scoresheet with clean switch moves. The "Kooks On The Water", the trio of Ben, Arne and Jasper from Hamburg, showed that they are far from being kooks, as they all sent their opponents back to the beach in the first round.
Maarten Molenaar, one of the brains behind the Freestyle Pro Tour, also gave himself the honour of showing off his best manoeuvres off Fehmarn. Unfortunately with, as he himself says, not the result he had hoped for. Florian Staudenhechtl was able to show a bongka (forward into flaka) in his heat against Maarten and thus secured the points to move on to the next round.
From the quarter-finals onwards, the moves became more intense and the wind turned up a notch on the Beaufort scale. Leon Struppeck beat veteran Kevin Langbehn, Lucas Nebelung beat Florian Staudenhechtl, Foivos Tsoupras defeated an extremely good Sebastian Gux and Arne Jörn had to concede defeat to the gracefully executed manoeuvres of multiple Freestyle Battle Champion Niclas Nebelung.
Leon Struppeck is crowned this year's island king
The pairing for the semi-final was thus finalised: Leon Struppeck against Lucas Nebelung and Foivos Tsoupras against Niclas Nebelung. Looking at the heat table, it became clear that the next heats would be the most exciting for a long time.
Organiser of the GFB Leon Struppeck managed to relegate Lucas Nebelung to fourth place with a 2-point lead. For the first time in 13 years of Freestyle Battle, Leon was in the final!
The heat pairing of Foivos against Niclas has been seen several times in previous battles, always with Niclas winning. It was clear after just a few seconds that this battle would be different after Foivos jumped an incredibly clean, freehand burner. Obviously invigorated by the first manoeuvre, Foivos conjured up a whole firework of tricks on the water. Niclas, who is currently still struggling with a knee injury, countered with all the manoeuvres his body and the conditions allowed. In the end, however, he had to admit defeat to the strong Foivos and ultimately had to settle for third place.
This put Leon Struppeck and Foivos Tsoupras in the final. Two best friends who spend almost every session on the water together, even outside of contests. Spurred on by their almost brotherly ambition, the two rivals showed everything they had in their bag of tricks in the weakening wind. In the end, Leon Struppeck kept his nose narrowly in front with technical manoeuvres and won his first GFB title. A strong second place for Foivos!
"The conditions were really difficult to sail in, extremely choppy and extremely gusty - in the end it definitely helped me, I'm often out in the chop and also with the bigger sails, so the change wasn't that big for me. Simply awesome and thanks to everyone who was there! I will remember this weekend for a long time to come," reports winner and organiser Leon Struppeck.
Elena Dominick dominates the women's competition
In the women's heat, it was Lina Schmied and Malin Körner who both put in really good performances in their eight-minute heat, with Lina beating Malin to reach the final against Elena Dominik. In the final, Elena was unfazed by the difficult conditions and jumped Grubbys, Spocks and Funnells as if the chop was non-existent. A well-deserved first place for Elena in the first women's battle of the year.
