Great sportsmen have unique, special stories, anthologies of achievements and discoveries, trophies and firsts. Leonardo Fioravanti built his one wave at a time, balancing on his board, learning about the tides and the right time. Savouring the feeling of freedom you get as you enter a pipe, as the water curls over you and whitens. “It's an incredible connection with nature, an experience that only surfing can give you,” he says. Freedom of movement, of choice, of action - that's one of the driving forces of surfing. “Being in the water with your board, picking up speed and choosing the lines you want, that's the true sense of freedom,” explains Leonardo, who found his true passion in this sport at the age of six, at the start of the new millennium. He would spend his days with his brother Matteo at Ocean Surf in Cerenova. Packed with youthful dreams and eagerly drinking up images of competitions broadcast on Sky, showing legends like Kelly Slater and Andy Irons, Leonardo hoped to become one of them. Today he competes with the world's best and in July, he will be in the water to compete for an Olympic medal at the 2024 Paris Games.
Reaching the top of a psychological, introspective yet creative as well as physically challenging sport such as surfing is no easy feat. It certainly required a good dose of talent - something which he had by the bucket load. But talent alone is not enough: “Talent exists, but it cannot be everything,” Fioravanti says. “You have to nurture it, improve it. There are no shortcuts. Every step is important and you have to work every day to make the most of your talent.” And then comes your body, always accompanied by the right mindset. Because the career of a professional surfer is all about ups and downs. Leonardo knows this only too well: he has had to overcome several injuries, some of which quite serious, but he has always recovered well. "The path of an athlete - he explains - is also speckled with injuries. Indeed, in my opinion it is not a matter of whether you get hurt but rather when you get hurt. It's in those moments that you bring out your very best, because every day you do everything you can to get back to the top.”
To tackle the waves day after day, you need fierce competitiveness, which allows you to ignore fatigue, weather conditions and day-to-day problems. “Thinking also that I still have so much room for improvement motivates me a lot. It's the idea of wanting to see how far I can go.” Of course, becoming the first Italian surfer to participate in the Olympic Games – in Tokyo in 2021 – was already a great source of satisfaction, “an incredible experience, even though I didn't get to bring home a medal”, but it's not the only one in his career. The first memorable moment that comes to mind, when asked this specific question, is a victory in Portugal in 2022: "It was spectacular. My family was there, my girlfriend, my mum, my brother, my niblings. Winning in Europe, which is my home, was incredible.”
When he looks to the future, Leonardo Fioravanti sees above all the relationship with the sea, with the environment, with nature, which inevitably changes, transforming over time. Not always for the right reasons. The climate emergency is a reality and an uncertainty for surfers: “I experience climate change every day. As surfers, we always go to the same places, at the same time of year and we see the differences with the passage of time.” One more reason to be an activist, even a silent one in this case. “The sea is a second home for me, which is why I always try to collaborate with local associations wherever I go,” he says.
But surfing is not just a job, it is not just a profession made up of contests, competitions, medals and maybe even regrets. There are also surf sessions which are simply pure fun: "A real competition - he says - is unrivalled in terms of concentration, focus, seriousness. When you surf just for fun, it's to take a break, to clear your head, to be in the water with friends." Because after all, surfing is a passion before being a job, so it's also a great way to spend a few hours. Beyond surfing however, Leonardo also has other passions, such as football and golf. “I've been an Inter fan since I was a child, thanks to Bobo Vieri. And I wear the number 46 as a tribute to Valentino Rossi, because I liked MotoGP and he was incredible.” Also, Leonardo has launched into video adventures on YouTube and social media, which are “great ways to stay in touch with my followers. In this sport, you don't have fans who can come and see you everywhere you surf, so these platforms are very useful.” The hope is that by watching his feats in the waves, the younger generations will also fall in love with surfing, as he did watching Slater and Irons. It's the ideal way to come full circle. Just like the tide, with a wave coming from afar, going up, peaking, folding over and then coming back down. Then starting again.
