Nic von Rupp: Portugal's big wave champion

3Team wins at the Nazaré contest

23.46Score in Dec 2025, 2nd by 0.14

Their story

Nic von Rupp is Portugal's best-known big wave surfer, and Nazaré is his home arena. He has won the team award at the WSL Nazaré contest three times: in February 2022 with Lucas Chianca, then twice in 2025, in February and December, with France's Clément Roseyro.

In December 2025 he came within 0.14 points of the men's title as well, finishing second to Chianca, 23.46 to 23.60.

His film The Biggest Wave on Earth is on our Videos page.

His film

His best and worst moments at Nazaré

His own film of his best and worst moments at Nazaré.

Nic von Rupp

More legends

USA (Hawaii)

Kai Lenny

2 team wins

Tow champion with Chianca, 2020 and 2021

Brazil

Pedro Scooby

Most committed

WSL award, 2021. Star of The Big Ugly

Andrew Cotton

Comeback

Broke his back here in 2017, came back

France

Clément Roseyro

2025

Men's best performance, Feb 2025

See the next one live.

One email when giant waves (10 m+) show up in the models, usually 5 to 7 days ahead.

Alert me when it's big

Photos: Luis Ascenso (header), CC BY 2.0; Founzy (Kai Lenny), CC BY-SA 4.0; 26° Prêmio da Música Brasileira (Pedro Scooby), CC BY 2.0; Web Summit (Andrew Cotton), CC BY 2.0; Carlos Eduardo Joos (wave photos 1, 2), CC BY 2.0; Walterpeitz (wave photos 1, 2), CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.