CNN
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It was a celebration worthy of the ages, or at least viral fame.

Surfer Gabriel Medina took on Kanoa Igarashi, the man who defeated him at the Tokyo Olympics and went on to win silver. This time he wanted to turn the tide.

The Brazilian not only beat the Japanese surfer, he did so in part thanks to a near-perfect 9.90-scoring wave on Day 3 of the surfing competition in Tahiti – competing halfway around the world from Paris. It was the highest-scoring wave in Olympic history.

The ensuing cheers provided another moment of perfection: Medina jumped off his surfboard, stuck his finger up in the air and his board narrowly flew parallel to him as Agence France-Presse photographer Jerome Brouillet snapped the photo.

“The conditions were perfect, the waves were bigger than we expected,” Brouillet told The Guardian. “So he (Medina) is behind the wave and I can’t see him and then he pops up and I took four pictures and one of them was this one.

“It wasn’t hard to get the shot. It was more about anticipating the moment and where Gabriel will start the wave.”

Brouillet added: “I checked my phone during the six-minute break after the shoot and I got a lot of notifications on social media. I thought something happened with this shoot and it got shared on ESPN and I thought, ‘Cool.'”

“It’s very cool, it’s a beautiful photo and a lot of people love it. It’s not really a surf photo, so it gets more people’s attention.”

The remarkable photo spread across social media, with Brazilians celebrating their surfer’s progress to the last eight of the competition, which included Real Madrid and Selection attacker Rodrygo.

When Medina posted the photo on his Instagram page, amid praise from astonished Brazilians and more than four million likes, Igarashi responded: “Damn, he didn’t even leave one for us, hahahaha (laughing so I don’t have to cry).”

Although Medina has come one step closer to his goal of an Olympic medal, he felt that the jury could have taken his efforts more into account.

“I felt like it was a 10,” the three-time WSL world champion said after his round. “I’ve done a couple of 10s and I thought, ‘That’s definitely a 10.’ The wave was so perfect.”

While the performance on the water may not have been 10 out of 10, the photo was certainly a picture of perfection.