The surf party in Puerto Rico: dominance of Brazil and the last seats for Paris 2024

In Arecibo, Puerto Rico, the 2024 ISA World Surfing Games was held for surfing, the last qualifying event for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. The sport, which made its debut in Tokyo, will be based in Tahiti.

The 2024 ISA World Surfing Games awarded eight places for women who were not qualified and six for men. The quota is for each National Olympic Committee, which will elect its Olympic representatives.

The seats for men were held by Alonso Correa (Peru), Andy Criere (Spain), Joan Duru (France), Ramzi Boukhiam (Morocco), Rio Waida (Indonesia) and Tim Elter (Germany).

These six joined those who had already qualified in the three previous stages: ISA World Surfing Games 2023, WSL Championship Tour 2023 and the Santiago 2023 Pan American Games. These were Filipe Toledo (Brazil), Griffin Colapinto (United States), Ethan Ewing (Australia), João Chianca (Brazil), Jack Robinson (Australia), John John Florence (United States), Leonardo Fioravanti (Italy), Kanoa Igarashi (Japan), Jordy Smith (South Africa), Matthew McGillivray (South Africa), Alan Cleland Jr (Mexico), Kauli Vaast (France), Reo Inaba (Japan), Billy Stairmand (New Zealand) and Lucca Messinas (Peru).

For their part, the women who qualified for the Olympic Games in Puerto Rico were Anat Lelior (Israel), Camilla Kemp (Germany), Janire Gonzalez-Extabarri (Spain), Nadia Erostarbe (Spain), Siqi Yang (China), Sol Aguirre (Peru), Taina Hinckel (Brazil) and Yolanda Sequeira (Portugal).

These eight surfers were joined by Carissa Moore (United States), Caroline Marks (United States), Tyler Wright (Australia), Molly Picklum (Australia), Brisa Hennessy (Costa Rica), Teresa Bonvalot (Portugal), Vahine Fierro (France), Shino Matsuda (Japan), Sarah Baum (South Africa), Saffi Vette (New Zealand), Johanne Defay (France), Tatiana Weston-Webb (Brazil) and Sanoa Dempfle-olin (Canada).

Brazil was enshrined in the 2024 ISA World Surfing Games

The team event was held by Brazil, which with a total of 3696 points left France (3360) and Australia (2895) behind, while the top 10 in Puerto Rico were completed by Spain, Peru, Germany, Portugal, the United States, Canada and Costa Rica.

In the men’s individual competition, the title went to Brazil’s Gabriel Medina; second was the Moroccan Ramzi Boukhiam and the Frenchman Kauli Vaast took the top step of the podium.

Meanwhile, the Australian Sally Fitzgibbons was established among women, who surpassed the Brazilian Tatiana Weston-Webb and the French Johanne Defay.

Surfing at the 2024 Paris Olympics

The sport will have its second Olympic experience after its debut in Tokyo 2020 and the venue will be Tahiti, an island in French Polynesia located in the Pacific Ocean.

There will be 48 (eight more than in Tokyo) who will be present on the beaches of Teahupo’o, which hosts one of the stages of the World Surf League (WSL) every year.

The first Olympic champion was the American Carissa Moore, who will be in Tahiti to defend the title, while the Brazilian Italo Ferreira, who was crowned in Tokyo among the men, will not be there.