San Clemente’s Caroline Marks celebrates Olympic surfing gold medal win
TEAHUPO’O, Tahiti — San Clemente resident Caroline Marks won the women’s surfing gold medal on Monday at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Tahiti.
Marks beat Brazilian Tatiana Weston-Webb, who was awarded the silver medal.
“Your whole life goes into a moment like this,” Marks said with a gold medal hanging around her neck. “It’s beyond all my wildest dreams.”
French Polynesian Kauli Vaast took home the men’s gold surfing medal for France.
Cheers and tears erupted from boats floating near the wave and crowds of spectators along the shore as the men’s final match ended in the afternoon. Vaast pumped his arms into the air in victory after beating Australia’s Jack Robinson, who received the silver medal.
“I don’t really realize it, but I just made history,” said Vaast. “I can’t be prouder to represent Tahiti and France at home.”
Marks, 22, took up surfing to keep up with her brothers. She quickly enjoyed success, becoming the youngest surfer to qualify for the World Surf League Championship Tour in 2017 at the age of 15.
Her Olympic gold medal victory was dramatic and involved a long wait before judges revealed the final scores that secured her victory.
“I was just like, ‘Oh my gosh,’” Marks recalled of her reaction when she learned she won the gold medal. “Just burst into tears, super-emotional.”
Gabriel Medina from Brazil and Johanne Defay from France won bronze medals after beating Alonso Correa from Peru and Brisa Hennessy from Costa Rica, respectively.
“Chopes gave me so many good waves, so many good results. So I can’t complain,” said Medina, using a common nickname for Teahupo’o.
Medalists — some in bare feet — stepped on to the Olympic podium near the ocean as crowds gathered to cheer and take photographs. Roosters ran along the grass while young local surfers called the names of the athletes as they walked by.
All winners of the Paris Olympics surfing competition are first-time Olympic medalists, after defending Olympic women’s champion Carissa Moore of the United States — who won at the Tokyo Games, where Olympic surfing debuted — lost in the quarterfinals on Thursday.
Two of the five athletes on the U.S. Olympic surf team hail from San Clemente; a third lives in Oceanside. They will compete in massive, barreling swells in Tahiti, a bold choice that has some safety-conscious experts shaking their heads.
“Obviously I’m really sad to not be a part of finals day, to get to represent my home and my family one more time, but I’m really grateful,” Moore said after her loss. “I just hope that at the end of the day I can encourage whoever is watching, win or lose, don’t be afraid to go into it fearlessly and don’t be afraid to fail.”
The final day of the Paris Olympics surfing competition began Monday morning after two days of delays due to unfavorable conditions. In the morning, conditions were smaller than the heavy, barrel-shaped waves Teahupo’o is famed for and that were seen during part of the men’s competition the week before.
But by the afternoon waves grew larger and more frequent, giving athletes a chance to impress judges with the time they spent inside the barrels. At one point during the competition, a whale jumped out of the water while surfers went head to head.
Six of the eight surfers who made it to the semifinals represented different nations. French Polynesian, Peruvian, Australian and other national flags flew from boats near the waves.
As surfers from around the world competed at the Olympics, you may have been inspired to hit the waves. Before you do, it’s best to learn popular surf lingo.
While not every surfer who competed was able to bring home a medal, many agreed that the second Olympics surfing competition — filled with viral photographs, record-breaking scores and hours of stunning video footage broadcast to viewers around the world — helped promote the sport.
“Everyone’s watching and paying attention,” said Medina, who said he gained millions of social media followers after a photo of him floating in the sky next to his surfboard while bailing out of a wave went viral during the competition. “I think surfing wins.”
Milko writes for the Associated Press.
