Erin Brooks at the ISA World Championships.
Eighteen of the 48 Olympic surfing qualification slots are still up for grabs. The 2024 ISA World Surfing Games (WSG), taking place February 23-March 3 in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, is the final event in the qualification system that will determine who will book tickets to Paris 2024 at Teahupo’o. The top eight eligible women and top six eligible men will qualify, plus, the top finishing men’s and women’s teams will earn their country a slot, even if they’ve already maxed out their quota of two surfers per gender.
There is plenty to talk about as surfers from around the world descend upon the Caribbean isle with hopes of becoming Olympians. Here are five storylines to keep an eye on as the competition develops:
Erin Brooks is back competing for Canada. Can she handle the pressure?
The last several months have been an emotional rollercoaster for Erin Brooks. Based out of Hawaii, Brooks had been using her father’s Canada/USA dual citizenship to surf under the Canadian flag. However, last year the ISA determined that she was ineligible to compete for Canada after her citizenship application fell through. Canada proceeded to double down on the 16-year-old’s citizenship denial, only to then reverse that decision in early 2024.
While the Canadian government was dragging its feet with Brooks’ citizenship request, Brooks missed out on an excellent opportunity to qualify. She missed the 2023 Pan American Games in Chile, where her compatriot Sanoa Olin was able to snag the women’s qualification slot.
Despite all the turmoil, Brooks has a chance to put it all behind her if she performs well at the WSG. With eight slots for women up for grabs, she is certainly one of the favorites to qualify. Given that Brooks took home the silver medal at last year’s edition of the WSG, she’s already shown she is more than capable. That said, given the high profile of her citizenship case, all eyes – and the corresponding pressure – will be on her. We’ll see how she performs in the spotlight.
Carissa Moore and Filipe Toledo in Saquarema. Photo: WSL//Thiago Diz.
Carissa Moore and Filipe Toledo will return to competition; they actually have to try.
While Carissa Moore and Filipe Toledo both stepped away from the tour this year (in Moore’s case, indefinitely), they will both be present in Puerto Rico. The reason: despite not doing the championship tour, they both expressed their desire to compete in the Olympics. And to remain eligible, they need to participate in the WSG.
Both surfers have a history of evading their WSG obligations with conveniently-timed injuries/illnesses that allowed them to leave mid-event. However, the ISA added an update to the eligibility requirements this year that requires the surfers compete in “good faith” to remain eligible. It will be interesting to see how this affects the mid-event no-shows that have become all-too-common among a few of the elite CT surfers, and how the arbitrary nature of “good faith” will be determined.
Gabriel Medina the Olympic venue well. Photo: Cestari//WSL
Can Team Brazil earn Medina an Olympic slot?
Another intriguing plot to follow in Puerto Rico will be the team rankings. The highest ranking men and women teams will earn their country a qualification slot that they can fill as they please. And if the country that places first in the team ranking has already filled their quota of two surfers for that gender, they’ll get a “bonus” third slot. It was a caveat added to the WSG qualification to create incentive for already-qualified surfers to truly surf their best.
A few nations have already announced how they would fill this third slot if they earn it, and the most exciting one is undoubtedly Brazil. Brazil’s national federation determined that if their men’s squad earns the slot, it goes to Gabriel Medina given he was the next surfer in line on the 2023 CT ranking. The surfers up to the task to get Medina his slot will be Medina himself, Filipe Toledo, and Yago Dora.
Does anyone not want to see Medina threading Teahupo’o pits? Surfing fans and the Olympics alike are crossing fingers that Medina qualifies, as he would immediately be one of the favorites to win gold.
Barron at J-Bay. Photo: Beatriz Ryder//World Surf League
USA’s men can earn Barron Mamiya a slot; Steph Gilmore still has Olympic hope
The other country that has publicly released its process for filling a potential third slot is the U.S. Its system awards any such slot to the surfer who made the semifinals at the 2023 Tahiti Pro. Caity Simmers already qualified via this route when the women earned the bonus slot at the 2022 WSG. In the men’s case, the slot would go to Barron Mamiya.
The task to give the U.S. a maximum six-surfer squad will be up to John John Florence, Griffin Colapinto, and Mamiya. With a win at Pipeline this year and a semifinal finish at Teahupo’o last year, Mamiya would be a formidable addition to the Olympic team.
It’s also worth noting that if the Japanese men win the team ranking at the 2024 WSG, the team slot that they earned at the 2022 WSG would then go to the second place finisher for the U.S. In other words, team USA would be just as happy with a win from Japan’s men.
And on the women’s side, if America’s women win the 2024 WSG, their 2022 WSG slot would go to the second place Australian. Tyler Wright and Molly Picklum are already qualified, so in this scenario (or if the Australian women win themselves in 2024) maybe we could see the Olympic return of Steph Gilmore.
March 3 will be a whirlwind of individual qualification scenarios
The finals day of the WSG will be dizzying with qualification ramifications. Depending on how the event advances, there could even be surfers who clinch qualification before finals day. There are a host of surfers who look promising to claim one of the 14 individual slots. (Note that originally the event was slated to award five slots for men and seven slots for women, but given that the host nation, France, earned qualification slots already, their designated slots for a man and a woman are added to this year’s WSG.)
CT surfers like Morocco’s Ramzi Boukhiam, Indonesia’s Rio Waida, and Brazil’s Luana Silva will be attempting to qualify.
The 2023 WSG was a continental qualifier, but if we were to apply the 2023 ranking to 2024, surfers who would be in the qualification mix include Peru’s Miguel Tudela, Canada’s Cody Young, Mexico’s Sebastian Williams, and Portugal’s Frederico Morais, for the men. For the women, Canada’s Erin Brooks, Peru’s Sol Aguirre, Costa Rica’s Leilani McGonagle, and Germany’s Noah Klapp, would be in the mix for the women.
It will be interesting to see these Olympic hopefuls match up against CT surfers who have already qualified in the later rounds, and see how their differing motivations to surf well affect the outcomes of their heats.
