First time in 68 years, an Olympic event surfing is scheduled 16,000 kms from host city

Amid much fanfare, the 2024 Olympics Games were opened on Friday with the fashion capital of the world, Paris, as the host city.

Of note in this edition of the Summer Games is that, for the first time in 68 years, an Olympic event is being conducted as far as 15,771 kilometers (9,800 miles) from the host city. The 48 best surfers will take on the crests of the world’s most terrifying waves off the coast of Teahupo’o, a small village on the French Polynesian island of Tahiti.

Along with surfing, sailing events and football matches will be held, respectively, in Marseilles and Bordeaux — away from Paris. While the two venues for sailing events and football matches are some hundreds of kilometres away from the host city, the surfing event will still be the farthest from the French capital.

The last time the International Olympic Committee held the Games away from the host country was when Melbourne hosted the 1956 Games. The equestrian competition was conducted in Sweden’s Stockholm, far away from the Trans-Tasmanian region. This was due to Australia’s equine quarantine policies, which forced the IOC to slate the competition to an equine-friendly country.

For the 2024 Summer Games, the Paris officials reportedly said that hosting the surfing event on Tahiti Island aligns with the intention of “spreading the Games across France.” Tahiti, in the midst of the massive Pacific Ocean, won the hosting rights of surfing back in 2020, even before the sport made its debut in the Summer Games in Tokyo Olympics 2021.

This year the sport will witness a first-of-its-kind floating Olympic village as a cruise ship with state-of-the-art amenities has been given as a venue to accommodate the Olympian surfers.

It will be a stern test for the surfers as Tahitian surf break is known for its world’s iconic waves.

SURFING COMPETITION FORMAT

48 Surfers — 24 men and 24 women — will be divided into eight heats, with three surfers in each heat. In surfing, a “heat” is a competitive round in which surfers compete against each other to score the highest points for their wave riding. During a heat, surfers take turns catching waves within a set time frame, typically ranging from 20 to 30 minutes.

Winners of the first round will reach the Round of 16 while the losers will contest in the head-to-head elimination round.

The Round of 16 has eight heats with two surfers in each heat facing each other. The winners will march into quarterfinals, semis and then finals. However, the losers in the semis will take on each other to vie for the bronze medal.