Evolving the process of qualifying surfers for the 2024 Paris Olympics with the International Surfing Association, this year earning a spot in the world's most important sporting event has some new paths laid out.
Four more spots have been added on both the women's and men's side of the event, with 24 surfers competing, instead of 20 as seen at the 2020 Tokyo Games.
Perhaps most notable, this year a special addition to the rules allowed for competing Nations to qualify an extra male and female surfer, if that Nation's team won the 2022 or 2024 ISA Games.
In 2022, American took home ISA Gold in the Women's Division, while Japan took the Men's. Team USA's bonus slot was taken by Caitlin Simmers, while Connor O'Leary will represent Japan.
Team Brazil won the 2024 ISA World Games in both Men's and Women's, opening slots for Gabriel Medina and Taina Hinckel, and giving the country a radical advantage over their competitors, with six instead of four surfers battling for Medals.
The rest of the surfers in the draw at Teahupo'o later this month earned their spots through one of a handful of different channels: Finishing amongst the top-10 men, or top-8 women, on the 2023 World Championship Tour; being one of 4 men and 4 women chosen from Africa, Asia, Europe, and Oceania; being the top-ranked eligible surfer at the 2023 Pan American Games; finishing one of the top-5 men, or top-7 women at the 2024 ISA Surfing Games.
If you want to get into the granular details, here's the ISA's attenuated explanation of the process, below. 24 men, 24 women.
- Maximum of 2 surfers per gender per National Olympic Committee (NOC). There will be two exceptions to this limit made for the winning teams, per gender, at the 2022 and 2024 ISA World Surfing Games (WSG) where each team will qualify one spot for their country/NOC.
- Qualification spots will be earned on an individual basis, by name, other than for 2022 and 2024 WSG Team World Champion slots.
- In accordance with IOC guidelines, the qualification events have been determined in hierarchical order of qualification, as further explained below; If two surfers of a gender have qualified through the first hierarchical order, that NOC will not be able to qualify more surfers of that gender through qualifying events lower in hierarchical order.
- All surfers selected by their respective National Federations for their national teams must have participated in 2023 and 2024 ISA World Surfing Games in order to be eligible for Olympic qualification.
The hierarchical order of qualification will be as follows:
- 2023 World Surf League (WSL) Championship Tour: First 10 eligible men and first 8 eligible women.
- 2023 ISA World Surfing Games: 4 men and 4 women selected based on their continent. Top finishing eligible surfer of each gender from Africa, Asia, Europe and Oceania.
- 2023 Pan American Games: First eligible man and first eligible woman in the surfing competitions.
- 2024 ISA World Surfing Games: First 5 eligible men and first 7 eligible women.
- 2024 ISA World Surfing Games: The winning teams by gender, will qualify 1 place for their respective country/NOC, regardless of the 2-per country quota limit.
- 2022 ISA World Surfing Games: The winning teams by gender, will qualify 1 place for their respective country/NOC, regardless of the 2-per country quota limit.
- Host nation slot: One man and one woman slot will be guaranteed for the host nation of France, unless already filled through the above hierarchies. Should athletes from France qualify regularly, their slots will be reallocated to the highest ranked eligible surfers from the 2024 World Surfing Games.
- Universality Place: For the first time, one place per gender will be made available to eligible NOCs. Special consideration will be given to the nature of the wave in Teahupo'o in terms of the eligibility criteria for these places. Should there deemed to be no qualified surfers in this category, these slots will be reallocated to the highest ranked eligible surfers from the 2024 World Surfing Games.
Learn more about Teahupo'o here.
Head to the International Surfing Association (ISA) for more information on surfing in the Olympics.