But while the likes of Patrick Mahomes, Simone Biles and Adam Peaty prepare to battle for records in — hopefully — less turbulent waters on offer 16,000km away from Paris when most Olympians head for France at least four years hence, perhaps it’s time they line their collective stomachs with a tasty dish that is closer in spirit those distinguished surfers.
There will undoubtedly be a running battle between the sport’s old money but France have been thrown well into contention, too, after two local Tahitian surfers nabbed home state showdowns.
“Having the Olympics at Teahupo’o is their best spot they could ever pick just because it’s such a good wave around that time of year,” said local Vahine Fierro, who won May’s pumping Saber Pro Tahiti held in perfection.
It gets the Olympics back to where it all started -surfing,” he said.
Surfing dates back as far ago as records from French Polynesia, now a territory of France, which show that the sport was being practiced in 1120 A.
The surf contest in front of the idyllic lagoon-side village of Teahupo’o will be nothing like Tokyo, nor anything that those early wave-riders could have ever imagined.
While Italo Ferreira and Carissa Moore were busy carving and spinning their way to gold in the murky, typhoon-churned waves of Japan’s Shidashita beach break (otherwise known as Tsurigasaki), it was out at Teahupo’o that real perfection could be found — a heavy wave breaking thick over coral reef underneath an azure sky.
