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On a quiet day for waves at Tahiti’s Teahupo’o surf break, USA’s Caroline Marks edged Brazil’s Tatiana Weston-Webb for the gold medal in a dramatic Olympics women’s surfing final.
The drama of the competition extended until after time ran out as the athletes awaited judgement on the decisive final ride by Weston-Webb. Her score wasn’t enough to overtake Marks.
In the final, competitors got 35 minutes to post two high scores judged by a panel of 10 international judges. The top and bottom scores were thrown out for each ride. The surfers’ top two scores on a scale of 0-10 were combined for the final score.
Slow start leads to frantic finish
With sets few and far between early in the final, neither surfer attempted to catch a wave until the 24-minute mark of the competition, and neither posted a score better that 0.5.
Marks secured the first significant score of the final with a successful barrel ride with 17 minutes remaining, putting pressure on Weston-Webb to log a score. The ride earned a score of 7.5 from the judges and ultimately proved to be the difference for the gold medal.
Weston-Webb countered with a score of 5.83 on a ride with nine minutes remaining. Less than two minutes later, Marks logged her second successful ride of the final. She didn’t catch a barrel but replaced a secondary score of 1.43 with a 3.0 to take a 10.5-7.63 lead.
With two minutes remaining Weston-Webb secured her second successful ride, but she didn’t catch a barrel. Time then ran out with surfers waiting for the judges’ verdict on Weston-Webb’s second ride. She needed a 4.68 to win. The ride was good for a 4.5, securing a 10.5-10.33 win for Marks and the gold medal.
Marks, 22, secured the gold medal after finishing just off the podium in fourth place in Tokyo. On shore, she celebrated the win with her supporters.
Marks made final thanks to tiebreaker
Marks got to the final by edging France’s Johanne Defay in the semifinal round earlier Monday. Both surfers had scores of 12.17 in their heat, but Marks got the win with a higher score of 7.00 on her best surf. Defay scored a 6.50 on her first wave, and a 5.67 on her second (besting Marks’ 5.17). However, the highest single-wave score gets the tiebreaker.
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Weston-Webb topped Costa Rica’s Brisa Hennessy in the other semifinal. Defay won the bronze medal with a decisive 12.66 score, easily defeating Hennessy’s 4.93 mark.
In the men’s final, Tahiti local Kauli Vaast secured gold for France on his local surf break over Australia’s Jack Robinson. Brazil’s Gabriel Medina won bronze.
This is the second consecutive medal for the U.S. in surfing, which became an Olympic sport in the Tokyo Games. Carissa Moore won gold for Team USA in the inaugural competition. Moore lost in the Paris Olympics quarterfinals to Defay.