Teen Skateboarding Bronze Medalist Loses Olympic Qualification for Surfing

With surfing being such a new sport in the Olympics – Paris 2024 will serve as only the sport’s second appearance – there’s a lot of “firsts” going down.

Primarily, at Tokyo 2020, the first-ever surfing Olympic medalists were crowned. Carissa Moore (USA) won gold for the women, and Italo Ferreira (Brazil) won for the men.

And there was almost, but not quite, another “first” to add to the list ahead of the Paris 2024 Games – an athlete competing in not one, but two sports.

Sky Brown, a 15-year-old dual sport skateboarder and surfer, who represents Great Britain, was gunning for a spot in the Paris 2024 surfing event during the 2024 ISA World Surfing Games. Brown, already an Olympian, had won bronze at the Tokyo 2020 Games for skateboarding. And she was looking good to qualify in surfing, too.

Related: Could 15-Year-Old Sky Brown Qualify for Both Surfing and Skateboarding at Paris 2024?

However, she fell short.

"It was definitely tough out there, but I fought. I had nothing to lose," she told Olympics.com. "It's definitely super cool to make it this far with the best people in the world. It was just an amazing experience, just being out there with the best surfers in the world and competing against them. It's the biggest event I've ever done and I'm really proud of myself."

Although she hasn’t officially qualified in skateboarding yet – she’s in third place in the Worldskate park rankings, and looking like a shoe-in to secure an Olympic spot – she’s still got her sights set on surfing in the Games…just, maybe not this year.

“I learned so much just competing here and I just had the best experience ever,” she said. “I learned so much and I am growing a lot, so hopefully I can bring it to LA. I'm going to work hard for LA.”

Los Angeles 2028...keep an eye out for Sky Brown.

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