Olympic surfing at Tokyo 2020: Top five things to know posted: 02/03/2021
Who are the top Olympic surfers at Tokyo 2020 in 2021? When and where will Olympic surfing take place? What is the history behind one of the Olympic programme's newest sports? Find out here.
On 3 August 2016, the International Olympic Committee voted to include surfing as one of the five new sports that would be included at Tokyo 2020. This will be surfing's first appearance at the Olympics. However, the art of riding waves on a surfboard has existed for hundreds of years. The Polynesians who lived on the Pacific island chains of Hawaii and Tahiti have had surfing at the core of their cultural identity for as long as it has been recorded, and recently archaeological records show that ancient pre-Incan cultures along the Peruvian coastline have used wave-riding crafts as early as 200 CE.
In the modern era surfing was popularised by famed waterman, and Olympian, Duke Kahanamoku, from Hawaii. Kahanamoku won three gold medals in swimming at the Stockholm 1912 and Antwerp 1920 Games for the USA. Not only is he considered the father of modern surfing', but he planted the seed for surfing's future Olympic inclusion by suggesting it while accepting his gold medal at Stockholm 1912.
One Minute, One Sport | Surfing
Surfing is one of 33 sports that will take place at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020. It is due to make its Olympic debut in July 2021 in Japan. But who are the ones to watch? When will competition take place, and where will it be held? Here is our guide to the top things to know about Olympic surfing. One Minute, One Sport will show you the rules and highlights of Surfing
Top Olympic surfers at Tokyo 2020
Surfing's debut at the Olympics includes a line-up of world champions, World Surf League (WSL) tour veterans, and rookie pros ready to make their mark on the sport.
As is the case in modern surfing history, the top surfers to watch will be coming mainly from Australia and the USA, but watch out too for Brazil.
Born in the same year and just miles away from each other in Honolulu, Hawaii, John John Florence and Carissa Moore represent the current pinnacle of American professional surfing.
Florence boasts two world championships and the coveted Pipeline Masters award, while Moore heads to Tokyo a reigning world champion, with three more titles under her belt to back it up.
The two pros smooth and fearless style is emblematic of their upbringing at the iconic Banzai Pipeline, and their 12 years of world championship tour experience each will make them a force to be reckoned with.
Olympic surfing competition format at Tokyo 2020
The event will involve 20 male and 20 female athletes competing in three rounds, and three finals comprised of 30-minute heats.
Round one features four athletes per heat while round two will have five. From round three onwards the competition turns to a one-on-one format.
During the heats each surfer will have 30 minutes to catch as many waves as they can and receive a score from 0-10 for every wave surfed. However, only the top two waves from each surfer get calculated into their final score.
Due to the nature of the sport, surfers are judged on a slightly different criteria than other athletes. Waves are scored by a panel of experienced judges using a five-point system.
Commitment and difficulty: This factor is the most important and judges the types, degree of difficulty, and risk of the moves performed. Additionally, because all waves are different, athletes are also judged on how high-risk the wave they have chosen is, and how committed that surfer is to maximise the potential scoring opportunities on each wave.
Innovation and progression: In addition to the standard manoeuvres in a surfer's repertoire, the judges will also award points for those who push the boundaries of modern surfing with progressive moves such as aerial or tail slide variations.
Variety: While quality is the most important, judges are also looking out for athletes who incorporate many different types of manoeuvres into their surfing.
Combination: This point considers how seamlessly a surfer can connect high scoring manoeuvres such as barrels, turns, and aerials on the same wave.
Speed, power, and flow: This age-old surfing mantra refers to an athlete's style on a wave, but also the subtle technical elements that separate good surfers from great surfers. The ability to react to shifting conditions on a wave and maintain proper speed to perform high scoring manoeuvres, the amount of power that is going into each move so that it can be displayed at it's highest potential, and a flow in the way that a surfer connects each move from start to finish.
Most recent headlines
11/12/2025
Dalet, a leading provider of cloud-native, end-to-end media workflow solutions, ...
20/11/2025
CINCINNATI Oklahoma Community Television (OCT) has selected GatesAir and Triveni Digital as key technology partners in an ATSC 3.0 deployment that establishes a...
20/11/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has opened a wide-ranging inquiry into the relations between broadcast networks and their affiliates that could...
20/11/2025
NEW YORK Ad spend in the creator economy has more than doubled since 2021 from $13.9B to $29.5B in 2024 and that amount is projected to reach $37 billion in 202...
20/11/2025
Graduate Spotlight: Krysta Mirsik DePuy The educator from Hackettstown, New Jersey, shares how it took her 11 years to find the right graduate program for her...
20/11/2025
LONDON The winners of the Rise Awards 2025, which recognize women and companies whose achievements have stood out in the media technology industry, have been an...
20/11/2025
SANTA MONICA & NEW YORK Lionsgate's Worldwide Television Distribution Group and Debmar-Mercury have launched MovieSphere Gold in more than 30 million homes....
20/11/2025
ALAMEDA, Calif. Clear-Com has introduced its four-channel HelixNet beltpack, a next-generation advancement of its widely used two-channel model, and anticipates...
20/11/2025
NEW PROVIDENCE, N.J. Streaming technology and services provider Kiswe has launched Kiswe Core, a next-generation cloud-based platform designed to simplify the s...
20/11/2025
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. Dolby Laboratories has signed on as an official signature partner of the Bay Area Host Committee (BAHC) for the 2026 Super Bowl and the we...
20/11/2025
STUTTGART, Germany 3 Screen Solutions (3SS) has announced that the Canadian multiservice operator Telus has launched its Telus TV+ entertainment platform on Sam...
20/11/2025
Major League Baseball has announced deals with ESPN, NBCUniversal and Netflix covering 2026-2028 that make ESPN the exclusive distributor for MLB.TV, put regula...
20/11/2025
Berklee Presents Holiday Extravaganza: Duke Ellingtons The Nutcracker Suite and ...
20/11/2025
It's the Late Late Toy Show BIG BIG Ticket Giveaway day!
It's the Late ...
20/11/2025
Editor's note: This post is part of Into the Omniverse, a series focused on how developers, 3D practitioners and enterprises can transform their workflows u...
20/11/2025
The How To Gael pocast gals, comedian Chris Kent and quizzer Darragh Ennis drop by for the fifth episode of The 2 Johnnies Late Night Lock In
In the penultimat...
20/11/2025
Tonight on RT Prime Time, Marie Crowe on how a Reading School changed her son&#...
20/11/2025
The NVIDIA Blackwell RTX upgrade is nearing the finish line, letting GeForce NOW Ultimate members across the globe experience true next-generation cloud gaming ...
20/11/2025
Tanya Berger-Wolf's first computational biology project started as a bet wit...
19/11/2025
Sphere Sound Kicks Up Its Heels at Radio City Music HallUltra-immersive system from the singular Las Vegas venue is also ready for sportsBy Dan Daley, Audio Edi...
19/11/2025
The Future of Stadium and Arena Video Control Rooms: Tech Leaders Talk 4K, IP, a...
19/11/2025
One Year at Intuit Dome: Walking Through the Stunning Arena's Advanced Video...
19/11/2025
SVG Sit-Down: IMG's Francois Westcombe Goes Inside IMG's Annual Digital ...
19/11/2025
Inside Brighton & Hove Albion's fan-first media machine By George Bevir
Tuesday, November 18, 2025 - 10:10
Print This Story
Brighton & Hove Albion'...
19/11/2025
Rock Chalk Rebuild, Part 1: Kansas Athletics Brings New Production Power to Rebu...
19/11/2025
Rock Chalk Rebuild, Part 2: A Pro's Guide to Kansas Athletics' New Video...
19/11/2025
MLB Media Rights Shakeup: NBC Inks Three-Year Deal for Sunday Night Baseball, Pe...
19/11/2025
Rohan Parashuram Kanawade attends the premiere of Sabar Bonda (Cactus Pears) at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival at Egyptian Theatre on January 26, 2025, in Pa...
19/11/2025
Awards season is heating up, and the International Documentary Association just ...
19/11/2025
Aerojet Rocketdyne President Ken Bedingfield and Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders were joined by state and local officials to celebrate the groundbreaking o...
19/11/2025
L3Harris and PentenAmio formalise their teaming agreement at MilCIS 2025, streng...
19/11/2025
Calrec gives Phoenix Broadcast Solutions its full support in strategic multi-year enterprise partnership New Singapore OB company invests in Calrec technology f...
19/11/2025
October brings a larger audience in front of TV screens. The cooler autumn weather and the continuation of new programming schedules brought increases in both t...
19/11/2025
IRVING, Texas Nexstar Media Group and Tegna filed applications on Nov. 18 with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) seeking its consent to transfer broad...
19/11/2025
Vitec has acquired Datapath, a developer of real-time video processing for large-scale video walls, AVoIP content distribution and KVM control in mission-critic...
19/11/2025
NEVADA CITY, Calif. Telestream has introduced ARGUS Version 2.3, which introduces Live Look, a feature that lets operators inspect live and on-demand streams vi...
19/11/2025
STAMFORD, Conn. and NEW YORK Charter Communications, Inc. has announced a major deal with Amazon Web Services (AWS) that establishes AWS as one of Charters stra...
19/11/2025
TOKYO Atomos has announced a major firmware update that brings integrated camera control to the Ninja TX GO and Ninja TX its new CFexpress-based monitor-recor...
19/11/2025
Berklee's Signature Series Reimagines the Musical and Visual Artistry of Col...
19/11/2025
PlayBox Neo departed the NAB Show New York 2025 on a high note. The company's all-new PlayBox Neo Suite made a splash on the show floor, drawing strong inte...
19/11/2025
AAVBR (American Audio Visual Baton Rouge), a leading full-service event production company serving Louisiana and the Gulf Coast region, has enhanced its product...
19/11/2025
In its mission to deliver live event services combining advanced engineering with a creative approach to captivating live sports and entertainment experiences, ...
19/11/2025
NEW YORK Short-form vertical video has exploded across platforms like TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, but a new survey commissioned by Media.net, a provider of c...
19/11/2025
NEW YORK YES Network, the regional sports network home of the New York Yankees and Brooklyn Nets, and CAMB.AI have struck a partnership they said will leverage ...
19/11/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has issued detailed guidance on filings that were disrupted by the government shutdown. While many of those fil...
19/11/2025
NEW YORK The popularity of NFL games is largely responsible for continued seasonal momentum in TV viewership into October (measured Sept. 29-Oct. 26), according...
19/11/2025
DirecTV has announced that its MyFree DirecTV streaming service has added seven new channels. Those include four sports services, NBA FAST, Red Bull TV, DAZN Ri...
19/11/2025
SURREY, U.K. Mark Roberts Motion Control (MRMC) has launched Flair Bridge, a compact device that transforms how operators control the company's motion-contr...
19/11/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission, which is continuing to rapidly ramp up its operations after the end of the federal government shutdown, has se...
Olympic surfing at Tokyo 2020: Top five things to know posted: 02/03/2021 
