Paris 2024: Two candidates ready to replace Teahupo’o

Mathieu Warnier, Media365: published on Wednesday December 6, 2023 at 11:00 p.m.

While doubts are growing about the feasibility of the Paris 2024 surfing events on the Teahupo’o wave, two cities have claimed to be candidates to take the place of the Tahitian site.

Paris 2024 could be forced to review its plans. While the corals were damaged during a test of the infrastructures planned for hosting the surfing events at Teahupo’o, the work was put on hold. If the Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games (COJO) is confident about the viability of the initial project, which would allow French Polynesia to participate in the event, the idea of ​​a plan B should not be completely ruled out. It is with this in mind that two candidates rejected in favor of Tahiti have confirmed their availability in the event of relocation of the Paris 2024 surfing events, these are the Gironde beach of Lacanau and the La Torche site, in Finistère. . “We continued to work quietly and today if we are called upon, we will of course be happy to host the Olympic surfing events,” he declared to theAFPthe mayor of Lacanau Laurent Peyrondet. Since last summer there have been a few press articles reporting difficulties, in particular difficulties in intervening on the site. So we stayed on standby. »

Only Biarritz no longer seems interested

It must be said that the Gironde site is very well known on the world surfing circuit, which stops there every year. On the Brittany side, the mayor of Pont-L’Abbé Stéphane Le Doaré assures that the region “will not say no” to the idea of ​​hosting the Olympic Games. “For the moment, we have not been asked but we are used to hosting competitions and installing temporary infrastructures,” he added to theAFP. We have average waves in summer but surfable by everyone. » However, the one who is also president of the community of communes of Pays Bigouden Sud is asking for a rapid decision from the COJO, if possible “before the end of the year”. “That requires a minimum of management and organization,” he added. On the other hand, the city of Biarritz did not comment after criticizing the choice of Teahupo’o by speaking of that of the “surf show”. If the ISA has validated the at least temporary cessation of work in Tahiti, the concerns encountered by the organizers could well lead to a revision of the initial plan.