Picture by 2024 Getty Images
The rain comes and goes during the interview with John John Florence. One moment it is quiet, the next torrential. Roosters crow in the background and a gingko lizard crawls up a whitewashed wall.
The two-time surfing world champion and environmental advocate is in his element – surrounded by wild nature, raindrops bouncing off a surfboard he has left on the grass behind him, answering questions about the sport he has done for 29 out of his 31 years.
There are smiles and laughs as he talks about what he most looks forward to in his second Olympic appearance.
“My mindset this year leading into the Paris 2024 Olympics is in such a good place and a much better place than I was before the Tokyo (2020) event,” Florence said.
“The last few years, I've been in this mindset before I go compete on the (WSL Championship) Tour that I'm like, ‘I don't know if I really want to be there this year’, and then I just go anyway. Whereas this year, I was just like, ‘No, I'm going, I'm going all in’. I really want to win an Olympic gold medal so I looked at it like that. I was like, ‘What will set me up the best for that?’”
As the Olympic Games Paris 2024 opened, Florence was set up in the best possible position – first in the world rankings, with four top two finishes this season, including at Tahiti Pro. Olympics.com spoke to the USA athlete about re-discovering his passion for surfing, and how he balances the adrenaline-filled career of a pro surfer with his down-to-earth environmental hobbies.
Florence is only 31 years old, so it may seem premature to be talking about competition fatigue, but once his story is mapped out on a timeline, that possibility becomes clearer.
The Hawaii native started surfing at the age of two and was riding his home wave, the powerful Banzai Pipeline, when he was five.
At 13, a mere 40kg and 1.49m tall, Florence became the youngest competitor in the prestigious Triple Crown of Surfing, which features the best Hawaiian waves – Haleiwa, Sunset and Pipeline. His effort turned heads and got him noticed.
In his interview with The New York Times for its "Baby on Board" piece, the teen surfer casually talked about play-wrestling Kelly Slater, arguably the best surfer of all time, and having no doubts about his place among the world’s best despite the significant age gap between them.
In the years since, Florence has proven to be more than a child prodigy, returning to claim the Triple Crown in 2011 as the youngest-ever winner, and claiming two titles on the WSL Championship Tour.
But this success came at a cost. The more he competed, the less connected Florence felt to why he started surfing in the first place.
The USA athlete struggled to find the right mindset during his Olympic debut at Tokyo 2020, where he finished ninth, and the years since only got more challenging.
“It's hard when you compete your whole life, from a little kid all the way to my age now,” Florence said. “I've been on Tour for 13 years and it's hard to find motivation every year and hard to find that excitement. And so, last year, I was really in that headspace of not really knowing why I was there, not really wanting to be there and not fully committed.
“It made it harder on myself being one foot in, one foot out. And I'm there, but I'm not mentally there and mentally committed to it. It made the losses hurt a lot. It made the wins feel good, but it was just an emotional rollercoaster for me and took a lot of energy.”
Finding himself at a crossroads, with rumours swirling that he might quit the Championship Tour altogether, Florence did the exact opposite – he went all in.
“Coming into this year, I really remembered how much I enjoy the work ethic of competing and being an athlete and putting in the time and the energy in the lead-up to the year and setting a plan and being 100 per cent committed,” he said. “It felt really good to have the full commitment mentally, physically, putting my life into it. It feels good when you're dedicating your life to one thing.”
The new approach has paid off on the scoreboard as well with Florence winning El Salvador Pro this year, and finishing second at Pipeline Pro, Margaret River Pro, and Tahiti Pro.
His 9.33 ride in the Tahiti Pro final against Italo Ferreira in May sparked talk about what this meant for his return to the same wave in two months’ time for the Olympic Games. Another 9.33 score, this time in the first round of the Olympic competition on Saturday (27 July), confirmed him as one of the strongest contenders.
Florence, for one, is not hiding his ambitions.
“A gold medal from the Olympics would be incredible for me,” he said. “It's definitely a huge dream of mine. When I started my surfing career, I never imagined that we'd be in the Olympics. But now, to be a part of it and be competing for it, it's pretty amazing. I've won world titles, but I've never had a gold medal, so I think that'd be an amazing thing to have.”
Florence was hoping Teahupo’o will be “big and scary” for the Olympics. Big waves are his specialty.
In those conditions, he said, a surfer must not only have a technical skill set, but also the ability to stay calm. Florence is that master of zen – tune into his Instagram account, volume on, and enjoy his smooth video edits set to 60s beach classics and sunny Bossa nova tunes.
“You want to be calm and relaxed,” he said. “If you're in the Olympics or you're in another contest, there's naturally things that come up inside of you, like nervousness. It gets you moving, it gets your heart pumping and stuff. But for the most part, you want to be calm and you want to make clean, good decisions.
“Before my heats, I breathe and I focus on what I'm feeling in the moment and relax my shoulders and then go out and have fun. And that's when I do my best.”
It is not only the relaxed music beats in his head that help Florence stay calm on the waves. Visualisation and meditation are other techniques that the surfer turns to often.
“Meditations are really good help for me especially in being able to take a step back and see where I am and see what I'm doing and not get so caught up in the moment,” Florence said. “The one I've been doing a lot lately is just trying to breathe and think about space and create a lot of space.
“If I can create as much space as I can, it allows me to be excited and all the good things come out of it, rather than so many thoughts, if I win or lose, or this happens or that happens. I let go of it all.”
That mental strength will be especially helpful on an intimidating wave like Teahupo’o. While Florence has been surfing in Tahiti since he was a kid, there are still things about the Olympic wave that intimidate him.
“It's scary. You're in a heat and you almost don't want the priority because you don't want to go. You're like, 'Oh no, I have to go on the next wave now'. But it's the best feeling because it's scary and it's on the edge of life and death,” Florence said.
“Having that mental strength for Tahiti, I think it'll block out a lot of external stories and things that happen in competition and the emotions that come in around it. Knowing that I'm going into a huge event on a big stage and being like, ‘I'm going to be nervous sometimes and sometimes I'll not feel the best. I can't wake up feeling 100 per cent every single day’ and understanding those things and knowing that that's all going to happen.”
No matter how Teahupo’o looks, big or small, Florence says specators will appreciate the beauty of what many surfers call the “seventh wonder of the world”.
For Florence, it is part of his life-long appreciation not only for the sea, but nature in general.
Known for his style and aerial manoeuvres on the waves, Florence also stands out for his efforts to live a more environmentally conscious lifestyle. Gardening and beekeeping are among his hobbies, and while a pro surfer’s schedule requires Florence to travel a lot, he tries to balance it out by reducing his ecological footprint.
Florence travels with a water filter and never buys plastic bottles. When at home in Hawaii, he and his wife use solar energy to keep off the grid as much as possible.
“Surfing is so tied in with nature. It's such a part of it that you can't ignore it,” John John Florence to Olympics.com
Picture by Ben Thouard-Pool/Getty Images
Florence is constantly learning more about the ocean, whether he is on a surfboard or exploring the waves though his other big passion, sailing.
The two-time surfing world champion started sailing on a Laser 2 and Hobie 16 but has since moved up to bigger vessels, such as the foiling Phantom 18 and Gunboat 48. Sailing to isolated islands in the Pacific Ocean, Florence discovered new ecosystems and the conservation works that are carried out there.
He documented one such month-long trip to the Line Islands in his Vela blog. It showed Florence and the rest of the crew, including younger brother Nathan, fishing, reading, and flipping off the boat’s bow.
“I've gotten really into sailing and travelling in that way and finding waves and going to really remote places,” Florence said. “There's so much you can learn about the ocean and just being on the ocean for days and days and days and travelling from one point to another thousands of miles across it.”
Having felt the full wonder of the ocean himself, Florence is eager to inspire others to make this natural connection as well through surfing, sailing or other sports.
“(I’m) trying to get other people to experience it through different ways. It doesn't have to be surfing. It could be bodyboarding, or it could just be spending time in the ocean,” Florence said. “Just trying to get people to experience it because then they have a connection to it and from there, they can understand why they should protect it.”
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