“Band-Aid girl” Candelaria Resano takes on challenge to surf Teahupo’o without going underwater after breaking nose
Most Tahiti-bound travellers return home with a collection of perfect paradise snapshots. The ones Candelaria Resano brought back show her with black eyes and a plaster on her nose. Find out why the Nicaraguan surfer has no doubts that it was all worth it and why her biggest goal is to go back there this year.
If telling someone to surf Teahupo’o sounds like a dare, imagine telling them to surf it without getting their head underwater.
That is exactly what Candelaria Resano’s doctor instructed her to do after an amateur surfer accidentally broke her nose with a board on the first day of surf camp in Teahupo’o.
As it turned out, even a broken nose was not an obstacle big enough to stop Resano from dropping into one of the most dangerous waves on the planet.
“I just love that wave. I've never had the chance to get to know it,” Resano told Olympics.com. “If I didn't go back out there, I would be so mad.”
Next time, Resano wants to go back out to Teahupo'o as an Olympian, and she is now aiming to prove at the 2024 ISA World Surfing Games in Puerto Rico that she and the famous Tahitian wave are a worthy match.
Candelaria Resano: Long trip, short snap
With big wave surfer Manuel Resano for a father, Candelaria Resano was almost destined to spend the days chasing the biggest swells herself.
And when the offer came to surf one of the most infamous waves of all, naturally, she could not refuse. Her destination was Teahupo’o, which will serve as the venue for the Olympic surfing competition from 27 July to 5 August.
To help athletes like Resano who have never surfed the wave before, the International Surfing Association held an Athlete Training Camp on the Tahitian wave in July 2023. Eleven athletes who have provisionally qualified for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games* or have a good chance of getting one of the remaining 18 slots were invited.
Resano was selected for the camp as a likely candidate for the women’s universality spot.
Unfortunately for the 18-year-old surfer, her first time surfing the wave ended in a freak accident. An amateur speed surfer let go of their board and it broke Resano’s nose.
“I didn't know it was that bad because it was a clean break. It was like 'dunk', the board hit me,” she said. “But my friend Saffi [Vette], who was also in the training camp, she looked at me and she was like, ‘Oh my God’. And she starts yelling, ‘Jet ski, jet ski!’ And I was like, ‘What? I'm fine. I'm fine’. I guess I have high pain tolerance.”
The first thing Resano did after getting a boat to shore was call her doctor.
She soon wished she could forget that conversation.
“The scariest part, actually, it wasn't breaking it. It was my doctor,” she said. “I called him. I was like, ‘What do I do?’ He was like, ‘Here's what you're gonna do. You're gonna grab two chopsticks. You're going to put them in your nose’. I hung up immediately. I was like, ‘There's no way I'm cracking this back into place like that’.”
“He wanted me to go, clinck, and I was like, ‘Hell no’,” Candelaria Resano to Olympics.com
Two hours later Resano made it to the hospital in Papara. The X-rays showed that her nose was broken into three fragments and, since she came to the hospital too late, the doctors could not no longer crack it into place.
“I didn't know it was that bad, but I could feel it,” Resano said. “There wasn't one hard part in my nose. It was like mush. And the swelling was so bad. My face started swelling. My eyes were completely black. My nose was getting black too. It was crazy.”
*As National Olympic Committees have the exclusive authority for the representation of their respective countries at the Olympic Games, athletes' participation at the Paris Games depends on their NOC selecting them to represent their delegation at Paris 2024.
Click here to see the official qualification system for each sport.
Candelaria Resano’s challenge: Surf Teahupo’o without going underwater
Now, most people would take a broken nose as a sign to take it easy. Not Resano, who went out to Teahupo’o again two days later.
Her coaches and family tried to talk her out of it.
“My dad called me. He's like, ‘Hey, I'll put you on the next flight home’,” she recalled. “And I was like, ‘Hell no, I'm staying here for another week’.”
“It is a high-consequence wave. It's the ultimate testing ground, which is what makes it so exciting, why I wanted to go back out,” Candelaria Resano to Olympics.com
After calling her doctor again, Resano got his grudging permission to surf – on one condition. She had to promise to surf Teahupo’o without getting her head under the water.
Defying all expectations, including her own, Resano managed to follow the doctor’s orders.
“As soon as I saw a set approaching, like a bigger one that I knew I wanted to turn around and catch, I just scooted deep and out into the ocean, and I was like, ‘Don't break on me’, because my nose was so soft. Everything hurt. I couldn't even sleep,” she recalled.
“Every wave I went, I was like, ‘No, I'm not falling. I'm going to make this drop. There's no way I'm going to fall’. I guess mindset really helped me make the drops. I wouldn't change it for anything. I'm so happy I did it.”
“Scar Girl” Resano: “I have a really high pain tolerance”
It took Resano about a month before she could get nose surgery in Nicaragua. Until then, she was breathing only through her mouth.
As uncomfortable as the broken nose at Teahupo’o was, however, it was not Resano’s most memorable injury. That honour belongs to the time when, aged 6, the fin of a surfboard flew up and sliced her face.
“If you put your finger through my nose, it would come out over there,” Resano said pointing to her right cheek. “I was Band-Aid girl for a while. I was scar girl because I had a Band-Aid. This thing couldn't be exposed to the sun for like three years or something, so I had a Band-Aid tan because I surfed all the time.
“I started surfing again two weeks after. I was like, ‘I don't care’. I was like, ‘Mom, I need waterproof Band-Aids, let's go’.”
The scar from that childhood accident is still visible on Resano’s face, but now there are no more adhesives to cover it up.
“All my scars are part of me, and I love it,” the surfer said.
Teahupo’o irresistible pull for Candelaria Resano
As physically painful as that week in Tahiti was, Resano has no regrets about her decision to continue surfing.
More than that, she cannot wait to go back.
“I'm so motivated to get to know that wave better and hopefully be able to compete in the Olympics there,” Resano said. “As soon as I heard four years ago that the Olympics would be held in Teahupo'o, I was like, ‘That's it. I got to go to the Olympics’, and I've been doing everything in my power since.”
This included qualifying for the 2023 Pan American Games and finishing in the Top 15 at the 2023 ISA World Surfing Games. Resano has another chance to prove her skill at the 2024 ISA World Surfing Games where eight individual women’s quotas are on the line.
The Nicaraguan athlete is also a strong candidate for a universality spot at Paris 2024, which will be chosen through the Olympic Games Tripartite Commission.
And if she does get a ticket to the Olympics, Resano already has a solid game plan in mind.
“If I get the chance to go back again, I'll go with a full quiver and I'm not breaking my nose,” she promised.
Watch Candelaria Resano and other Paris 2024 hopefuls compete at the final Olympic surfing qualifier from 23 February to 3 March on Olympics.com and the official Olympics app.