The Evolution of a Champion
5-time World Champion and Olympic gold medalist Carissa Moore announced she's stepping away from competitive surfing. But really, she's expanding the idea of what it means to be an athlete.
About 45 minutes into my interview with Carissa Moore, I asked her what she wanted her legacy to be. It was October 2021, just about two months after Moore won Olympic gold for surfing at the Tokyo Olympics—the sport’s debut at the Summer Games—and two weeks after she won her fifth World Championship title. I was interviewing Moore for a cover story for Red Bull’s magazine and tasked to explore the question: What else does Moore have to prove—to herself, to the sport, to the world?
When you’re an athlete, it’s pretty easy to think of yourself by your accomplishments, to evaluate yourself by your ranking or podium finishes. When you’re considered a generational talent, it’s a hell of a lot of pressure.
Because it been long assumed that Moore will leave a mark on the sport. Ever since she started surfing at age five in the rolling waves of Waikiki. Ever since she began to rack up titles as an amateur. Ever since she joined the professional tour as a teenager and has pushed the progression of women’s surfing with her powerful and creative presence in the water. It’s been a foregone conclusion. I mean, when my editor texted me Moore’s phone number for the interview, her contact showed up as: Carissa Moore, The Champ.
Moore hesitated before answering my question. She said that maybe she hadn’t spent enough time thinking about her future legacy. But when she gathered her thoughts, her answer didn’t have anything to do with her professional accolades. “I want people to remember my surfing because it made them feel something. I want it to spark inspiration. I want them to feel joy and love.”
While Moore said that she hadn’t thought enough about her legacy, she had been thinking about her future. She told me that she’s been on a journey throughout 2021—growing into her own skin, feeling more comfortable in her decision making, trusting herself and having faith that it’s all going to work out, and letting go of the stuff she can’t control. And when she faced some of the highest pressure moments of her career and her life that year, she proved to herself that she could handle it. “Any other year, I would have crumbled,” she said.
In some ways, it seems like notching arguably the most successful year the sport has ever seen has given Moore the freedom to let go of expectations and to walk away from the sport. She has nothing left to prove.
On Friday, Moore announced that she is stepping away from competitive surfing. She’ll surf two competitions this year—the Lexus Pipe Pro on the North Shore of Oahu (the contest window runs between January 29 and February 10) and the Paris Olympics this summer.
In an interview with The New York Times, Moore said she was excited to see what was there outside of competing in a jersey. But still, she’s not immune from worrying.
“All those wins, the competitive part that’s so much of my identity, I’m taking that away, and I’m facing myself this year,” she said. “And that’s scary. Like, who am I? Am I going to be OK? Will I be able to love myself and think that I’m worthy without this?”
I’ve been thinking a lot about athletes—how athlete identities are created and maintained, how athletes can thrive as humans both within and outside the athletic arena, how we can support athletes without reducing them to one-dimensional score cards.
The thing that I really admire about Moore is that she very often shows her full self, that she shows her full heart. She’s “the people’s champion,” as current world champion Caroline Marks described her to me.
Moore is creating a new model for what a woman athlete is and can do outside of and apart from the traditional notions of “athlete.” In talking about stepping away from competitive sport, Moore says she doesn’t think of it as retirement but rather an evolution, echoing the language Serena Williams used when she announced she was turning her focus away from tennis.
It’s been clear that Moore has been searching for a way to free herself from the strictures of competitive surfing and the way it pigeon-holes women. Women are supposed to have a certain body type and surf gracefully, but not too powerfully. Moore broke all those rules. She was doing maneuvers like aerials, fin throws, and massive carving turns at a time when no other girl was doing them. Even when reflecting on her world titles, she describes them as an evolution from achieving a life-long dream to proving she wasn’t a fluke to reclaiming her power to freedom.
But breaking the mode wasn’t always a positive thing. She’s spoken about the body shaming she experienced as a younger athlete because her body didn’t fit the norm considered acceptable for women surfers and how it led to struggles with binge eating. She’s also talked openly about her insecurities, something athletes have been told to steer clear of.
“It’s something I have to work at every day, looking in the mirror and being, like, ‘You’re good enough, Riss. I’m so proud of you. And you can do this. You can do the things that you dream of.’ I think it’s the beauty and the beast of me, because it guides me to keep pushing and going for more, but at the same point, I struggle with just internal peace sometimes.”
She caught herself. “Not sometimes. All the time.”
(Carissa Moore to the The New York Times)
For those who don’t follow professional surfing, it’s hard to emphasize enough the impact that Moore has had on the sport, especially on the women’s side. But the reason I’m proud of my profile of Moore is because, above all else, it showed her as a multi-dimensional person who just happens to do some pretty cool things on a surfboard. It showed how Moore has inspired so many people to believe in the the power of belief. And belief is such a powerful thing.
With her decision to move away from competitive sport, she and so many other women athletes are showing that there can be another path in sport. That athletes don’t have to be one-dimensional and only defined by what they do in the athletic arena. That they are partners and parents and siblings and friends. That, above all, they are human. These conversations about the physical, emotional, and mental needs of athletes are so necessary, especially among the younger generation.
On Instagram, she wrote: “I’ve found that my favorite rides have often come when my heart starts to race a little, there is a tingle of fear, but I paddle over the ledge anyway.”
Paddling over that ledge is scary. I hope that with this evolution, Moore is proud of her legacy. After all, she’s at her best when she acts freely and from the heart.
Speaking of multi-dimensional athletes, I loved this reel from pro runner Nikki Hiltz on how athletes are shaped by all the teammates and coaches they’ve had through the years and how we carry bits and pieces of them with us always.
Thanks for being here. More soon.
Christine
Your story highlights something I've always believed, that no athlete should put "all their eggs in the basket" of their sport. Anyone who's an athlete (professional and amateur enthusiast alike) faces injury and aging. Evolving is healthy! And being an athlete doesn't have to mean competing at the top of the game. Thanks for your post.
I loved reading the original article (I’d never have found it on my own). So inspirational.
There are so many stages through athletics. When I was younger I never expected to get SO MUCH slower as I age. I have and yet running still is such an important part of life. It’s difficult and interesting to evolve and appreciate new phases.
Thanks for sharing the original article and for this post. I really enjoy your writing!!!