Caroline
Marks
United States
·
Surfing
Date of birth | 14 February 2002 |
|---|---|
Place of birth | Boca Raton, Florida |
Age | 24 |
Nationality | United States |
Career start | 2011 |
Disciplines | Surfing Competition |
Forget peer pressure, Caroline Marks’s older brothers provided all the incentive she needed to ascend to the top of surfing's ranks after first getting in the water aged just seven.
Marks’s effort to outperform her brothers elevated her skill set quickly, while the surf break across the road from the family home in Melbourne Beach, Florida, provided the perfect training facility. When the family moved to California, the level of competition also forced her to step up her game.
At the age of 11 Marks won the Under-12 Surfing America Prime – the top US amateur title – then never looked back, winning a slew of national championships before setting her sights on surfing's biggest stage.
Breaking through on the biggest stage
Marks's meteoric rise through the junior ranks was just the beginning for the powerful goofyfooter who, at 15, would become the youngest surfer to ever qualify for the WSL's Championship Tour. In 2018 Marks finished seventh in the world to claim Rookie Of The Year honours, before winning two Championship Tour events and finishing second in the world in 2019, her true breakthrough year.
Marks represented Team USA at the delayed Tokyo Games in 2021 and then, in 2022, won two Championship Tour events as she finished third overall at the end of the regular season.
A world title win and a gold medal
The 2023 season proved to be a memorable one for Marks as she cemented her status among the world's elite with victories in El Salvador and Tahiti. She then defeated five-time world champion Carissa Moore at Lower Trestles to become the first mainland American woman to win the world title since 1997.
Marks carried this brilliant form into the following season as she beat Brazil's Tatiana Weston-Webb at Teahupo'o to claim the gold medal at the Paris Games.
"Once they announced it, I just burst into tears," said Marks. "Just super emotional – your whole life goes into a moment like this, so it's just really special."
Marks had enjoyed a meteoric rise
© World Surf League/Red Bull Content Pool
Celebrating her world title win
© World Surf League/Red Bull Content Pool
Marks feels at home in the ocean
© Domenic Mosqueira/Red Bull Content Pool
Enjoying the F1 in Miami
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