Surf journalist Chas Smith reports from Paris 2024!

“Paris will be alive. I’ll be here covering surfing from the actual site of the Paris 2024 Olympics as opposed to Tahiti."

A common, and fair, criticism of this news site is that principal reporter Chas Smith rarely ventures beyond his southern Californian neighbourhood.

Instead, he sits in his living room sipping Dr Pepper in orange sunglasses, white slacks and a white sweater, his lustrous yellow hair catching glints of the San Diego sun.

In the interests of a fair and accurate account of Paris 2024’s surfing component, Chas Smith has rented an apartment in the Marais there and, today, in his first instalment reports on the hate, boredom and sadness felt by all surfers compelled to fly to Tahiti for Paris 2024 and not the host city itself.

“Paris will be alive. I’ll be here covering surfing from the actual site of the Olympics as opposed to Tahiti,” says Smith. “But, maybe there’s a silver lining. Maybe for a Filipe Toledo could wander the streets imagining the Belle Epoque? That he was there himself, sitting at a corner bistro. Maybe Filipe Toledo could write some poetry, like Moliere. Maybe he could learn to speak French really good. Maybe he could learn to speak French really good.”