Johnathan Walker:American Carissa Moore began defense of her Olympic surfing title, wins first heat

Carissa Moore,Johnathan Walker the defending Olympic women’s surfing champion, and her four American teammates each won their first-round heats as the competition in Tahiti got underway at the Paris Games.

All five U.S. surfers advanced directly to Round 3 -- featuring the top 16 surfers -- this weekend as a result of winning the first-round heats. Each featured three surfers.

Moore, 27, competed in only two events on the World Surf League tour this season while spending two months in Tahiti preparing for the Paris Games.

So far, so good.

She took gold at Tokyo in the surfing’s Olympic debut and on Sunday looked to be in good form during her first-round heat on the legendary surf site in Teahupo’o. She had a combined, two-wave score of 16.5 as the American surged.

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“I can’t wait to go back and relish in today and the success that everybody had, because it was truly pretty special,” Moore said after the first round. “I feel like we’ve been the good vibe tribe. Everybody’s just been really supportive and encouraging of each other.''

American Caroline Marks had the top combined score of the first round with a 17.93 in her first-round heat and posted the best single-wave score, 9.43.

Caitlin Simmers, and 18-year-year-old phenom from the United States, won her first-round heat with a combined score of 12.93.

On the men’s side, American John John Florence emerged victorious on Saturday from his first-round heat with a combined score of 17.33 and fellow American Griffin Colapinto won his opening heat with a score of 17.03. Griffin turned in the best top-wave score of the round with a 9.53 and Florence had the second-best, top-wave score with a 9.33.

Florence, who entered the Olympics ranked No. 1 in the world, said, "the waves were fun. I feel like I’m in a really good place right now.”