Picture this: you’re a kid, 21 years young. You have the biggest day of your life tomorrow; your entire family, friends, and country are counting on you. The whole world is watching. One wrong move, and you blow it. How would you sleep that night? Like a baby, right?
Um, yeah, how ‘bout no.
“I was so freaking nervous,” said Leilani McGonagle after the dust had settled at the 2021 ISA World Surfing Games in El Salvador, the final Olympic qualifying event. “For three nights, I couldn’t sleep. Like I would go to bed and wake up at midnight and wouldn’t go to sleep after that. I’d try, but I’d just toss and turn. Then, I’d wake up – or whatever you wanna call it, basically just get out of bed – and try my best to put my game face on. Like, okay, I’m running off three hours of sleep, but here goes nothing. This is the biggest contest of my life. No biggie, right? I can do this, right? Right?!”
Well, the Costa Rican pulled it off…lack of sleep be damned.
Leilani McGonagle, pure Olympic qualification bliss. Photo: ISA/Pablo Franco
“When I qualified, I wasn’t a hundred percent sure if I had or not,” she said. “And then my brother [Noe Mar McGonagle; also a shredder who, unfortunately, just barely missed qualification] was like, ‘You’re going to the Olympics!’ And I just burst into tears – I had a complete meltdown – because I had obsessed over that goal. I prepared physically, mentally; I did everything possible. Before the event, I knew that I had done everything I could. I just needed to go out and surf. It was definitely a relief and rewarding once it became official. And it’s still so surreal. Like I cannot believe it, but I did it.”
The road to qualification was grueling for McGonagle, as it was for all the Tokyo 2021 surfers. It entailed training, physically and mentally, in addition to dedicating everything to this one specific goal. Luckily, like a lot of the other athletes, she had plenty of support – because, for once, international sporting committees, started taking surfing seriously.
McGonagle putting her experience at Pavones into practice on the left at La Bocana during the 2021 ISA World Surfing Games in El Salvador. Photo: ISA/Pablo Jimenez
“The Olympics really brought this whole new perspective to the sport,” said McGonagle. “It was like, ‘Hey, you’re an athlete now.’ For so many years it was like, ‘You’re an athlete, but you’re a surfer. It’s not a real sport.’ When the Olympics happened, Costa Rica took it seriously. Aside from soccer, they wanted to really step up our game with surfing. It was totally legitimized. Whereas before, you could be a great surfer but end up just being a bum on the beach giving surf lessons for the rest of your life or something.”
It also helped that McGonagle grew up surfing one of the best waves in Costa Rica, if not one of the best lefthand pointbreaks in the world: Pavones. (And yeah, it’s a crazy thing that two surfers who were raised on the same wave are going to the Olympics; see our chat with Leon Glatzer here.)
“It was like, ‘Hey, you’re an athlete now.’ For so many years it was like, ‘You’re an athlete, but you’re a surfer. It’s not a real sport.’ When the Olympics happened, Costa Rica took it seriously.”
“We grew up in, like, the before technology era, and also practically at the end of the world,” she said. “Pavones is 15 minutes away from where the road ends in Costa Rica. So, it’s all dirt roads, tropical, straight-up jungle. Everything’s very small. And when I say small, I mean two of the biggest supermarkets in Pavones put together make up, like, one aisle in the US…and that’s maybe.”
However, what they lack in first-world resources, they make up for in other areas. McGonagle wouldn’t have changed her childhood for anything:
“I had so much fun. I played, I surfed, I did karate…One moment I was playing with Barbies, and the next I was like rolling down a hill with a plastic PVC gun that I had built myself. I definitely had an amazing childhood and I think it has a lot to do with where we grew up. It allowed us to be very free and expressive.”
Just one member of McGonagle’s support system, her dad, on the ground post-heat in El Salvador. Photo: ISA/Pablo Franco
Another thing about Costa Ricans is that, even though it’s a very mellow and pura vida country, they still have a strong national pride. And for McGonagle, that mentality will translate to her time in Tokyo – in addition to having the whole country rooting for her.
“Our culture in Costa Rica is really strong and really passionate and loud,” she said. “From a really young age I became like a firecracker – very opinionated and not afraid to say it how it is. National pride is a huge deal. We fly that flag high, and we know we have a whole country behind us. Because it’s such a small country, everyone’s knows what’s happening and will get behind you. Even if they haven’t surfed, or they know nothing about it. They’re like, ‘Yeah. Let’s go!’ We’re a tiny country, but big at heart.”
McGonagle again, La Bocana. Photo: ISA/Sean Evans
Representing her country, becoming one of the first Olympic surfers in history, and having the chance to bring home a country are all very important to McGonagle. But she has another element inspiring her to compete in Tokyo, another aspect that’s much more sentimental. And that’s Katy Diaz, the El Salvadorian surfer who tragically passed away earlier this year.
“We’ve been friends since we were like 10 years old,” McGonagle said about Katy. “I had so much love and appreciation for her. And I had planned to come and stay with her for two months and train with her. And like two weeks before I came, she passed away. The last day I was with her, and I was about to get on a plane, she looked at me and said, ‘You gotta do this for us.’ And I looked at her and said, ‘What? We’re going to do this together!’ And she was like, ‘No. You’re going to do this for us.’”
“It was bigger than me, bigger than for my country, for my pride, for my ego. No, it was for her.”
McGonagle used that love, that memory, that tragedy, that loss of her good friend as motivation to qualify for the Olympics. And she’ll carry that with her once the Games begin.
“Ever since I got the news that she passed away, I realized that this was for her,” McGonagle said. “It was bigger than me, bigger than for my country, for my pride, for my ego. No, it was for her. She really gave me purpose and strength to push through it. And she’ll be with me in Tokyo, and for the rest of my life. She was an amazing human and, because of her, I have to believe that there is something bigger out there that needed her light for her light for a greater purpose.”
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And now, just a few short weeks away from the start of the Olympics, how’s McGonagle feeling? What would it mean for her to bring home a medal to the tiny town of Pavones?
“It would be amazing,” she said. “I just gotta start manifesting it. It’s all going to happen very quick and we’re going to be up against the best of the world. So, I’m just going to try to prepare as best as I can. And hey, I already made it here. That’s insane. I can’t believe that I’m going to be one of the first 40 surfers to ever be in the Olympics. That’s historic in itself, and to be honest, I’m just so honored. I’ve already won, in my mind. But don’t get me wrong, doing well in Tokyo would be pretty freaking cool, too. [Laughs.]”
For a refresher on who else is going to Tokyo 2021, here are all the qualifiers:
Women:
2019 WSL Championship Tour
Carissa Moore (USA)
Caroline Marks (USA)
Tatiana Weston-Webb (BRA)
Silvana Lima (BRA)
Brisa Hennessy (CRC)
Sally Fitzgibbons (AUS)
Stephanie Gilmore (AUS)
Johanne Defay (FRA)
2021 World Surfing Games
Yolanda Sequeria (POR)
Teresa Bonvalot (POR)
Daniella Rosas (PER)
Leilani McGonagle (CRC)
Mahina Maeda (JPN)
Amuro Tsuzuki (JPN)
Pauline Ado (FRA)
2019 World Surfing Games
Anat Lelior (ISR)
Bianca Buitendag (RSA)
Ella Williams (NZL)
Sofia Mulanovich (PER)
2019 Pan Am Games
Dominic Barona (ECU)
Men:
2019 WSL Championship Tour:
Gabriel Medina (BRA)
Italo Ferreira (BRA)
Kolohe Andino (USA)
John John Florence (USA)
Owen Wright (AUS)
Julian Wilson (AUS)
Jeremy Flores (FRA)
Michel Bourez (FRA)
Kanoa Igarashi (JPN)
Jordy Smith (RSA)
2021 World Surfing Games
Leon Glatzer (GER)
Miguel Tudela (PER)
Lucca Mesinas (PER)
Manuel Selman (CHI)
Hiroto Ohhara (JPN)
2019 World Surfing Games
Rio Waida (INA)
Frederico Morais (POR)
Billy Stairmand (NZL)
Ramzi Boukhiam (MAR)
2019 Pan Am Games
Leandro Usuna (ARG)
Editor’s Note: We’re down in El Salvador covering the 2021 ISA World Surfing Games, but not just the event itself. We’ll be chasing all the interesting side stories, Olympic developments, and on-the-ground happenings, too. Follow along here.