When Tate Carew drops into the park bowl at the Place de la Concorde, there will be certain expectations surrounding him – and with good reason.
The 19-year-old from the United States will enter the men’s park skateboarding event at Paris 2024 as the world’s number one ranked skater owing to an impressive collection of results from the past two years.
In the six Olympic qualifiers he entered ahead of the Games, Carew never once finished below sixth place; claiming three podium finishes and a contest victory at the first stop of the Olympic Qualifier Series in Shanghai.
Very few have been as consistent as Carew but it isn’t just the numbers that have made the U.S. skater a point of focus for those looking for potential medallists in the men’s park field in Paris.
In a podcast episode published earlier this year, legendary skateboard star Tony Hawk recounted a story of having identified something special in the skater when watching him at work in an early Olympic qualifier.
“I was watching a qualifying run like two years ago and it was some [Chris] Gregson footage, you know, he’s there and whatever on some story. And I just wrote, ’Tate, Paris 2024’,” Hawk said in a conversation with Jason Ellis and Carew’s Olympic teammate Tom Schaar.
“I saw it,” Hawk confirmed. “I think he’ll do well.”
It prompted Hawk to take a further interest in Carew with his brand sponsoring the U.S. skater and turning him ‘professional’ over a week before the Games started.
Sitting for an interview with Olympics.com not long after his victory in the People’s Republic of China, Carew seemed comfortable recounting his winning moment. But there is a notable shift when shared how it felt to hear Hawk’s words recounted back to him.
“Someone told me six or seven months ago that that interaction had happened between Chris Gregson and Tony and I kind of just… I didn’t really know what to say because, at the time, I wasn’t that close to Chris and also I didn’t ride for Tony, but it was so crazy to hear it,” Carew said.
“And then hearing it again on the podcast and hearing Tom, and they all talked about it… I don’t even know how to feel. It’s just very humbling and a great compliment.”
