Here Comes Carissa!
As Hawaii’s most accomplished teenager, Carissa Moore has hardly made a blip on our radar screen.
By Chad Pata
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“When we got there we saw black,” remembers Moore. “The beach was littered with rubbish and debris. My sisters and I got to work right away and began picking up rubbish and filling up trash bags. We spent several hours trying our best to clean as much as we could.
“The following day my dad woke us up really early and told us to come see something he had found on the beach. We followed him to find a dead sea turtle on the sand. A piece of netting was wrapped so tightly around its neck that it choked to death. It had to be one of the saddest things I have ever seen.”
The incident had such an effect on her that she now preaches about how others can help the environment in a section named “Make a Difference” on her web site, carissamoore.com.
Though she enjoys camping at the North Shore, the south is where she does her surfing. Her home break is Kewalos, which works well since she has three younger sisters who like to surf as well.
“Kewalos is great for us because Carissa can surf on the outside and the smaller ones can be kind of staggered on the inside,” says Katie, who teaches at Kahala Elementary. “There’s a great big channel and everyone can kind of paddle around.”
The wave sets up perfectly for Moore.This is the break where they held the King of the Groms, providing her with a solid, steady canvas with which to paint her moves. The adrenaline rush of a monster winter swell doesn’t much appeal to her.
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“I like small to medium waves, I’ve been to North Shore a couple times, to Haleiwa, but all the time my dad’s right there by me,” says Moore, who has surfed up to 15-foot waves. “I’m scared of big waves.”
Winning the Eddie may not be in the cards for her, but you would-n’t want Allen Iverson guarding Shaq either. She excels in the carving, not the death-defying.
Surfer magazine is so high on her that she just finished a photo shoot for a photo layout in Indonesia, courtesy of her biggest sponsor, Roxy.
But summer is coming to a close and despite the fame, teenagers must get back to school. She is a straight-A student at Punahou, a fact that Katie believes gives Carissa the diversity kids need.
“I think because she has done so well in school, and because she goes to Punahou and has to work hard, it has given her so much balance in her surfing,” says Katie.
“You see these days so many of the surfer kids coming up with the home schooling so they can surf all day. Personally, I think that puts a lot of pressure on the kids.”
So it’s back to the books for the phenom, and the surfing world will have to wait.
She says she plans to turn pro after graduation, so the start of her professional career is still three years out.
Consider yourselves warned: Carissa’s wave is coming, and she never misses her ride.
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