MARC PARÉ: THE LONG & EMOTIONAL JOURNEY TO THE TOP

Marc Paré’s journey to victory at the Tenerife PWA World Cup was a remarkable story of resilience and determination. Marc tells us how he dealt with losing his sponsorship and also how he fought back from a nasty injury to claim an emphatic victory in El Médano.

Words: Marc Paré // Photos: Carter / pwaworldtour.com and Fish Bowl Diaries.

A NEW BEGINNING

Back in December when I lost my sponsorship with Duotone I was going through a pretty tough time. Emotionally I was a bit shocked because it was so unexpected. It came out of the blue. I thought I was cemented with the brand, but I guess they had to make a difficult decision. I just had my best result on the World Tour ever. I was fighting for the world title heading into the last event, so it was quite hard for me to understand. I took quite a big hit emotionally, but it all turned into something positive in the end, as I came back to Simmer and they made me feel right back at home – as though I’d never left. We have a very good relationship, so in the end, maybe it was meant to be like that. I was not really expecting a reaction when I parted ways with Duotone, but I had a huge amount of support online from all of my followers. There was kind of an explosion of support, which was very reassuring.

I returned to Simmer in early to mid-January. We held some initial talks earlier in December when I found out I lost my sponsorship. I explained to them my situation and I hoped I would be sponsored by them, but I knew the whole industry was going through a tough moment. My plan was to get back in somehow, whichever way we could do. In the end they made huge sacrifices for me to rejoin them, which I’m super grateful for. I was able to start the season in full swing and I was able to do the whole tour and complete all my training. I experienced a huge dip, but then suddenly I was back on track. It was the start of a new beginning.

INJURY STRIKES

I was super motivated once I was back with Simmer. I really wanted to do well and win the world title with them this year. I had an OK result in Japan, but missed out on the final by a very small margin. I then went to Maui to train and was going hard on the water. I had one week of full-on training where I think I actually sailed too much. On the last day, before catching the plane, all hell broke loose. I broke my foot, which was a catastrophe. I remember when I broke it, I just heard a big snap when my whole foot twisted sideways until it couldn’t take anymore. I immediately knew it wasn’t good. I didn’t really get washed; it was just too much pressure while I was rotating a taka. It was just a very unlucky moment. I immediately knew it was bad. When I made it back to the beach I started feeling dizzy. All I kept repeating to the lifeguards was: “My whole season is over, my whole season is over, my whole season is over”. I was just saying that for ten minutes! I couldn’t believe my luck. I assumed it was a bad injury physically, but it wasn’t just physically that it affected me as it caused a great deal of emotional pain as well. After going through all the sponsorship changes at the end of 2023 and getting back on my feet with Simmer, suddenly I was back to fighting again and doing what I love, then everything just went down hill again – which was even worse.

NEW APPROACH

Looking back, the injury gave me time to start a new approach with my physical and mental training. On a positive note, there is always something good that can come out of a bad situation. It was positive in the sense that I could spend some time with the Simmer guys in Sweden working on some boards and learning more about the business, which was cool as well as I got to see how the company operates from the inside. I had a very good physiotherapist in Sweden who helped me with my rehab. The toughest times were the first two or three weeks. The first week my foot was broken and I still had to go through surgery, after which I couldn’t move from the sofa for two weeks. That was very draining as I lost the muscle in my legs and I couldn’t even stand up. Every time I stood up my foot was swelling and it felt like it was going to explode. It was one of the toughest moments of my life, but at the same time it helped me to change a few things about my approach and to do things better.

POZO – A TOUCH TOO SOON

I was slowly recovering in the lead up to the Gran Canaria Gloria Windsurf World Cup, but I wasn’t quite ready, so I did go through a pretty low moment after Gran Canaria had happened. I went there as I thought it was a good place to slowly start getting back on the water after the injury. I thought I could start sailing again and Gran Canaria would be windy. I was just there while the event was happening, which in hindsight perhaps it wasn’t the best idea as it mentally hurt even more not to be competing. I did some commentating with Ben Proffitt, but it wasn’t in a happy place just watching it all. I was still going to the gym and sailing a bit, but I did hit quite a low point mentally. Having to watch the others was painful. My first goal was to try and be ready for Pozo – I knew it would be a very tight schedule and it probably wasn’t realistic, but it was still my first goal. I am glad I didn’t do anything stupid and enter. To this day my foot is still painful and that would have been too early. Two weeks before Tenerife I had a session in Pozo and it was pretty painful to sail there. There is so much chop and it is a very physical place to sail. Your body has to be so tense when you fly over the chop, so you get a lot of weird twists and at that point I knew I wasn’t totally recovered, which hurt me, but deep down it made me realise that I had made the right decision not to enter Pozo.

TENERIFE – EMOTIONS RUN HIGH

Winning in Tenerife made up for all those hard times. What more could I ask for? After coming out of an injury like that and experiencing the biggest low points of my career mentally. Those eight months were really tough. I knew I was back to a decent level of sailing, but I didn’t know how I was going to be able to compete and react. To be able to win in the single elimination and the double was absolutely awesome, but it was made even better by the fact that I got to share the podium with Victor [Fernandez] and Julian [Salmonn], who are two of my very good friends. Both my parents were in Tenerife as well, so it was just an incredible feeling to win – the perfect storm in a sense. After the final, it was a weird feeling, I was so happy that I won that I was overcome with emotion – it all hit me at once. Just the thought of what I had been through and all the work I had put in had finally just paid off. It was a culmination of everything I had been through over the years. I had never really been able to get to the top until that moment after all those years of fighting. I just broke down in tears on the beach. It was a very emotional moment for me.

JUSTIFIED

When the double elimination started creeping up, I was starting to get nervous. It was better for me that I sailed that final because that was a reassurance as well. It proved a point that I didn’t just win because I was on fire on one day. It took me a day after winning the single to be ready for that heat mentally. I was constantly trying to stay calm right up until the final of the double elimination. My brain always over thinks these situations. I was analysing all these different scenarios, but I just had to try and tell my brain to just focus on staying calm and let my sailing do the talking. I had this weird click right before the final with Victor. I just knew I was going to win. I just knew it. I had that same feeling when I won the European Championship back in 2019. It sounds a bit stupid, but that helped me perform better. I went from really nervous to super confident and I am not really sure how it happened.

Straight off the bat, I landed a perfect double loop. I remember Victor had got underneath me right before the heat started, so I stayed a bit upwind from him and I just saw this peak lining up. I had done some of my other doubles in the previous heats in exactly the same spot. There was this weird south swell that was setting up this peak. I could just see it and I already knew I was going to do the double. I was flying towards the ramp and it just kept getting steeper. I didn’t have that much power in my sail, but it all worked out. I had speed and a good ramp, so I pulled the trigger, and the rest as they say is history.

FIN TUNE UP

I am a bit of a fin freak and I was messing around with my fins just before the event. I had used that board with my standard onshore set up, but I changed the fins around on one of my warmup sessions and they gave me an extra spark in my turns. They felt good and like I was moving better on the water. That became my set up for the event. I was using a thruster – on my big board I had an 18cm and 11cm on the side, and on the rest of my boards I have 17’s and 10’s on the side. In the final I was on a 92L board and my 5.3m. I could have gone a sail size bigger if I had to, but with the 5.6m the wind has to be consistently light otherwise you soon get overpowered. I also knew that I could get planing very early with the 5.3m anyway, so that’s what I took in the final.

The atmosphere on the beach after the finals was awesome. It was cool to win at the same time as Lina Erpenstein because we are similar ages, and she has also been trying for many years to break into the top spot, so we have similar stories. Lina is now leading the world rankings and I am in a much better place right now after the horrid start to the year. I feel relaxed and relieved, but I need to keep going and keep moving forwards, that is the plan.