Encinitas skater Tom Schaar wins silver in Olympic men’s park

PARIS — San Dieguito Academy graduate Tom Schaar earned the silver medal in the men’s park skateboarding final at the Paris Olympics on Wednesday, making this the second skate medal for Team USA secured by an Encinitas athlete. 

Schaar, 24, took the silver with a best-of-three-rounds score of 92.23, coming in behind Australia’s Keegan Palmer with 93.11 — he also won gold in Tokyo — and ahead of Brazil’s Augusto Akio with 91.85 for the bronze.

This is Schaar’s Olympic debut. He just missed out on a spot on the Tokyo team in 2020 with a fourth-place finish. Now, he is one of two skateboarding medalists for the United States in 2024, with fellow Encinitas skater Jagger Eaton also winning a silver medal in the men’s street skating final last month. 

Park skaters are given three 45-second runs to impress the judges, with only their highest-scoring run counted. Schaar secured his 92.23 score in the second round and was looking to best Palmer’s 93.11 in the third round for a shot at gold before becoming unglued from his board while attempting a 720 with less than 10 seconds remaining. 

However, his strong showing in the second round kept him on the podium.

Schaar, who was born and raised in Malibu before moving to Encinitas, was one of two Americans competing in the park finals. The other was Tate Carew, 19, of San Diego, who came in fifth.

Schaar exploded onto the national skateboarding stage at age 12, when he landed the first-ever 1080 in competition and became the youngest X Games gold medalist.

In the women’s park skate final the day prior, fellow Encinitas skater Bryce Wettstein entered as the sole competitor for Team USA coming off a strong second-place finish in the preliminary. She came in sixth place in the final, the same place as her finish in Tokyo in 2021. 

Arisa Trew, 14, of Australia, took the gold, giving the Aussies a sweep in both men’s and women’s park skating in Paris. Japan’s Kokona Hiraki took silver, and Great Britain’s Sky Brown took bronze.

Other North County athletes competing for the U.S. skateboarding team in Paris included Oceanside’s Gavin Bottger, 17, who just missed a spot in the men’s park final after coming in tenth in the prelim. Ruby Lilley, 17,  also of Oceanside, finished 13th in the women’s park preliminary. 

This is the second Olympics where skateboarding has been featured as a sport. Several North County athletes paved the way as part of the inaugural team in 2021, including Wettstein, Eaton, Jordyn Barret, and Brighton Zeuner.