Olympic digest: Snoop Dogg to carry torch, Surf's up and Refugee team

American rapper Snoop Dogg will be among the torchbearers carrying the Olympic flame in the final stretch before the opening ceremony of the Paris Games on Friday.

Snoop Dogg, 52, will carry the torch through the streets of Saint-Denis, the underprivileged northern Paris suburb that is home to the Stade de France Olympic Stadium, the town's mayor Mathieu Hanotin said on social media platform X.

"Saint Denis: last step before the Eiffel Tower. An international cast @SnoopDogg for the last stretch of the Olympic Flame," Hanotin wrote.

The rapper, who is also contributing to NBC Primetime's coverage of Games, is better known in the sports world for his Snoop Youth Football League. The championship game is called the 'Snooper Bowl'.

Other carriers of the torch in Saint-Denis on Friday include French actress Laetitia Casta and French rapper MC Solaar.

Surf's up

While most 2024 Olympians will be battling for glory in Paris, the world's best surfers will be going for gold some 16,000km away on the island of French Polynesian island of Tahiti, where the spinning blue barrels of Teahupo'o might be the real star of the show.

Competition is likely to be fierce between the sport's traditional powerhouses but host nation France are a genuine threat after two Tahitians, Vahine Fierro and Kauli Vaast, qualified to compete at their home break.

"Hosting the Olympics at Teahupo'o is the best spot they could ever pick just because it's such a good wave at that time of the year," said local woman Vahine Fierro, who won the Tahiti Pro in pumping waves in May.

"I think the Olympics are going back to where the surf was born."

Surfing was recorded in French Polynesia, now an overseas territory of France, as early as the 12th century but only made its