World Champion Wakeboarder Mary Morgan Howell Is Ready To Shine Again At Pan Am Games

Five years ago, as wakeboarder Mary Morgan Howell prepared for her biggest competition of the season, Hurricane Michael barreled ashore and destroyed her family’s vacation house on Compass Lake in Alford, Florida.

“That was right before the qualifiers for the Pan American Games, and I really was just about to not go to the qualifiers at all,” Howell recalled. “I didn’t get to train for a number of weeks just because of the debris in the water. It was insane.”

Howell leaned on her faith and qualified for those 2019 Pan Am Games anyway, despite her lack of preparation. The next summer in Lima, Peru, she had her best competition of the year and came home with a Pan Am Games silver medal.

“It was such a cool experience out of something terrible,” she said. “The most important thing was people were OK. That’s the most important thing.”

As she gets ready for the 2023 Pan Am Games that begin Oct. 20 in Santiago, Chile, the 20-year-old Howell — now a world champion, too — is unlikely to face such a daunting obstacle this time around. She has, however, had a chance to reflect on her remarkable competitive career.

“I think, always coming up to a big event like this, you just look back on your career and you’re like, man, how in the world did I get to where I am today?” Howell said. “It just kind of makes you think (about) just how lucky you are and how blessed you are to be where you are.”

To go with the 2022 world title and the 2019 Pan Am Games silver medal, Howell can look back on a pair of championships from the prestigious Masters Water Ski & Wakeboard Tournament. She is currently ranked No. 3 in the world.

In World Wake Association events, competitors earn scores out of 100 from three judges based on difficulty of tricks, risk in the run, intensity, variety and execution.

It hasn’t always been calm water for Howell. She experienced plenty of turbulence when she turned professional at age 15. 

“The first three years were horrible, competition-wise, but I think they were some of the most formative years of my life,” she said. “It was pretty discouraging for a little while, but it really, really grew me in a lot of ways.

“Those years were really difficult, but I think that the Lord knew I needed those years to get me on the right track.”

Howell said she grew not only in the water, but also in her faith.

“The success is wonderful, but it’s truly not for success,” she said. “It is for impact, and specifically, impacting people for Christ. That’s my goal, why I do what I do.”

Howell said she feels closer to God on the water than anywhere else.

“I feel connected with Him in a way that I don’t feel any other time,” she said. “Wakeboarding is what I feel like He’s calling me to do right now for this season of life.”

It’s a busy season of life for Howell, from Dothan, Alabama, who is fitting training and competitions around her studies as a junior international business major at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

“It’s a balance, of course,” she said. “It’s all a balancing act.”

The eldest of three sisters, Howell got up on a wakeboard for the first time as a 6-year-old at Compass Lake in 2008.

“I don’t remember that day, obviously, but I also don’t remember life without wakeboarding,” she said. “I don’t know life without wakeboarding.”

She began competing two years later and was fully committed to the sport at age 10.

“We really, really, really started dedicating ourselves to the sport,” she said. “Wakeboarding, though it is an individual sport, in nature it’s totally not individual.”

Howell explained how her father, an orthodontist, built his practice around her wakeboarding sessions, which began daily at 6:30 a.m., even in winter.

“It was my entire life,” she said. “Just extremely grateful for that. Just very, very special to me. A lot of support, for sure.”

Those who know her understand that food is another important part of Howell’s life. 

“I just love food,” Howell said. “Food has just been extremely important just in my training. There’s a lot of key elements that go into making you into the athlete that you need to be. 

“We think about those things as legs on a stool. If we don’t have one of those legs, that stool’s going to be wobbly. Nutrition is extremely, extremely important to me.”

She will get to sample another new cuisine when she travels to Chile for the Pan Am Games, but the competition will come first.

“I have nothing but amazing expectations for this year,” Howell said. “I’m really, really looking forward to it.”