Tide is turning as record numbers of women take to their surfboards
The surf's up on the British coast - but it's women who are making all the waves. In surfing hotspots, from Newquay in Cornwall to Thurso in Scotland, men are increasingly finding themselves fighting for space in the swell with a new breed of female board riders.
New figures from the British Surfing Association (BSA), the sport's national governing body, show that the number of female surfers in the UK is set to reach a record high, with double the number this summer in the biggest rise the sport has seen. By the end of this year, the BSA estimates that women will account for 100,000 of Britain's 350,000-strong surfing community.
Driven by the rise in women-only surf schools, weekend and holiday packages, as well as multimillion-pound advertising campaigns by leading brands such as Quiksilver and Rip Curl, women are swapping beaches for boards in their neoprene-clad droves. Magazines for "surf chicks'' have sprung up and sales of specialist female apparel have soared.
In recognition of this upsurge in interest, next month the UK will host its first event on the women's professional surfing world championship tour - the Roxy Jam at Perranporth, Cornwall. This is a major coup considering that only one European venue is selected by the tour each year.
Karen Walton, the national director of the BSA and herself a surfer, said the number of women passing through the organisation's 50 approved surf schools has risen dramatically. "It's definitely a major growth area in the industry,'' said Ms Walton speaking at the BSA's headquarters on Fistral Beach in Newquay - the spiritual home of British surfing.
Source: The Independent Online
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