Carissa Moore, En route to winning the Roxy Pro, Snapper Rocks, Australia

Along with Tyler Wright, Sally Fitzgibbons, Coco Ho, Laura Enever and a coupla others, Roxy Pro, Gold Coast winner Carissa Moore (pictured here) took women’s surfing into a new realm on wednesday. It wasn’t unusual on the day to hear people muttering “I reckon the chicks final was better than the blokes, ay.” On her 5’9″ Matt Biolos-shaped Mayhem (which she called her “Magic Board”), Hawaiian Carissa threw down a combination of carving 360’s, open-face lay-back gouges and smooth finner-reverses to beat Chelsea Hedges, Sally and then Tyler in the final. Tyler, who’s brother Owen Wright bit his nails through each of his sister’s heats, was unlucky to have lost – both Tyler and Carissa surfed on a level that’s seldom been seen in women’s competition till now, and undoubtedly boosted interest in women’s surfing ten-fold in one day.