Is Women’s Big Wave Surfing Stuck In The 1960’s?

This month, providing a decent swell hits and the competition is greenlit, surfing will recognize the first Women’s Challenge held at Mavericks. This is a modest step in the right direction for the future of the Women’s BWT. To date, the Women’s tour is only in its second year, with a mere six competitors. It has a long way to go. Which isn’t a criticism, we often hero the efforts of any woman waxing up a 10-foot gun and threading deeper waters than you or I would dare venture.

In the coming years, we will undoubtedly see more women in the ranks and expansion potential. It’s not like there is lack of skill or fearless in our female competitors. Which Albee Layer commended in lieu of 2016’s Jaws challenge “Some of the women surf jaws better than some of the guys,” Albee told Stab. Also mentioning that he’d laid witness to Paige Alms “waxing” guys on the bigger days. A fitting complement for the most decored women surfing XXL walls.

Two-time Pe’hai challenge winner Paige Alms and Bianca Valent are both women who demand your respect.

Recently they spoke out about unfair treatment in the sport they love so much. The interview, which originally featured in Outside Online has the pair calling out some real shit comments they previously encountered in the lineup, some very questionable and outdated comments from the late Buzzy Trent and how women can blaze their own trail in the sport.

Original Article published by Outside Online:

“Girls do fine when it comes to housework, raising children, doing office work, doing the twist and even riding the ankle snappers at Malibu,” wrote big-wave surfing pioneer Buzzy Trent in a 1963 article in Surf Guide magazine.“But one thing I can’t stand is girls riding (or attempting to ride) big waves.”

He goes on: “You see, girls are much more emotional than men and therefore have a greater tendency to panic. And panic can be extremely dangerous in big surf. …Girls are weaker than men and have a lesser chance for survival in giant wipeouts.”

Finally, he concluded by writing: “Girls are intended to be feminine, and big-wave riding is definitely masculine… Girls are better off and look more feminine riding average-sized waves.”

Sure, that sounds like classic 1960s sexism, but has much changed in the intervening 55 years?

Paige Alms stole headline pixels in 2015 when she stormed out of a 20-foot barrel at a Jaws paddle session on Maui, where she’s lived since the age of nine.

Photography

TRACY LEBOE

According to two big-wave pros—Bianca Valenti, a professional surfer from the Bay Area, and Paige Alms, a Maui local and big-wave world champion—the answer’s no. Both Valenti and Alms have been invited to surf in the 2018 World Surf League Mavericks Challenge, which if it goes off in the next month, will be the first time women have ever surfed in the event. They also co-founded the Committee for Equity in Women’s Surfing along with fellow big-wave surfers Keala Kennelly and Andrea Moller.

Here’s what they had to say about Buzzy, sexism, and the future of their sport:

On Shitty Things They’ve Heard in the Lineup

Valenti: “While paddling out to a Northern California surf break, a guy yelled, ‘This is a man’s playground. I don’t want to see you unless I’m going out on a date with you because you’re kind of cute.”

On Fighting for Their Place 

Valenti: “As a woman, you have to constantly prove yourself, whereas a guy—even of lesser experience—will paddle out and no one will say anything. Now I get cheered on [by the guys], but it took me a while. Psychologically, it was the hardest thing to deal with that hungry pack of wolves while I earned my place.”  

Alms: “Men will look at women and be like, ‘Who does she think she is?’ A lot of the time they don’t say anything, but you can feel it. The male bravado, the ego.”

Bianca Valenti is no stranger to a hold down. Here she is, about to be exploded by a mound of water in the 2017 Pe’ahi challenge.

Photography

Keoki Saguibo

On Muscling Out to a Wave

Valenti: “It takes a tremendous amount of hard work to be out there—for anyone. But if you’re a woman, you have exponentially more work, mentally and physically. To catch waves, you have to be able to match the speed of the wave and most men have an easier time with this, with more muscle mass up top and a longer wingspan. For every man’s paddle-stroke, I have to do three.”

On the Lack of Women Role Models in Surfing

Valenti:  “There’s a young, up-and-coming male big-wave surfer at Mavericks who has older male surfers basically fighting over him, wanting to his mentor. Most girls don’t have that sort of opportunity. For most women, without mentors, the questioning and looks by men are enough to keep them from trying. Women really have to be willing to blaze their own trail.”

On the Feminism of Big-Wave Surfing

Alms: “Yeah, big-wave surfing is dangerous and scary, but I don’t see why that makes it more masculine. Women birth people—that’s pretty much the gnarliest thing you can go through and no one’s calling that masculine.”

Valenti: “I’m a female and I’m a surfer, therefore surfing is feminine. Men feel like we’re trying to take something away from them, but we’re not. We’re all in this together. Let’s celebrate men and women.”

On Fighting for Pay and Airtime Equality 

Alms: “We’re at a time and place in our country, and in our world, and in this sport where we [women] are in a place of power, where we need to speak up.”

Valenti: “It’s exciting right now. Women are getting media exposure, and competitive opportunities and the overarching conversation in our society of is focused on equality.”