Dunsborough surfer Lizzie Nunn, was deeply involved in changing the landscape for female surfers around the nation during the 1990s. At just 19 Lizzie became the National Women’s Director for Surfing Australia and was one of the first female contributors to Tracks Magazine, putting female surfers in the spotlight. In 2000, Lizzie was awarded the Australian Sports Medal for her contribution to the sport of surfing by sport-mad, then PM, John Howard. As a result of her legacy, she was awarded Surfing WA Life Membership in 2022.
2006 Lizzie surfing Del Mar, California. Photo Moses
In 2018 World Surfing League WSL announced that female surfers were going to receive equal prize money as men and after years of trying to create a more equal environment for women in surfing, this announcement had a proud effect on Lizzie. Here, she reflects upon what could have been…
Ask any Baby Boomer where they were when Neil Armstrong landed on the moon, and they will tell you not only where they were, but in explicit detail what they saw and heard, who they were with, and how it made them feel. That moment in time they bore witness to, so pivotal in history, affected them deeply and it is embedded in their brain, and they can recall it as if it were yesterday.
I too, have had a ‘landing on the moon’ moment.
It was in 2018 when Triple J broadcasted on the 5pm news that the World Surfing League announced that female surfers were going to receive equal prize money as men. And they were the first sport on the planet to do so.
It took everything in me not to drive off the road! I remember the gasp that came out of me, my hand clamping over my mouth in shock and my eyes instantly welling with tears.
Initially I felt joy, but moments later I was struck with immense sadness. On one hand I was elated by the WSL’s most-awesome announcement, but conversely, I was overcome with grief, sadness and a touch of bitterness for all those women surfers who went before: who missed out on opportunity, who struggled financially, who never got the proper respect, prize money or equal representation in the press simply because they were a girl. There are lots of women in surfing’s history who helped to bust down the door and then held it open allowing a new generation of female surfers to literally ride in on their coat-tails. And sadly, many of those influential women, those trail-blazers are not remembered in the surfing history books.
2006 Lizzie surfing Del Mar, California. Photo Moses
I doubt any of today’s Surf Bettys could recall the likes of Christine Cox, Sunny Richards, Catherine Fletcher, Brooke Farris and other legendary women who forced that door open, and even fewer could relate to the hardships, the prejudiced and the adversity these women faced.
I was pretty mouthy and at the forefront of women’s surfing in the 1990s but I wasn’t acting alone. There was some pretty solid WASRA (now Surfing WA) crew around guiding me along and supporting the women’s’ surfing movement. Credit needs to be given to those people whose words, actions, and encouragement, ultimately changed women’s surfing forever and so let’s list the people who inspired me the most over my surfing lifetime.
That random surfer girl
I was about 10 and Dad was pushing me into winter swells in the corner of Eagle Bay post a massive storm. I was scrambling around in the foam on the shoreline retrieving my board when I looked up and saw a long figure jogging along the beach with a board tucked under the arm. I looked closer. It was a WOMAN!
A female surfer! To this day I remember that she was wearing a man’s wetsuit, had a rad looking short board under her arm, she had long brown hair with golden sun bleached tips, a face full of freckles and her gaze was fixed intently of the surf breaking beyond me. Her eyes scanned the horizon, and in a flash, I saw her reading the swell direction, picking where the best peak was and choosing her pathway to paddle out into the abyss. As she jogged past, she saw me. Her face split into the sunniest of smiles, white teeth beaming, blue eyes shining and she winked and gave me the slightest of nods. My jaw dropped open. Who WAS this woman? I called for my dad, paddled out to him as quick as I could and said, “get me into another wave.” And so it began.
Mark Lane
2017 Mark Lane with Claire Bevilacqua at WA Surf Gallery Yallingup. Photo Lauren Trickett.
The ‘Godfather’ of Surfing in WA as far as I’m concerned. This man changed everything at Surfing WA and carved out a reputation for surfing as being a real sport worth funding from the government, with its very own million-dollar office on the beach at Trigg and who helped to get surfing into every school in WA for Phys ed. You’re welcome, kids. Laney undoubtedly shaped who I am today. His diplomacy and non-judgmental personality were an inspiration to a 17-year-old kid trying to find her way in life and it was him who taught me to be direct, to the point and not fluff my questions with emotive language. He taught me the importance of integrity and honesty and I am grateful for that. My most favourite mentor for LIFE!
Mark Clift
2022 Mark Clift at Trigg. Photo Raeley Jones SWA
‘The Rat’ was my coaching guru and he is a MACHINE as a coach and competitor. He was older than all us coaches, but man he could outlast us in the water any day of the week and then some. Mark taught me to surf, then taught me to coach and HE is the Obi-Wan One of the back foot technique that can get just about any learner standing without using their knees. And during an era when girls were not welcome in the surf, Mark, his brother Kim, Peter Hayes, Kerry Whitford, Paul Manners and Ernie Stead- Richardson all helped us at Trigg Point. Careful not to damage their own reputation out there, these guys communicated to us chick frothers through eye contact, surreptitiously blocked for us, sneakily gifted us waves on the most crowded peak in WA and hooted LOUDLY when we caught waves and sped past them down the line. Over time, we earned our space at Trigg but their support went a long way in our acceptance out there.
Brooke Farris
Brooke Farris surfing. Photographer unknown.
Undoubtedly the most underrated surfer of my time, the quietest of achievers and the ultimate female heavyweight of the surf industry. Brooko was multiple WA State Champion, National Champion and surfed on the WQS before side-lining her competitive career to act as Layne Beachley’s PA during Layne’s domination of the WSL and mainstream media. Brooko has worked her way up through RipCurl ranks since 2010 to now be the CEO of RipCurl ! If you had told us 17-year-old hasslers of the Point we’d be getting a Lifetime Memberships of SWA and or be the CEO of a global surf brand, we’d have laughed in your face before paddling away and hitting you with our spray on the way past.
Vlads, Moose, Elrap and Devoluci
Each summer I invited Vlads, Moose, Elrap and Devoluci to our beach house in Eagle Bay. I must have been the only 16-year-old girl taking 4 boys on holidays with her and every day, Dad would drive us to the surf at Windmills, Yallingup, Smiths and to Bears where we’d get a stuffing full of waves. In the afternoon we’d swim, snorkel, fish, dive for abalone and build bonfires on the beach. It truly was a golden time. Those boys took care of me in the surf and encouraged me to no end. And they taught me valuable lessons.
Vlads and I cruising in Margs. Photo Lisa Quinn Schoefield.
Vlads who was undoubtedly the most handsome boy in my year at school, left me floundering inside at Honeycombs in the southern corner one surf for what seemed an eternity as I tried to paddle back out stuck in the rip. After about his 5th or 6th wave and again, cruising past me on his way back out, he beckoned me over. Responding to his gesture, I paddled directly to the side of the rip to where he was waiting and found myself in safer waters.
“Looks to me like you’re trying to fight against the ocean rather than go with it.” He then showed me the rip, the sand bar and how the water was rushing back out to sea and suggested that if I paid attention to the ocean and its natural movements rather than fight against it, I might get along better in the surf and catch more waves. It was a bloody revelation.
From year 8 to year 12, Vlads, Moose, Elwrap and Devocluci were my greatest surfing allies.
Moose ended up being my first true love, Elwrap and I chucked a sickie from school one crisp Autumn day and biked to City Beach groyne to enjoy a day of windless waves. And Devoluci was my very handsome Year 12 date to the ball. Such good mates and I doubt they ever really knew the influence they had on my surfing in those early years.
Thanks Lizzie, for sharing your early surfing memories.
Dunsborough surfer Lizzie Nunn, was deeply involved in changing the landscape for female surfers around the nation during the 1990s. At just 19 Lizzie became the National Women’s Director for Surfing Australia and was one of the first female contributors to Tracks Magazine, putting female surfers in the spotlight. In 2000, Lizzie was awarded the Australian Sports Medal for her contribution to the sport of surfing by sport-mad, then PM, John Howard. As a result of her legacy, she was awarded Surfing WA Life Membership in 2022.
In 2018 World Surfing League WSL announced that female surfers were going to receive equal prize money as men and after years of trying to create a more equal environment for women in surfing, this announcement had a proud effect on Lizzie. Here, she reflects upon what could have been…
Ask any Baby Boomer where they were when Neil Armstrong landed on the moon, and they will tell you not only where they were, but in explicit detail what they saw and heard, who they were with, and how it made them feel. That moment in time they bore witness to, so pivotal in history, affected them deeply and it is embedded in their brain, and they can recall it as if it were yesterday.
I too, have had a ‘landing on the moon’ moment.
It was in 2018 when Triple J broadcasted on the 5pm news that the World Surfing League announced that female surfers were going to receive equal prize money as men. And they were the first sport on the planet to do so.
It took everything in me not to drive off the road! I remember the gasp that came out of me, my hand clamping over my mouth in shock and my eyes instantly welling with tears.
Initially I felt joy, but moments later I was struck with immense sadness. On one hand I was elated by the WSL’s most-awesome announcement, but conversely, I was overcome with grief, sadness and a touch of bitterness for all those women surfers who went before: who missed out on opportunity, who struggled financially, who never got the proper respect, prize money or equal representation in the press simply because they were a girl. There are lots of women in surfing’s history who helped to bust down the door and then held it open allowing a new generation of female surfers to literally ride in on their coat-tails. And sadly, many of those influential women, those trail-blazers are not remembered in the surfing history books.
I doubt any of today’s Surf Bettys could recall the likes of Christine Cox, Sunny Richards, Catherine Fletcher, Brooke Farris and other legendary women who forced that door open, and even fewer could relate to the hardships, the prejudiced and the adversity these women faced.
I was pretty mouthy and at the forefront of women’s surfing in the 1990s but I wasn’t acting alone. There was some pretty solid WASRA (now Surfing WA) crew around guiding me along and supporting the women’s’ surfing movement. Credit needs to be given to those people whose words, actions, and encouragement, ultimately changed women’s surfing forever and so let’s list the people who inspired me the most over my surfing lifetime.
That random surfer girl
I was about 10 and Dad was pushing me into winter swells in the corner of Eagle Bay post a massive storm. I was scrambling around in the foam on the shoreline retrieving my board when I looked up and saw a long figure jogging along the beach with a board tucked under the arm. I looked closer. It was a WOMAN!
A female surfer! To this day I remember that she was wearing a man’s wetsuit, had a rad looking short board under her arm, she had long brown hair with golden sun bleached tips, a face full of freckles and her gaze was fixed intently of the surf breaking beyond me. Her eyes scanned the horizon, and in a flash, I saw her reading the swell direction, picking where the best peak was and choosing her pathway to paddle out into the abyss. As she jogged past, she saw me. Her face split into the sunniest of smiles, white teeth beaming, blue eyes shining and she winked and gave me the slightest of nods. My jaw dropped open. Who WAS this woman? I called for my dad, paddled out to him as quick as I could and said, “get me into another wave.” And so it began.
Mark Lane
The ‘Godfather’ of Surfing in WA as far as I’m concerned. This man changed everything at Surfing WA and carved out a reputation for surfing as being a real sport worth funding from the government, with its very own million-dollar office on the beach at Trigg and who helped to get surfing into every school in WA for Phys ed. You’re welcome, kids. Laney undoubtedly shaped who I am today. His diplomacy and non-judgmental personality were an inspiration to a 17-year-old kid trying to find her way in life and it was him who taught me to be direct, to the point and not fluff my questions with emotive language. He taught me the importance of integrity and honesty and I am grateful for that. My most favourite mentor for LIFE!
Mark Clift
‘The Rat’ was my coaching guru and he is a MACHINE as a coach and competitor. He was older than all us coaches, but man he could outlast us in the water any day of the week and then some. Mark taught me to surf, then taught me to coach and HE is the Obi-Wan One of the back foot technique that can get just about any learner standing without using their knees. And during an era when girls were not welcome in the surf, Mark, his brother Kim, Peter Hayes, Kerry Whitford, Paul Manners and Ernie Stead- Richardson all helped us at Trigg Point. Careful not to damage their own reputation out there, these guys communicated to us chick frothers through eye contact, surreptitiously blocked for us, sneakily gifted us waves on the most crowded peak in WA and hooted LOUDLY when we caught waves and sped past them down the line. Over time, we earned our space at Trigg but their support went a long way in our acceptance out there.
Brooke Farris
Undoubtedly the most underrated surfer of my time, the quietest of achievers and the ultimate female heavyweight of the surf industry. Brooko was multiple WA State Champion, National Champion and surfed on the WQS before side-lining her competitive career to act as Layne Beachley’s PA during Layne’s domination of the WSL and mainstream media. Brooko has worked her way up through RipCurl ranks since 2010 to now be the CEO of RipCurl ! If you had told us 17-year-old hasslers of the Point we’d be getting a Lifetime Memberships of SWA and or be the CEO of a global surf brand, we’d have laughed in your face before paddling away and hitting you with our spray on the way past.
Vlads, Moose, Elrap and Devoluci
Each summer I invited Vlads, Moose, Elrap and Devoluci to our beach house in Eagle Bay. I must have been the only 16-year-old girl taking 4 boys on holidays with her and every day, Dad would drive us to the surf at Windmills, Yallingup, Smiths and to Bears where we’d get a stuffing full of waves. In the afternoon we’d swim, snorkel, fish, dive for abalone and build bonfires on the beach. It truly was a golden time. Those boys took care of me in the surf and encouraged me to no end. And they taught me valuable lessons.
Vlads who was undoubtedly the most handsome boy in my year at school, left me floundering inside at Honeycombs in the southern corner one surf for what seemed an eternity as I tried to paddle back out stuck in the rip. After about his 5th or 6th wave and again, cruising past me on his way back out, he beckoned me over. Responding to his gesture, I paddled directly to the side of the rip to where he was waiting and found myself in safer waters.
“Looks to me like you’re trying to fight against the ocean rather than go with it.” He then showed me the rip, the sand bar and how the water was rushing back out to sea and suggested that if I paid attention to the ocean and its natural movements rather than fight against it, I might get along better in the surf and catch more waves. It was a bloody revelation.
From year 8 to year 12, Vlads, Moose, Elwrap and Devocluci were my greatest surfing allies.
Moose ended up being my first true love, Elwrap and I chucked a sickie from school one crisp Autumn day and biked to City Beach groyne to enjoy a day of windless waves. And Devoluci was my very handsome Year 12 date to the ball. Such good mates and I doubt they ever really knew the influence they had on my surfing in those early years.
Thanks Lizzie, for sharing your early surfing memories.
Coming soon
Part #2 Vlads, Moose, Elwrap and Devoluci
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Elizabeth ‘Lizzie’ Nunn posted 6 December 2023
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