Salt Rock success at Summer Surf Challenge

Salt Rock surfers Jade Mets and Sophie Bell both took podium places at the Billabong Women’s Summersurf Challenge in Long Beach, Kommetjie on the weekend of November 15.

Mets secured a hard-won second place in the U20 division with the honours going to Anoush Zakarian of Melkbosstrand.

The grade 11 pupil from Crawford College North Coast said she was very happy with her result.

“My age division is one of the hardest and is so competitive so getting to the finals is never an easy task. When I made it to the finals I was so happy so receiving second overall was a good result and I was happy that fellow surfer Anoush took the win, she deserved it,” she said.

Bell will count her long trip from KZN to the Western Cape a success as she won both the U16 and U14 titles at the event.

The SA Under 15 Champion beat fellow Umdloti surfer Cana Foster into second place in the U16 division.

In the U14 final Bell overcame an interference penalty to take the win ahead of her good friend Olivia Izzard of La Lucia.

The Billabong Women’s Summersurf Challenge is the only stand alone women’s surf event held in South Africa, but unfortunately the 41 surfers from across the country not only had to deal with tough conditions at Long Beach but had to fight for their waves with bad mannered non contestants on the first day of the competition.

Surfing South Africa’s Robin de Kock said the girls handled the situation with dignity and style but the same could not be said for the disrespectful surfers who spent the better part of the day intimidating the girls in and out of the water.

“There are not a lot of contests in South Africa that are just for women and girls, so I was over the moon that we got the surf all to ourselves, until we met the locals,” said Mets.

“It was so sad because some of us had traveled as far as from Durban to take part in the event and with every wave we had a fight or were sworn at by the local men. They just were not budging, even though the organisers had permission to hold the contest there,” said Mets, who believes that if the event had been held in Durban the water would definitely have been cleared.