THE ORIGINS OF SURFING

It is difficult to know exactly when and where surfing originally began. Although there are theories that place the origins of surfing on the west coast of Africa and in Peru, it is believed to be in Polynesia and the islands of the South Pacific where this sport truly began.

The Polynesians, during their constant inter-island voyages, were the ones who brought this custom to places like Hawaii. In 1778 Captain Cook described how the natives of this island paddled among the waves and rode on top of them with great ability using wooden crafts. In that era, the entire Hawaiian society was involved in the practice of this activity. For them it was a way to challenge each other to a duel or demonstrate their courage and ability upon catching big waves. The best waves and biggest boards were reserved for the ruling classes.

With the arrival of the western imperialists, a large part of the native population was eliminated due to illnesses and general disrespectfulness and abuse toward the island people from the invading cultures. Surfing was prohibited by the church for various decades as it was considered to be in disagreement with the Christian morale. By the middle of the 19th Century, the number of surfers had been reduced to an occasional few. Only a few isolated groups, in which many women were included, kept up this tradition during their trips from island to island.

It wasn’t until the beginning of the last century that surfing came back to life in Hawaii thanks to a man named Duke Kahanamoku. This lifeguard and expert canoeist spent a large part of his life spreading this sport throughout the world. In 1911 he founded the first surf club in the history of surfing, the Hui Nalu, in Honolulu. As well as a great surfer, he was also a champion swimmer, winning at the Olympic Games in Helsinki in 1912 and in Antwerp in 1920, revolutionizing the swimming world of that era introducing the “crawl” stroke, now known as freestyle. “The Duke” is considered to be the father of modern surfing.

In 1935 Tom Blake introduced the fin to the concept of surfing, a revolutionary factor allowing the surfboard to be more manouverable. Surfing continued to evolve due to technological breakthroughs in materials introduced mainly by Californians and Australians allowing for lighter and stronger surfboards. At the end of the 1960’s, California and Australia had become the two epicentres of surfing throughout the entire world.

In Europe, the earliest trace of surfing dates back to 1957 on the beaches of Biarritz. The evolution of modern surfing came about in the 70’s and 80’s mainly from Australia, brought on by surfers like Nat Young who introduced a new style full of turns and aerials, or Simon Anderson, the inventor of the three fin system, the most common fin set-up today.

Due to the radical increase in popularity of this sport, there are approximately 20 million surfers today spread out among the coasts all over the world.