Boardriders given plenty to celebrate
BOARDRIDING clubs are the backbone of Australian surfing and nowhere are they more concentrated than on the Gold Coast.
There are eight active clubs located on the Coast, including North End, MNM, Burleigh, Palm Beach, Alley, Kirra, Snapper and Dbah.
The Palm Beach boardriders club established in 1968 and will celebrate its 50th anniversary at Currumbin RSL on Saturday, August 4.
Tickets are available until the end of this month via the Palm Beach club’s Facebook page.
From this month, Surf World surf museum at Currumbin will showcase the Gold Coast clubs’ “grassroots” history in monthly exhibitions.
The series kicks off with the Windansea story.
Windansea was founded in 1962 at San Diego, California, with some of California’s then best surfers. The aim was to be the best club in the world.
Membership was by invitation only, so to be invited was a big deal.
The prestige that came from wearing the famous club logo on club shorts, T-shirts and jackets meant you had made the big league.
Bondi surfers Max Bowman, Dave Norman Spencer and Dennis Lindsay were offered the chance to form an Australian branch when on a trip to California in 1964.
As the first Aussie president, Bowman recruited the most competitive surfers he could find up and down the coast.
Phil Waller was the first Gold Coast president and by 1970 the Surfers Paradisebased club in the flats behind Paula Stafford’s Bikini Queens store was the official HQ after Bondi had disbanded.
The Gold Coast Windansea Club peaked in 1970, with local champions such as Peter Drouyn, Graham Black and Paul Neilsen winning multiple national and state titles. By 1975, the Surfers Paradise club had faded out.
Everyone is welcome to the launch of the Windansea Exhibition on Friday night. Doors open at 6pm.
Guest speakers include former members, world champion Wayne “Rabbit” Bartholomew, Karen Neilsen and Lawrie Jarman.