CAROLINA BEACH, N.C. (AP) - School, friends, family: These are what many might expect to occupy the top spots of a 13-year-old’s to-do list. Not breaking down gender barriers.
But for Carolina Beach’s Katelyn Sewell, proving that women belong amongst the world’s top surfers has become a priority.
A big step came in late September: Sewell became the first female to win the Eastern Surfing Association’s Under-14 Menehune Longboard championship in the competition’s 50-year history.
“I had done shortboard and hadn’t done very well, so I just went out on longboard,” she said. “I didn’t think I’d make it past the first round, but I ended up making it to finals and surfing the best I ever had. I got out of the water and was just like, ’Woah.’ I couldn’t believe I won.”
A surfer for about three years, Sewell first discovered her love for riding the waves while spending time in the ocean with her father, Andrew, and things took off from there.
She now practices more than three hours each day, surfing before school and then again in the afternoon.
She takes lessons from professional surfer Tony Silvagni, who is also based out of Carolina Beach. She hopes to become a professional surfer herself, but she knows she needs to continue the success that’s carried her to this point.
“I think if I just keep doing what I’m doing and keep making bigger contests and gaining more sponsors, I can just keep going until I get there,” she said.
Surfing has taken Sewell places and given her opportunities she never imagined possible. In addition to visiting Costa Rica, where she says the waves are much bigger than in North Carolina, she is sponsored Wilmington’s Aussie Island Surf Shop.
“We’ve gone to Florida and Puerto Rico, and that’s probably the coolest place I’ve surfed,” she said.
Beyond becoming a professional surfer, proving to young women everywhere that female athletes can compete with the boys is her biggest goal.
“There are a lot of female surfers that I look up to, but I hope maybe when I’m older other people will look up to me like I look up to them right now,” she said. “I just have to keep getting better. I think it was cool that I was able to show that girls can beat boys too. They’re not just better than us because they’re boys.”
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Information from: The StarNews, https://starnewsonline.com
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