New England Science & Sailing Foundation’s 7th annual “Catch a Curl” youth surf competition was held this past weekend and was a huge success! We had perfect weather for both surfing and the beach cleanup. We had 28 surfers competing and 14 participants for the new “Try Surfing” portion of the morning! With our educators’ instruction and guidance, participants were able to try out surfing for free!

We had four divisions of surfers, Big Kahuna (advanced surfers ages 15-18) competitors, Wahine (girls ages 11-14) competitors, Menehune (boys ages 11-14) competitors, and our biggest division- the Ankle-Biters (ages 10 and under! Big shout out to all our surfers who came out and competed, you all did amazing! It was so much fun to watch you all catch some great waves! Be sure to check out pictures from the competition on our Facebook page!

Surf Competition Results

Congratulations to our winners: Sawyer Mason (1st Place-Ankle Biters), Devin Yaworky (2nd Place-Ankle Biters), Garrett Cooper (3rd Place- Ankle Biters), Wendy Flanagan (1st Place- Wahine), Annalise Kane (2nd Place- Wahine), Macey Nenna (3rd Place- Wahine), Eli Leach (1st Place- Menehune), Christian Watrovs (2nd Place- Menehune), Camron Eidam (3rd Place- Menehune), Julian Mileski (1st Place- Big Kahuna), Hazel Peters (2nd Place- Big Kahuna), and Tyler Mileski (3rd Place- Big Kahuna). If you were not present for the award ceremony, please stop by NESS in Stonington to claim your prize!

Beach Clean Up

Following our competition, we partnered with NAMEPA (North American Marine Environment Protection Association) to organize a beach-wide cleanup for International Coastal Cleanup Day. Our competitors, staff members, volunteers, partners, and surfer’s families collected a whopping 65 lbs of trash and marine debris! This included over 400 cigarette butts, over 100 food wrappers, and over 60 bottle caps! Thank you so much to NAMEPA for organizing the cleanup and for the awesome table setup! Also, a big thanks to Humans for the Future for coming out to support our event and to inspire our beachgoers to create a more sustainable future.

Sponsors

“Catch a Curl” would not be possible without our amazing sponsors, so thank you so much to the following for your generous donations and for supporting our youth surfers: Tidal River Clothing Co. for gift certificates, Raw Elements for tinted face sticks, lip rescue lip balms, and sunscreen samples, NAMEPA for lip balm, coasters, and bags, RI Surfrider Foundation for the rashguard, CT Surfrider Foundation for buffs and reusable water bottles, O’Neill for stomp pads, sunglasses, posters, and hats, Civil Skateboard Surf & Shop for bathing suits, a rashguard, and swag, Avies Ski/Sport for apparel and gift certificates, and finally Narragansett Surf and Skate for the rashguard and the Bic surfboard grand prize! Also, this event would not have been possible without the support of Town of Westerly, NAMEPA, Humans for the Future, and all of our volunteers.

Once again, thank you to everyone who helped and supported our event this year. Congratulations to our surfers, keep up the good work! We couldn’t have asked for a better turnout, we can’t wait to see you next year!

Check out photos from the competition here!