Surfing Australia offers new challenge to Margaret River Senior High School’s champion surf squad

Margaret River high school surfers will face a fresh challenge next year – and an opportunity to test their mettle on the national stage.

Surfing Australia earlier this month announced ambitions to take the State school surfing titles national, with an exciting contest slated for May.

While the recently-concluded Australian Junior Surfing Titles included school categories for the Mark Richards Shield, the new contest would be a true test of which were the highest-performing school surf sides in the country.

It would also provide an elevated platform for juniors with ambitions for professional surfing careers, organisers said.

Margaret River Senior High School has now won 17 WA school titles in a row, with unquestioned dominance in Western Australia.

MRSHS teacher and surf coach Mark Meyer told the Times his cohort were relishing the chance to take their competition to the next level.

“We are excited by this new opportunity and are exploring our options,” Mr Meyer said.

“It is great to have a school-based surfing competition with this format.

“The tag-team event and an individual event allow schools to enter a larger team than what currently goes to the Australian Junior Titles.”

With the opportunity expected to kick off fundraising to help local chargers make the trip east, young punters and their families expressed excitement.

The Times understands the all-stars division will be removed from the junior titles as part of preparations for the new Australian Interschools Surfing Championships.

The new competition is to include senior and junior male and female three-person tag teams as well as individual divisions, with the format to help schools with fewer team members.

Surfing Australia’s chief of sport Luke Madden said he was thrilled to add a major schools surfing competition to the Surfing Australia calendar.

“The Australian Interschools Surfing Championships will fill a huge gap in our development pathway at the school surfing level whilst providing an amazing opportunity to show the depth of school surfing talent across the country,” he said.

“We hope that in the future, every school will be watching surfing, either on the beach or live from their auditorium, with thousands of students competing and families also making holidays of the national events.” The competition will be held on the Gold Coast from May 22 to 24.