Surf contests are meant to be a celebration of our sport and culture, but we all know they’re a pretty high strung environment for those involved. Whether you’re a ‘CT champ or an NSSA grom, putting on a jersey can easily turn into a hunt for scores rather than a hunt for waves. Erin “Worm” Ashley doesn’t vibe with that. She wants everybody to be more stoked to surf, and she’s incredibly passionate about getting people stoked on women’s surfing in particular. And that’s why she created the Women’s Logger Invitational, showcasing some of the most stylish women on longboards at the wave most synonymous with walking up to the nose of your board – First Point Malibu. Alas, the Aloha Heat was born.
But deeper than Worm’s desire to raise our appreciation for women’s surfing was the urge to raise awareness about the importance of early breast cancer detection. Moved by the great things Shaney jo Darden had accomplished with the Keep A Breast Foundation, Worm enlisted Darden’s help to make her big dream a reality: a “contest” that rewards great surfers for sharing good waves and her own brand of good vibes. As Worm puts it, she just wanted to be “more actively good as a human being and less passively good.” Thanks to that we have a fresh new “no bad vibes” celebration of surfing with the added bonus of educating people about a disease that impacts us all in some way.
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Worm Dreams Big: A Tribute to the Benevolent Bad-asses of the Women’s Longboarding Community from SeaLevelTV on Vimeo.
