SCU claim third Australian Title at Newcastle

Southern Cross University has won the 2014 Australian University Surfing Championships for the third time in four years after a tough contest at Newcastle’s Bar Beach last week.

Spearheaded by former ASP World Tour professional Rebecca Woods, Team SCU won the men’s and women’s pennants as well as the overall trophy.

Student team manager, Gabriele Ghigi, said it was a great team effort by the 10 surfers who headed to Newcastle.

“Bar Beach was a great location with four foot waves and the occasional rogue six foot sets coming through. It was a very contestable wave with left and right peaks surfed at times from the outside banks right through to the beach,” he said.

“The results for the contest were not revealed until the day after the final, and the team had started to head back to Uni, enjoying an empty wave on the coast near Forster on the way home.

“However, when news came through we had scooped all the trophies from the games, the whole team was ecstatic and proud to have won everything and to bring the trophy back to SCU after a two year hiatus.”

Osteopath student Rebecca Woods, claimed two gold medals including the women’s longboard and the mixed tag-team event with Ned Sanchez. She picked up a bronze medal in her pet event the women’s shortboard. She was also the only female surfer to have scored a perfect 10 during the competition in the semi-finals.

Tag-team team-mate Sanchez, finished third in the men’s shortboard final, while Grace Hamilton claimed another bronze in the women’s bodyboard. She also finished fourth in the women’s shortboard behind Woods and another team-mate Ellie Weinert, finished third in the women’s longboard.

Oliver Troughton (fourth men’s longboard) and Tom Halloran (fourth men’s bodyboard), also made the finals of their events.

The men’s team consisted of Troughton, Sanchez, Halloran, Peter Duncan, Leon Yasuda and Jorma Bushnell. The women’s team included Woods, Hamilton, Weinert and Coline Merlet.

Photo: Peter Duncan in action in the men's shortboard competition. Picture: Jorma Bushnell.