Para-surfing champion to show sport is 'attainable'

Zoe Smith won gold at the World Para Surfing Championships in California last month

Newly crowned Para-surfing world champion Zoe Smith said it is important that she shows people that the sport is "attainable" for anyone with a disability.

Smith won gold in the stand 2 category at the ISA World Para Surfing Championships in Huntington Beach California last month, to claim her first world title.

The Bournemouth athlete took up the sport in 2021, six years after having her leg amputated following an accident.

"It's very important to me that I represent within that community and show people that it is attainable," Smith told BBC Points West.

"Ultimately for me, I compete to try and represent a narrative of disabled people who have been in a life-changing injury or accident, getting back into sport and rediscovering their love for a pursuit of physical activity - especially in the water.

"It's really hard for amputees to get in the water because we don't get provisions for waterproof prosthetics."

Phil Williams said it was a 'big disappointment' that para-surfing missed out on a place at the 2028 Paralympics

Smith was one of two gold medallists for Team England at the competition alongside Charlotte Banfield in the stand 3 category, as the 10-person squad finished seventh overall in the eighth edition of the event which formed in 2016.

The team train at the Wave - an inland surfing lake near Bristol - where many staff coach the athletes on a volunteer basis.

However, with the sport missing out on a place at the 2028 Paralympics in Los Angeles, athletes will continue to be almost entirely self-funded for the foreseeable future.

"It meant a funding stream we were hoping for was shut down," Phil Williams, para team manager of Surfing England, said.

"All of these athletes are self-financed so it's a real struggle."

Para-surfing was edged out by Para-climbing for a spot at the Games in four years but Williams hopes the sport will be on the programme in Brisbane, Australia in 2032.

"It was a big disappointment, the whole process took quite a long time and there were good signs it was going to happen," Williams said.

"The real disappointment was actually [for] the athletes themselves.

"We've done a really good job of getting to the stage, into the last two, so surely that will be the launchpad for Australia in 2032."

Team England has been at the forefront of para-surfing's progress on the world stage in recent years, yet Smith says there is still a long way to go.

"Overall we do need a lot more sponsorship because trips to California to compete to keep up with your Hawaiis, Australians, USA, is hugely expensive. Just the cost of being a disabled athlete is monumental," Smith said.

"We're a really solid team, we've got some great surfers, people on the fringes as well that are up and coming. [There is a] Big solid community spirit so we're enjoying ourselves."