When surfer Lucy Small received less than half of the paycheck her male counterpart recently received at the Curly Maljam, she decided when she needed to report it.

“Thanks to the sponsors for the money they put into the event, but I would say it’s a bittersweet victory knowing that our surf is worth half the price of the men,” Small said in his acceptance speech, after winning the women’s competition at the North Curl Curl long board event.

“It took the same amount to drive here, flights were the same price to fly here, accommodation was the same and our surf is half the price, so maybe we could think about that next time. “

Small had just accepted a check for $ 1,500 for winning the long board surf competition on Sydney’s northern beaches. His male counterpart received $ 4,000, more than double.

Small posted a video of his acceptance speech on Instagram and received a flood of media attention for speaking out against the inequality.

At the time, Curl Curl Longboarders Club secretary Phil Nicol defended the gap in the prize money and said it was more of a “moral issue”.

“Did we do something illegal?” No. It’s one more question, it’s a moral question… we haven’t done anything illegal, ”he said. The Sydney Morning Herald.

The club has since taken into account the wave of comments following Small’s comments on the prize money and said next year’s event will offer equal prizes to all attendees, including those from different groups of people. age.

“We asked ourselves why don’t men over 50 jump up and down because they don’t have the same money as men?” Said Nicol.

“This is ageism, the ageism card could have been removed.”

“We just have to keep going, little by little, until we end up creating meaningful change,” Small wrote in an Instagram post. “We want equal recognition of women as legitimate athletes at all levels of competitive surfing.”

Small said she didn’t realize that the Curly Maljam competitors would receive less prizes than the men, and before the event, she had just assumed that the competition would line up with most other surfing events, where the women now receive the same price. money as men. The World Surf League introduced an equal prize for women in 2019, but this event was not affiliated with the World Surf League.

Sydney-based surf retailer Global Surf Industries thinks so too and decided to step in to rectify the uneven prices received by women at the event. The company donated $ 4,850 to the Curl Curl Longboarders to close the cash prize gap received by all female awards at the event.

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