By Dan Walsh
The future of women’s surfing might just be 157 centimetres tall, hailing from the middle of nowhere, Texas, with the scar of 15 staples in her head.
Prodigious aerial artist and prospective Canadian Olympian – if the government gets out of her way – Erin Brooks can take flight with NASA’s best, so fittingly, it’s the numbers that drop jaws most in her incredible story.
Erin Brooks takes flight in a wave pool in Waco, Texas.
Age nine: Brooks moves from Texas to Hawaii, hits saltwater for the first time and instantly falls head first for surfing.
Age 11: She first surfs Teahupo’o.
Age 13: She takes on the biggest waves of her life so far – six-metre faces at Hawaii’s iconic Sunset Beach break (where the local measuring customs tend to describe waves as half the size as the rest of the surfing world would).
That same year, Brooks wears a surfboard fin to the head in Indonesia’s remote Mentawai Islands, requiring a bit of impromptu surgery on the sand.
Canadian surf prodigy Erin Brooks’ 15 staples from a fin to the head in the Mentawais in 2020.
“That was the first Stab High event (an aerial-specific competition for surfing’s most progressive performers to put as much clear air between themselves and the water as possible) I’d ever been invited to, it was the day after,” Brooks tells this masthead from California.
“We didn’t know if there was a doctor anywhere nearby, but we found one at the next resort. I had to get 15 staples to close it up [but] I only spent three days out of the water.
Brooks is stitched up by Dr. Dave Bassler while fellow pro surfers Caity Simmers, Bella Kenworthy, Sierra Kerr and Bela Nalu watch on.
“I didn’t want to miss out so I patched it up with Vaseline, so the water wouldn’t get in and made sure I cleaned it super well. No infection, it was all good, the only thing I had was a scar.”
There’s a reason professional surfing’s biggest names – from the greatest of all-time Kelly Slater, to Bethany Hamilton and Brooks’ coach, renowned big-wave chaser Shane Dorian – are all either heavily invested in or keenly watching the pint-sized teen.
She’s as tough as she is talented. And as for the talent…
Age 15: Brooks sets surfing alight with a series of aerial manoeuvres during a session at a wave pool in Waco, Texas. Purists argue over the technicalities of whether Brooks has performed backflips, front flips, backside front flips… whatever you like on the strapped in boards.
PerfectSwell, the company behind the wave pool’s technology, puts it more succinctly: “Erin is the first female surfer to be doing these types of manoeuvres. Made possible by strapping in, the potential for off-axis rotations and more gymnastic style acrobatic tricks is seemingly limitless.”
Brooks plans to end the debate on her own terms.
“The goal is to do a backflip without the strap board,” she says.
“I use that board to get comfortable flipping upside down like that. And I’ve gotten super-close before, I’ve done a full flip and landed before but just fell riding down the wave.
“It’s the most rewarding feeling when you land a new air. It takes at least 1000 tries just to make one, so you feel very proud of yourself.”
Three days after those videos hit the cyber highway, Brooks becomes the youngest competitor ever invited to the prestigious Padang Padang Cup in Bali, Indonesia’s longest-running surf comp at one of the best barrelling waves in the world, over some of the most unforgiving, razor sharp coral to be found.
Brooks takes flight in the Mentawais.Credit: Marcelo Maragni
Against a 15-strong contingent of the best men’s barrel-riders in the world, Brooks beats most of them, including Dorian, to finish fourth in the final.
Age 16: Brooks graduates from high school (online courses suit her globe-trotting, surf-chasing ways best) and a few weeks later claims her first WSL competition in Brazil, sealing her qualification for the 2024 Challenger Series – the next rung below the top-tier Championship Tour.
In the same week, she landed front and centre of a citizenship drama that has the Canadian Olympic Committee [COC] rallying political support to get her a start at Paris 2024.
Surfing steps out on the famed Tahitian break of Teahupo’o next July and Brooks had been a shoo-in as one of Canada’s two female representatives given she’s flown that flag for years now in competition.
Brooks celebrates becoming Canada’s first junior surfing champion in El Salvador, 2022Credit: Sean Evans/International Surfing Association
Her father Jeff is a dual American-Canadian citizen, most of her extended family live north of the border, and until immigration authorities stepped in, the International Surfing Association recognised Erin as a Canuck.
But Canadian immigration authorities have denied “her pathway to citizenship because the COC is trying to show why she needs to be processed faster with the Olympics in mind,” Jeff says.
“She hasn’t been denied the right to citizenship. The COC have their attorneys and consultants and they seem very certain it’s going to get done, it’s just ‘is it going to get done in time for the Olympics?’, that’s the question.
“But I’ve told Erin from day one that all we can do is focus on her surfing and training. If it doesn’t work out it will obviously be disappointing, but she’s 16 years old and she’ll have other opportunities. It’s certainly not the end of her story if it doesn’t happen.”
That’s the real story here. Brooks is 16, 157 centimetres tall, and only just getting started.
Sports news, results and expert commentary. Sign up for our Sport newsletter.