Story by Glenn Ellard, South Coast Register



When Australian surfing legend Pam Burridge was given her first homemade surfboard at the age of 10, she was soon put under the guidance of renowned experts.

Speakng from her home in Bendalong, the former women's world champion recalled being sent to one of the earliest surf schools and learning from the likes of renowned surfers Nat Young and Mark Warren.

Burridge said surf schools were only just starting at the time, and no one really knew what to do, but the training still had its desired impact.

That impact was felt the first time she caught a wave, unleashing a passion that has remained throughout her life.

And she continues to share that passion, teaching people to surf through the Mollymook and Bendalong Surf Schools, which are just heading into their busiest time of the year.

Through her schools, Burridge is helping to initiate people into the world of surfing.

Burridge said it was easy to spot real surfers. "It's part of the way you identify yourself, about what makes you feel good," she said.

Surfing has not always been as kind as it could to Burridge, who was thrust into the international spotlight at the tender age of 17, just a handful of years after she was given her first surfboard.

By her own admission, she was a bit of a tomboy in her younger days, growing up in the northern Sydney suburb of Clontarf.

No one in her family surfed -- which is hardly the pedigree for someone whose rapid rise to the top of the surfing world is the stuff of which legends are made, and whose life has inspired succeeding generations of young surfers.

Burridge's success started early when at 12 she won the first competition she entered -- the Manly Pacific Boardriders' winter point score event that netted her the first prize of a plastic trophy and a top that was several sizes too large.

Despite the standard of the winnings, Burridge's victory was just a taste of things to come.

A keen competitor going up against boys and girls in many junior events, she quickly learnt about tactics, at the same time improving her surfing.

At the age of 14 she won her first State title, and the following year was national champion, which resulted in her being invited to compete in the elite Hawaiian North Shore events.

This event catapulted Burridge into the world of professional surfing, as she was deemed a professional at the age of just 15.

Undaunted by what seemed to be an all-too-early induction into the to world of professional surfing, Burridge went onto the international circuit and was just 17 when she came close to conquering the world.

She said she was probably too young to handle the pressure of being on the world circuit -- and particularly the disappointment that came with finishing runner-up in her first season on the international circuit.

Burridge was leading the points coming into the final event and beat her main rival Debbie Beacham in that event -- but still lost the world title to Beacham in a points adjustment introduced that year, that saw each surfer drop one event.

"I didn't completely understand the system," Burridge said, explaining the disappointment and confusion at losing by a handful of points at such a young age created "a chink in my armour from early on."

The runners-sup position in the world titles was something she was to fill an unprecedented six times before finally breaking through to win the crown in 1990.

And when Burridge finally did win, she did it with style: taking the world title by a record margin.

She said that the win was "more a relief than a great victory."

In the following years, she and her partner, renowned surfboard shaper Mark Rabbidge, moved to the surfing Mecca of Bendalong -- a tiny village that in recent times has also attracted the interest of six times world women's surfing champion Layne Beachley.

There have been occasional forays into the world of professional surfing, including finishing third on the world tour a couple of years after retiring from international competition., but being forced back on to the circuit by a new qualifying system.

That third pacing was "probably the most satisfying result of my life," she said.

Surfing these days is mostly for fun, and rekindling of the same rush Burridge felt the first time she caught a wave.