If you need an advert for the fitness benefits of surfing, then Candice O’Donnell is it. Tall, toned and tanned, the Roxy team longboarder is promoting Virgin Active’s Roxy Beach Body Workout in High Street Kensington, London (tried and tested by yours truly) in between her competition commitments. And, if the end result is anything like O’Donnell, the class comes thoroughly recommended.
Born in Durban, South Africa, O’Donnell lives and breathes surfing and has done all her life. With her family, she moved around for her first ten years, but was always by the ocean – Cornwall, Hossegor, Biarritz and then back to Cornwall, where she has lived for the past 16 years. She turned professional as a longboarder in 2005, and has since become a well-known name on the tour.
O’Donnell recently competed at Watergate Bay in Cornwall for the third stop on the British Longboard Tour. She went into the event having won the English Championships (also at Watergate) and previous two stops on the British tour at Perranporth and Saunton Sands; and, with four stops making up the tour, she successfully defended her British title with this win.
The win meant O’Donnell went on to represent GB at the Billabong ISA World Surfing Games at the end of August in Punta Hermosa, near Peru’s capital of Lima.
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Sportsister tests: Roxy Beach Body Workout
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As the defending English, British and European Women’s Longboard Champion, O’Donnell has high expectations. “There’s definitely more pressure going in as defending champion. Everyone else has nothing to lose, but you’ve got to try and keep the same mindset as if you don’t either,” she explains. Not an easy task, as many a defending champion will agree, because once you’re defending the titles, the expectations go up – suddenly you do have a lot to lose.
Surfing is a sport that is tough on body and mind, and O’Donnell frequently refers to the mental as well as physical strength she draws on in training and competition. She clearly enjoys the fierce rivalry alongside the camaraderie on the competition circuit and, with a twin sister, she has evidently had a lifetime to hone her competitive streak – sometimes with unfortunate side-effects.
“I am a bit accident-prone,” she confesses, “normally when I’m trying out new manoeuvres.” She pauses, and adds – a little sheepishly – “I tend to hurt myself more in smaller surf – I get over-confident when I should be sticking to my limits”. No matter – there are no obvious signs of cuts and scrapes and O’Donnell’s confidence in her abilities clearly serves her well in competition.
So, let’s go back to the beginning.
O’Donnell got into surfing through joining junior Surf Life Saving at home in Cornwall when she was about 12. She started body-boarding, which progressed naturally to longboarding. Her father is also a longboarder – “Well, he used to shortboard too but as he’s got older he’s a little [she pauses diplomatically] less flexible, so is longboarding now” – and encouraged her in the sport. Then a local shaper shaped her first longboard and promised to continue shaping her boards if she stuck at it. “The relationship with my shaper has been really important,” O’Donnell says.
Like skiing and snowboarding, long- and shortboarding divides itself into two camps encapsulating differing attitudes, styles and fierce defending by each sport’s proponents. For those of us with limited surfing knowledge, O’Donnell volunteers a short rundown on the difference between long- and shortboarding.
“Shortboarding is faster, more aggressive; you continue working the board and it’s about speed and big manoeuvres,” she explains. “Longboarding is more graceful and drawn-out, you’re moving the board – it’s balletic and slower,” she continues; “there’s more variety and diversity, it’s more elegant.” Longboarding is also more versatile – “with shortboard you can only ride it when it’s big and punchy otherwise you get frustrated, so longboarding is more practical”.
Surfing keeps O’Donnell in shape, but she mixes it up – particularly when there is no surf (as when we spoke) – with stretching and yoga, cycling, swimming, skateboarding – “really good practice for surfing” – and circuits in the gym. In fact, the Roxy Beach Body Workout is exactly the sort of gym work that O’Donnell will put herself through. “I was really impressed with the workout,” she said when we spoke a week after the class. I admitted that I had certainly felt the effects of the workout in the days after the class and was relieved to hear her sympathise. “I could feel it during the class,” she agrees, “it really hit all the right muscles used for surfing.”
And as for keeping her mental energy in good condition and managing to deal with any pressure, O’Donnell appears to have nailed it. She simply loves her sport, and her face lights up when discussing the Roxy Jam in Biarritz, “one of my favourite places”. What makes the event so special? “There’s a really good atmosphere,” she says. “Everyone is having a good time”. The best thing about the event, from O’Donnell’s perspective, is that it combines her two greatest passions – surfing and art. O’Donnell is a keen photographer, going back to basics with film and stocking up on cameras rooted out at car boot sales – none of the ease of digital for her. With her sister (a shortboarder, since you ask), O’Donnell has set up a studio in the attic where they work on photography and design. At the Roxy Jam, the exhibition has a different theme each year (this year’s theme was recycling), but is always focused on surf culture.
“I think it’s great that the cultural side is really coming out now,” she says. “It used to be that it wasn’t really accepted to be into art, but more surfers are getting into it”. Little wonder, really, given how inspiring the sea has been for generations of artists. It’s certainly inspired O’Donnell.
Quick Fire Round
Hawaii or Australia? Australia “I haven’t been to Hawaii yet!”
Sweet or salt? Salt (makes sense for a surfer)
Caravan or combi? Caravan
Trilby or visor? Trilby (as modelled on the Roxy website)
Autumn or spring? Spring
Northern hemisphere or southern hemisphere? Northern
Fact or fiction? Fact
Skiing or boarding? Skiing
Wakeboarding or kitesurfing? Wakeboarding
Electric or acoustic? “Oh acoustic, definitely”
Mountains or valleys? “That’s really hard! OK, mountains.”
Anna Young, Sportsister
The Women’s Sports Magazine
