FORMER Yallingup surfer Jarryd Foster last night won the perennial award at the 2015 Oakley Big Wave Awards in Sydney.
Foster, originally from Yallingup was the winner of the Biggest Wave Award for his charge down a massive wave at Cow Bombie, near Gracetown in August 2014.
11 out of 12 finalist nominees were from Western Australia.
Foster said the particular day he surfed Cow Bombie was a “special day of waves”.
“It was the biggest I had seen out at Cow Bombie and definitely the cleanest it gets at this size,” he said.
“I had to scramble to borrow a wetsuit and borrow some boards and luckily for me I got towed into this wave, on all borrowed gear, and it’s turned out to be the biggest.”
Foster said he was proud to have won the award and wanted to share the prize with his fellow West Australian surfers.
Foster took home $20,000 for his efforts.
Margaret River surfer Chris Ross also took out the Biggest Slab category for the “thickets and heaviest” wave at the Right, a notorious surf break off Denmark.
Ross won $5000 for braving the heavy and dangerous conditions.
“If you fall off in the wrong spot at The Right you can go over the ledge and it can pull you down thirty feet or more, bust your ear drums and you might not know how to get back to the surface,” he said.
“I’m stoked to finally take the Slab Prize, I’ll be back out there next swell trying to nail it again, for sure.”
