Surfers: How the sport started on the NI’s north coast

As Olympian surfers take on the famous wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti, BBC News NI has been speaking to a family which was integral in growing the popularity of the sport in Northern Ireland.

The Hill family have spent three generations helping to put surfing on the map for the north coast.

Ian Hill, now 86, was one of the first people to surf in the area in 1964, passing the tradition on to his son Andy, a six-time Irish National Surf Champion.

Ian’s grandson Ethan now helps run his grandfather’s original surf business with his dad in Portrush.

Ian first surfed the north coast in 1964 on his Australian ‘modern Malibu’ board, in jeans and a t-shirt.

“I didn’t know I was the first person in the area to surf, I just did it.

“I didn’t have anybody to watch and find out how you did things. It was completely new to me.”

“The first time I took a board in water was Castlerock in Easter 1964.

“I was wearing a pair of jeans and a t-shirt and it was freezing.”

“You couldn’t buy surf wax then so I used to get a candle and drip the wax along and then rub it in.”

In the Republic of Ireland, in the 1960s, surfers were making their own surfboards, inspired by a picture in Reader’s Digest.

Ian’s board was a 10ft pop-out weighing 56 lbs “made in a chicken shop in Cornwall.”

“Anyone in my way would have got their head taken off because I couldn’t turn on this big huge board.”

Ian’s friend Martin was also one of the first surfers to ride the waves of the north coast in the 1970s.

Martin who is in his 80s, said he became “obsessed” with surfing when the band The Beach Boys took over in the early 1960s.

“No one really knew what surfing was in those days, people were in awe that you could stand up on a board,” he told BBC News NI.

Martin still lives in Portrush.

“Once a surfer always a surfer”, he said. “Some of my best friends are from the surfing community.”

When Ian Hill moved to Portrush in 1979, a surfing community was beginning to develop in Northern Ireland.

Due to a lack of surfing equipment, the Hill family set up their shop a pop-up surf shop in the garage of their guesthouse on Mark Street, Portrush in 1984, named Troggs.

There are now a number of surf shops in the area.

Ian’s son Andy grew up surfing the north coast and went on to represent Ireland in seven European and three world championships.

“When my friends and I discovered dad’s surf boards you couldn’t get us out of the water – it was all day, every day,” he said.

“In the early days we were told constantly, what are you doing? There’s no surfing in Ireland but of course we knew better and now 40 years later everybody knows we’ve got world class waves here.”

Andy now runs three surf shops and his son Ethan heads up the surf school and online store.

Andy has high hopes for the future of the sport in Northern Ireland.

“We’re seeing local kids representing Ireland at international surfing events and international surfers flying from Hawaii and California to surf our waves here.”

Ethan agreed and added: “The sport has just grown so much, especially coming up to Olympics, kids camps are booking up and everyone is getting really into it.”

Surfing the north coast all the way from Bermuda, BBC News NI caught up with Amy and Lorchan, fresh from their morning surf lesson.

“It was cold at the start but beautiful and really fun,” Amy told BBC News NI.

Keeping her eye on the lessons, East Strand lifeguard and local surfer Freya said she was grateful for how the “original surfers have passed down the joy of surfing to younger people”.

“There’s a great sense of history with the Hills beginning with Ian, the godfather of surfing,” her colleague Wilber said.

Ian still runs the company’s surf hire hut during the summer with his son, grandson and the “rest of the Troggs tribe”.

At 86, he can be found with his feet up in the hut joking that “unless the water is 28 degrees then I’m not going in”.