POINT BREAK

In his latest book, Great Sporting Sites, GLEN HUMPHRIES showcases a collection of Australia's most iconic venues. In this edited extract we take a deep dive into two of the nation's best surfing locations...

- By PHIL JARRATT

No one but a rabid local would ever accuse Bells Beach of having the best waves in Australia, yet it has been the Holy Grail of modern era surfboard riding for almost 70 years.

Its magical, mystical and somewhat spiritual aura stems not just from the rugged beauty of its cliffs, which give way to a cove brimming with powerful, challenging waves with their own unique qualities, but from its identification with the traditional owners the Wadawurrung People, who have been acknowledged and celebrated by the surfing community for decades. The role that the reality and idea of Bells has played in the shaping of Australian surfing history cannot be underestimated.

The neighbouring beach resort town of Torquay hosted the 1956 Melbourne Olympic surf carnival, an event that brought Californian and Hawaiian lifeguard teams to our shores and introduced the Malibu Chip, a finned balsa surfboard that quite literally changed the direction of Australian surfboard riding, from straight in to the shore to performing on the green face of the wave running parallel with the beach. As soon as the surf carnival ended a bidding war broke out to secure the lifeguard boards that would become the construction prototypes that ignited the Australian surfboard industry.