dkeller's blog

Thousands of surf fans entered to win a surfing weekend in Santa Barbara with Lakey, and we gave away of Lakey-autographed gear every day of the event. We’re announcing here for the first time that our Grand Prize winner is Tessa R. of Long Beach, CA. “I’m really surprised. I never win anything!” she told us.

Tessa is a competitive swimmer as well as a surfer, and says she looks forward to meeting the USO champ. “I think professional female surfers are awesome,” she says. “They surf the big waves just as well as the guys do. They’re amazing.” After watching Lakey, we couldn’t agree more. Congratulations to Tessa and special thanks to all who entered. If you are new to the SCA community, continue reading to see how others are working for the planet and see which of our conservation service opportunities is right for you.

With longboards, shortboards, skateboards, and three SRO concerts, it was a wild scene at the Nike US Open of Surfing in Huntington Beach, CA – but SCA helped to ensure it was a clean scene, too.

SCA volunteers and staff removed copious amounts of litter from the beach which, as our own Joe Thurston tweeted, may have otherwise been headed to “one of those gargantuan offshore trash islands.” Seventeen-year-old world class surfer and SCA spokeswoman Lakey Peterson led the week’s biggest project, a Saturday sweep that left HB good to go for Sunday’s surfing finals, where Lakey absolutely rocked the house.

The Santa Barbara native scored a near-perfect 19.76 on her way to winning it all after finishing second in last year’s event and first in the Junior Division. Moments after she was carried off the beach by a buoyant mob, the new US Open champion found other reasons to celebrate. “I am so stoked that everything with SCA worked out so well!” Lakey shouted.

The beach clean-ups were a major success, SCA handed out more than 20,000 “Get On Board” wristbands with directions to our social media site: jointhesca.org, and our booth in the Festival Village drew daily crowds pumped about SCA crew and intern positions. We salute Lakey for an awesome victory and her generous support, and thank all the folks at IMG, Nike, Rainbow Environmental Services, and our super volunteers, especially the team from the California Conservation Corps.