It’s a fact of life that many men are threatened by powerful and skilful women. Nowhere is this more so than in sport. While women’s sport might just be entering a golden age right now with women’s soccer, rugby, basketball, Australian football, cricket, surfing etc. emerging from the shadows to not only provide fun and exciting fitness alternatives for women but also to … [Read more...]
Cecil Healy – the village hero who changed the world through his sport!
One of Australia's least known sporting heroes changed the world in so many ways... but his mercurial swimming and other sporting feats were not much help against the guns and bombs of war! Manly is viewed by most as a commercial, services and tourism hub surrounded by an urban sprawl. Well, it is that. Sort of. But it’s also a village. Even twenty years ago, when I still … [Read more...]
A very strange summer (1966–1967) – when surfers became sporting gods but social pariahs!
In a strange quirk of history while one of Sydney Northern Beach's greatest ever surfers was winning the world title in the USA, public authorities back in Australia were banning his wonderful sport! On a windy Sunday morning a few dozen surfers were enjoying some fun, little waves at the protected southern end of Palm Beach. Around mid-morning the patrol captain of the … [Read more...]