Why did I have to surf with a cis man at Capitola’s Women On Waves?

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The Women On Waves surf contest at Capitola Beach has uplifted our region since 1996, but this year, the biggest threat for competitors didn’t come from Mother Nature, but from a cisgender man, surf instructor Calder Nold, who entered and competed in the Masters category (ages 40-49).

By entering, Nold brought one of the nation’s thorniest issues to our shores: divisive debates about transgender athletes, specifically, trans women competing in women’s divisions.

The question everyone had that day was, why? What point did he – and those who put him up to it – think they would make? 

I competed alongside Nold that sunny Saturday morning. He wore the requisite jersey wrapped around his neck and was bare-chested and in board shorts. 

A participant asked why he was there. What was he trying to do or prove by competing in Women On Waves? Did he identify as a woman? 

Nold brushed it off, saying a friend had “nominated” him.

To enroll a man in a women’s event to protest the inclusion of trans women in women’s events is a harmful act, hands down.

When further pressed about his reasons, he facetiously replied, “This is an inclusive event for charity, right? I just want to support.”

Competing against a cis man was not the intimidating part to me; I love the contest and surfing, and I’m happy to surf against anyone. What hurt me personally about his participation was the intent behind it. 

He seemed to be there to make women uncomfortable on purpose. 

At first, the contest organizers had assumed perhaps Nold did identify as a woman. But then, as word got around the Esplanade that day, we learned he had been entered for nefarious reasons — a personal vendetta on the part of a competitor who opposes Women On Waves’ inclusion of trans women, at least two of whom competed in the contest. 

To enroll a man in a women’s event to protest the inclusion of trans women in women’s events is a harmful act, hands down. 

So much so, in fact, that I wasn’t originally going to pen this response to what Surf Equity co-founder Sabrina Brennan calls a “mean-spirited, disrespectful, unkind, and selfish” attempt at making a point. I didn’t want to bring more attention to any hatred against an already marginalized group. 

This action also buried the happy news that there was an adaptive division for those with physical disabilities to compete for the first time this year, too. 

But then I read an op-ed by local chiropractor EmilyAnne Pillari, who entered Nold. In the piece, she admits she entered him as a provocation, to test the rules and make a point that as supportive and appreciative Nold is of women surfers, he can easily outpaddle even the strongest surfer. She says that wouldn’t change if he “thought he was a woman.” 

In this flippant, simplistic way, Pillari belittles the trans experience. She naively and meanly asks, “If he had shaved his beard and painted his nails, would he have been any less of a man?” 

Her argument –  that if trans women compete, so should cisgender men – shows zero empathy or subtlety. It offers no space for grace, complexity or understanding. 

Pillari says she intended the “spectacle,” (this alone is offensive, implying trans women are a “spectacle,”) to make a point that identifying as a woman should not be enough to garner someone admission in an amateur, fundraising women’s contest.

For competitors like me, the intention fell flat. 

We mostly shrugged it off, unwilling to engage. Confused, mostly. Others were angry that a cis man was allowed to compete. They felt belittled and disrespected by his presence and that he was able to register and surf. 

In 28 years, this hadn’t happened before. 

However, the false notion that trans women are advantaged over other women in athletics is a perspective that’s recently been in headlines, such as surfer Bethany Hamilton and swimmer Riley Gaines becoming outspoken in their transphobic views.

“What is wrong with having a male in the contest is that it’s a women’s contest, period,” says Legends category participant Victoria Tatum. “In my mind, this includes transgender women, but not males, but I’d be interested in what others had to say about this.”

I was interested, too. 

As a journalist who has interviewed trans pro surfer Sasha Jane Lowerson and nonbinary surfboard shaper Mando, among others, I believe these are voices we need to hear, and anyone who hasn’t yet should listen to their stories. 

Brennan, of Surf Equity, has been on the forefront of the fight for gender parity in professional surfing and also co-founded the Committee for Equity in Women’s Surfing. She became known as the San Mateo County harbor commissioner who fought for a women’s division at Mavericks.

The move of entering a cisgender man in Women On Waves to try to argue against trans inclusion was “so nasty,” Brennan says. “I don’t care how nice and polite the cis guy was, he was there to make fun of them. It’s juvenile, immature, pathetic behavior. To engage in this behavior to be exclusionary is so targeted.”

Women On Waves organizers Marisol Godínez, Corey Grace and Aylana Zanville had a few things to explain in the aftermath of the action that caused harm to both the atmosphere of the contest and its participants.

“We’re dealing with two issues,” Godínez says, the first being “what EmilyAnn was trying to say about trans women,” and the second, of “the women in the contest who were upset they had to surf with a man.”

Pillari says she was not aware of having surfed against a trans woman. But that’s not the point anyway.

“We wish she would have reached out to have a conversation about her experience,” Godínez says, “since we believe it was an important conversation, rather than the theatrics that were created to make her point, affecting everyone’s experience at the event.”

As for Nold slipping in under the radar, Zanville explains that the organizers don’t Google or vet everyone who signs up. And why should they? Women On Waves isn’t about policing entrants. 

“We assume they are telling the truth about who they are,” she says. “We had never seen that name before. Men come down to support the women and that is what they do from the beach. There are plenty of ways for men to be involved and support women from land.”

Grace intends to restore faith that “the community we’ve built can weather any storm created by people who are not aligned with our mission,” she says. Other women have brought up the topic “in a direct, transparent way,” which then led to open-minded discussions and evolution. 

“We hope to have more heartfelt, authentic conversations in the future so we can learn and grow together,” Grace says, adding that it’s these conversations that can bring us together rather than tear us apart, “if we approach them the right way.”

Scotia Macgillivray, who competed in the Legends age category, says that “as a trans woman who surfs and loves to compete, [Pillari entering Nold] was a stunningly silly thing to do.” 

She calls the “ax to grind” about trans women’s inclusion “disconcerting. … Just another political opening salvo on LGBTQI+ people of all makes and models … the absurdity is on the chiropractor’s act because there already was a trans woman there, surfing right underneath their nose. Sharing waves, competing and having fun.”

Macgillivray, too, sees no connection between having a man compete in a woman’s surf competition and a trans woman competing. “There are hardly any of us that surf” anyway, she says. “Hell, I can barely unscrew beverage container tops like I used to after eight years of estrogen!” 

Victoria Tatum was in Macgillivray’s heat. “I never questioned her identifying as [a woman] or her being in the heat,” Tatum says, adding that others in the Legends category felt the same and that “transgender women are not overwhelmingly defeating [other] women in athletic contests.”

What direction can we go to ensure more inclusion? Where there can be many or any genders? What would that look like? And how to make it work? 

“It’s women who’ve been discriminated against,” Brennan says, “and now it’s trans women — and cis women are oftentimes the ones doing this. Trans women get it. They understand fear of cisgendered men, sexism, misogyny … the things women understand, they understand too. They also understand that segregation isn’t going to help us solve those problems. They have an interest in seeing it that way but I think we all do.”

One option, according to Brennan, is opening single-gender contests out to even greater inclusion, more along the lines of what’s been done in rock climbing. “Climbing has a nonbinary division, a women’s, and men’s,” she explains. “If you’re trans, you compete in the gender category you identify with. Everyone is included.”

Brennan suggests this open approach, where even a self-identified cisgender or trans man would have a clear place: “It’s still going to attract mostly women — why not switch it over to all genders welcome?” 

I love the idea of this, because the simplistic notion of Pillari’s anti-trans statement doesn’t take the many other factors into account, such as skill level and experience. If Nold was a Mavericks surfer and professional surf instructor, he’s likely been able to invest more time in developing his skills than the amateur surfers for whom the contest is intended. 

The year prior, former pro surfer and local shaper Ashley Lloyd came in first in my heat. Some women didn’t think it was fair that she registered — not because of gender, obviously, but because of course, with her skill level and pro history, she’d win. And she did. 

Lloyd wasn’t in this year’s contest, but were she to compete against Nold, who do you imagine would outsurf the other? My bet would be on Lloyd.

The trans woman who also surfed in the competition the year prior was also eliminated before the finals, as was Pillari. This in itself debunks the false argument that if a trans woman competes against other women, the trans woman will win. At least six other women placed ahead.

Sasha Jane Lowerson, the only publicly known trans woman pro surfer, came in ninth place in the 2022 Noosa Festival of Surfing. Only after she won the Women’s Open and Logger divisions of the Western Australia state titles at age 43, after a full career of frequent wins in men’s divisions, was there any outcry about trans woman competitors.

Brennan points out that this becomes an issue for certain women who “didn’t win,” such as Riley Gaines, whom Brennan says was “a really good swimmer but not a top-tier, first- or second-place swimmer. She felt she might have been doing better if there wasn’t a trans swimmer out there. But if you look at her career, it makes no sense,” as Gaines wasn’t about to win first place anyway.

The trans woman in last year’s Women On Wave didn’t win either, and well, the facts speak for themselves. Arguments otherwise are just propaganda fueled by hate and distraction.

For the women who were upset by having a man in their heats, Zanville, Grace and Godínez want the community to know they were blindsided by his arrival. 

“People don’t know we were caught off guard,” Godínez says of Nold’s appearance. “Legally we didn’t know how to proceed, so we did what we could with what we had.” 

Zanville says the contest will continue its tradition of being inclusive of all who identify as women. “I want them to be comfortable and for no one to cause a huge scene,” she says. 

I’d call that a fairly simple request.

Moving forward, the organizers will do their best to create a safe event for women surfers. Godínez emphasizes that “Women On Waves is about building a safe community that empowers and celebrates women and people who identify as women, living in kindness and inclusivity.”

I will enroll again next year, and I hope others will, too. Let’s show how Santa Cruz sportsmanship and inclusion can be the real winners of every heat. 

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FOR THE RECORD: This piece has been updated to reflect EmilyAnne Pillari’s assertion that she was not aware of having surfed against a trans woman in the Women On Waves competition.

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