Surf Coast surfer shoots for the stars

After recently taking out his maiden junior world championship in El Salvador, Jan Juc dynamo Willis Droomer is shooting for the stars and certainly has a long and entertaining career ahead of him.

Droomer knew he wanted to take his surfing seriously from quite a young age, having learnt to surf as a three-year-old at Jan Juc with his parents Ean and Janelle.

“I was around three years old when I started getting into my surfing,” Droomer said.

“I remember from a really young age just seeing surfboards lying around the house and thinking that I’d really love to get in the water with my parents who loved getting out in the water.

“From there I started at Jan Juc and absolutely fell in love with it.”

Droomer said by the time he was six or seven years old, he knew he wanted to surf for the rest of his life and make something out of it.

By choosing to stick to the sport, Droomer began surfing in junior Surfing Victoria events, taking commanding wins in his age divisions along the way.

From there, the 16-year-old began taking his surfing to the next level, enlisting coaching from Surf Better Now and Surfing Victoria High Performance coaches at the time of Cahill Bell-Warren and Adam Robertson (Surfing Victoria CEO).

A spade of Victorian Surfing Titles in his arsenal, Droomer set his sights on the Australian Junior Surfing Championships.

Luckily for the youngster, his effortless style and flawless transitions rail to rail delivered him a nationwide honour that would set him on a path towards destiny.

A first national title gave Droomer an opportunity to shoot for gold on the global stage, heading overseas with the Australian team and fellow Victorian Ellie Harrison to chase his dreams of becoming a world champion.

The ISA World Junior Surfing Championships in El Salvador would be the stage where everyone would begin to know the 16-year old’s name worldwide.

The Billabong-sponsored athlete said he went into his maiden world championships with plenty of excitement however, he had plenty of nerves attached.

“El Salvador was certainly a very different place to what I was used to and there was certainly a bit of nervous energy floating around,” Droomer said.

“I’d never surfed a contest in boardshorts which was certainly an amazing, yet interesting and different feeling.

“I felt I begun the contest surfing a bit shaky and nervous in the first couple of rounds.

“Every single round felt like it was like surfing a final in the Victorian titles, the talent on show was absolutely amazing.”

While Droomer noted his early round jitters got the best of him, therefore delivering him into the repercharge, he said that the second chance heats were a great refresh and another chance to show off his surfing repertoire.

 

“The second chance repercharge heats were obviously the ones that were the most important,” Droomer said.

“If you didn’t get through a main draw heat, you had the second chance to win the repercharge to re-enter the main draw, however with the repercharge, you lose, you’re fully out.

“I feel like the second chance heats allowed me to generate somewhat a bit of form, where I felt I was able to put aside the nerves and jitters and really loosen up.”

Droomer noted that his best surfing comes when he is the most relaxed, his flawless and effortless style is best painted on a canvas where stress isn’t a factor.

By making it through repercharge heats and entering the main draw on multiple occasions, Droomer would begin to make inroads.

Putting great score after great score together delivered the Jan Juc local with a finals berth, something he had only dreamed of.

“Once I begun to loosen up in the contest, everything started to go to plan and happen,” Droomer said.

“I somehow felt I found the energy to put my best surfing forward and then I was in the final!”

Droomer alluded to his maiden world championship final starting as a bit of a slow one, where his counterparts had all locked in strong scores before he had even scratched into a wave.

However, by utilising his extensive heat experience both in the event and throughout his career, Droomer was able to claw his way back with two near excellent scores.

While there was an anxious wait to hear the overall results at the end of the final, it was absolute pandemonium at the buzzer as Droomer would be crowned the U/16 ISA World Junior Champion.

 

 

As the Australian team squashed into him, the 16-year-old said it was one of the more surreal and exhilarating moments of his life.

“It was such an amazing feeling winning the event in front of all my fellow Australian team members and having them screaming for me on the beach.

“It’s a pretty weird feeling being a world champion and the title is amazing but I’m still just a boy from Jan Juc who loves surfing with his mates and having fun.”

Droomer said the win has fired him up to want to achieve more in the surfing fraternity, with his sights set on making the jump onto the world tour in the next few years, while also continuing to make fun surf movies with his mates.