Our Festival wouldn’t be possible without the staff and volunteers who make it all happen. With 6+ months of planning and organising in the background to deliver this amazing world-class surf contest, popup beach bar, and all the other Festival activations happening around Noosa. Our team is dedicated and passionate about creating and sustaining this long and illustrious Surf Festival for the community to enjoy.
Festival Director – Josh Allen
Originally from Sydney, Josh saw the light and moved North to the Sunshine Coast in 2015.
With a background in Logistics and Marketing, it’s no wonder Josh excels at planning, organising, and managing events for a living.
A larrikin with a well-guided head on his shoulders, Josh is a people person and a professional operator that wants nothing more than to put smiles on people’s faces as they enjoy the events he works overtime to deliver.
Since taking over in 2020, Josh has managed to pull off some of the most memorable Festivals. Despite challenging surf conditions, Covid, managing 400+ surfers and a beach bar, it’s a miracle Josh still has enough time to raise a young family and run his own pub!
Festival Chairman – John Finlay
John is the owner of World Surfaris, who had been a sponsor of the Noosa Festival of Surfing for many years.
When management of the Festival became available at short notice in 2018, John didn’t hesitate to commit and has taken the Festival to new heights implementing several groundbreaking initiatives.
Adamant that long term sustainability was to be a key element in the Festival’s future, John eliminated all single-use plastics in the first year and also introduced a Sustainability Pledge and Report.
More the elder statesman these days, John is never backward in leading by example in all Beach Bar activities and plays an important role in pre-tasting all our suppliers before the Festival.
Contest Director – Tully St John
Laguna Bay Longboards & Shotgun Surfboards are brands synonymous with the Noosa and Sunshine Coast surfing fraternity since the 1970s.
After traveling Australia and the world, Tully’s father, Mike lured a young Tully back into the shaping bay where the father & son combination began.
In all his spare time, Tully takes the reigns coordinating 400+ competitive surfers for the annual Noosa Festival of Surfing.
For 3 weeks Tully lives and breaths tides, currents, swell, wind, and what the sand is doing to ensure our surfers are surfing the best waves and giving them the greatest opportunity for success.
Noosa Malibu Club President – Glen Gower
Glen Gower is the quintessential Noosa local having grown up on Hastings Street in the 60′s and early 70′s. This upbringing started Glen’s addiction to Noosa and it’s world-famous surf breaks.
Back then, Glen shared his playground of Noosa main beach and it’s world class point breaks with just a handful of his best mates and siblings. Moving to Sunshine Beach in 1974 (thought to be the end of the earth in those days!!), Glen found that surfing the Opens with little or no company was both fun and scary at times. “I am truly grateful and humbled by my blessed surfing life and my biggest thrill is sharing special days in the surf with friends and especially my family”
Surfing perfect Noosa point waves has been described as like having a cup of tea with god, if so then I have had to top up my cup hundreds of times over 40 years of surfing Noosa”.
Head Judge – Keenan Roxburgh
If being a professional surfer is the best job in the world, then being a professional surf contest judge is a likely second?
Keenan is a seasoned judge with several years of experience judging a variety of comps from longboard world tour events on the WSL to local boardriders at a deserted beaches on the weekend.
With arguably the hardest job out of anyone involved with the Festival. Keenan takes it all in his stride and is a true professional.
Over the years Keenan has experienced a pivotal shift in the longboarding scene paying homage to the Noosa Festival of Surfing for being a big reason why innovation and delineation between traditional log events and performance longboarding have become obvious.
Media Manager – Charlotte Lerpiniere
A multi-talented young entrepreneur hailing from Sydney’s Northern Beaches. Charlotte is a fresh face to the Noosa Festival of Surfing team but brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to our ranks having spent time in multiple different industries, including a stint with the WSL.
Charlotte also has a wealth of experience in Event & Sponsorship Management working in large scale events and music festivals. Recently Charlotte organised and hosted the first ever Northern Beaches community event of its kind, for female business owners which was a resounding success.
What drives Charlotte is her passion for social media and brand personality. Turning brands and events to life and the fact ours revolves around surfing is a just a bonus. So if you see Charlotte pointing the camera at you in the future remember to smile and wave 😉
First Aid & Water Patrol – Stuart Jeays
Be nice to Stuey, there’s every chance he could be saving your life one day. Stuey is our resident water patrol, first aid officer and Brad Pitt wannabe, whose job it is to patrol the lineup and keep a safe contest site.
Although Stuey spends more time-saving members of the public than competitors. His presence and a happy smile are appreciated by all.
On a serious note, Stuey is a professional lifeguard patrolling several Sunshine Coast beaches and is a very good surfer himself competing in a handful of the pro divisions and usually doing quite well.
Glenn Currie – Site Manager
Every festival team needs a man like Glenn!
Glenn has been our site manager since 2021. Being 6’6″ in stature helps big Glenny with his role at the festival.
A gentle giant, Glen is quite often seen laughing in between jobs around the comp site or making sure the beer is cold in the bar. A super reliable resource for the Festival.
Matt ‘the waxhead’ Chojnacki – Head Commentator (& multiple divisional winner)
A name that has become synonomous with Australian longboarding and surfing in general is Matt ‘the waxhead’ Chojnacki or as we like to call him Chonno!
An extremely accomplished surfer and surf coach, Chonno has been competing at the Festival since he was a grommet and has since created a unique and successful career for himself most notably as a regular on the commentary panel at WSL events both shortboard and longboard. What makes Chonno so great to listen to is his way of breaking down surfer styles and analysing their surfing so it makes sense to the purests as well as the newbies.
When he’s not articulating the abundance of surf styles on the mic, Chonno is often smashing heat after heat on his way to another final and podium finish of his favourite events like the Logger Pro and the Old Mal.
