XXL Awards - Surfer Girls Win Big, And Keala Kennelly's Speech Kills It!

Keala Kennelly & Niki DiSanto

Keala Kennelly

Keala Kennelly wins the Pure Scot Barrel Award

Courtney Conlogue

Bob Pearson and family

Andrea Moller

Fletcher Crew

Andrea Moller Wins Women's Best Performance

Keala Kennelly & Crew

Mason Barnes, Jim Gray & Pelle

Malia Ward & Jacqueline Miller

Malia Ward

Shane Dorian

All images by Lorrie Palmos Photography

In case you missed it, the XXL awards were pretty awesome, and we have to say that for us, the best part of the show was Keala Kennelly's speech (below) after winning the Pure Scot Barrel Award. This is the very first time a female has been up for this award and her wave was insane!

It was the speech everyone in the action sports world was talking about minutes after it went down, and we think it's pretty fierce.


"When I was a little girl I didn't want to be a little girl. Because when I was a little girl, I kept getting told you can't do that because you're a girl. You can't play football because you're a girl, you can't pee standing up, and for the record I can pee standing up, my aim isn't that good so I'll give you guys that one.  I heard all these things - you can't do this because you're a girl. You can't do this because you're a woman. Women can't surf. OK, women can surf, but women can't get barreled, women can't surf big waves, women can't surf pipeline, women can't surf  Teahupo'o, women can't paddle Jaws, women can't get barreled at Jaws. So who I really, really, want to thank is everyone in my life who told me you can't do that because you're a woman, because that drove me to dedicate my life to proving you wrong. And it's been so damn FUN."   Keala Kennelly


Hell yeah Keala - thank you for smashing glass ceilings, kicking ass, and showing the world what girls can do.   #Boom    You can also watch it in the video above - it starts at about 1:29 minutes in.


*Big thanks to Lorrie Palmos for sharing her photos from the night with us!