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THE NEXT WAVE OUT OF NSB

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THE NEXT WAVE OUT OF NSB
Photo by cool guy jon / Unsplash

New Smyrna has been producing good surfers for generations, so talented kids growing up around the Inlet are nothing new. In 2026, several local surfers have results worth paying attention to.

Two local surfers, Sawyer Glynn and Tylah Maresh, were named to USA Surfing’s new junior national teams this summer. Auburn Hilley is already competing in World Surf League Qualifying Series events and made a semifinal in Virginia Beach in September. Asher Eastwood finished directly behind Glynn at the NSSA East Coast Regional Championships here in April.

These four are at different points in the process, and they are not the whole local field. USA Surfing also named New Smyrna’s Ansley West to its U16 Girls Development Team.

Auburn Hilley

Auburn Hilley is competing on the World Surf League Qualifying Series.

Hilley’s 2026 results include third in Junior Pro Girls at the Mike Martin Pro/Am at the Inlet. The next month, she was one of eight young women invited to the Ladybirds division at Stab High in Virginia Beach.

Stab High is not a normal surf contest. It is built around aerial surfing and progression, and the field included surfers brought in specifically for that style of surfing. Just being invited put Hilley into a much different environment than another regional junior event.

By September she was competing in the World Surf League’s Virginia Beach Super Girl QS 4000. She won her quarterfinal over a field that included former Championship Tour surfer Chelsea Tuach, then advanced into the semifinal. Her run ended there, giving her an equal seventh-place finish.

For a young surfer from New Smyrna, that is a meaningful step. The Qualifying Series is where the competition begins feeding toward the Challenger Series and eventually the Championship Tour. The field is no longer limited to surfers the same age or kids from the same regional contest circuit.

Hilley has also started building the industry side of a surfing career. Her current management profile lists ROXY, FCS, Orion Surfboards, We Are Feel Good and LEUS as partners. Red Dog Surf Shop also lists her as a team rider.

Her media footprint is growing with it. She's appeared in projects and features from Super Girl, Surfline, the World Surf League and ROXY, along with her appearance at Stab High this year.

Of the group coming out of New Smyrna right now, she is a clear example of someone beginning to make the transition from junior surfing into the professional system.

Sawyer Glynn

Sawyer Glynn posted two strong results right here in April.

At the Mike Martin Pro/Am in April, Glynn won the 14-and-under boys final with a 12.33 two-wave score. The runner-up finished with a 6.83, leaving Glynn with a 5.5-point margin.

A few days later, many of the best junior surfers on the East Coast were back in New Smyrna for the NSSA East Coast Regional Championships. Glynn won Open Boys, with fellow New Smyrna surfer Asher Eastwood finishing second.

In July, USA Surfing selected Glynn for its 2026 U16 Boys National Team. USA Surfing says the roster was selected through results from its Prime Series and Junior National Championships at Lower Trestles, putting Glynn into a national group alongside young surfers from California and the rest of the East Coast.

There is still a very local part of his story, too. Red Dog Surf Shop also lists Glynn as one of its team riders alongside Hilley.

That connection between a local shop like Red Dog and the national contest system is part of what makes New Smyrna’s surf scene interesting. These kids can grow up surfing the same break, get support from a shop in town, compete here for years and eventually find themselves traveling across the country against some of the best surfers out there.

Glynn appears to be right in the middle of that transition now.

Tylah Maresh

Tylah Maresh is taking a similar route.

She finished second in Open Girls at the NSSA East Coast Regional Championships in April, behind Cocoa Beach surfer Kendall Dimmick. By July, USA Surfing had selected Maresh for its U16 Girls National Team.

USA Surfing’s current roster has ten surfers in that group. Most are from California, with Maresh representing New Smyrna alongside a handful of other East Coast surfers.

Asher Eastwood

Asher Eastwood has been appearing near the top of local and East Coast results for several years, and he was right there again in 2026.

At the NSSA East Coast Regionals in April, Eastwood finished second in Open Boys behind Glynn. He also reached the Explorer Boys final and finished fourth.

The first and second-place finish is probably the more interesting result from a New Smyrna perspective. In one of the major East Coast junior events, held here at home, the top two Open Boys surfers were both from New Smyrna Beach.

A surf town still producing surfers

There is a tendency for “surf town” to become more of an identity than a description.

New Smyrna has the surf shops, contests, photographers, board builders and history. The Inlet has been one of Florida’s best-known surf spots for decades. Surfing is baked deeply enough into the town that it is easy to stop noticing it.

But the more meaningful part of that culture is whether another generation keeps coming through.

Right now, it is.

Sawyer Glynn and Tylah Maresh are on USA Surfing national teams. Glynn and Asher Eastwood finished first and second in Open Boys at the East Coast Regionals. Auburn Hilley reached a WSL QS 4000 semifinal in September.

None of that guarantees where any of them will end up. The distance between being an exceptional junior surfer and making a career out of professional surfing is enormous.

That is also what makes them interesting to follow now.

They are not former New Smyrna surfers being remembered twenty years later. They are kids growing up here now, competing at the Inlet now and beginning to see how far surfing can take them.

For a town with this much of its identity tied to surfing, they are worth paying attention to.

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