Super Girl Surf Festival makes its East Coast debut Labor Day weekend 2026, bringing 100-plus pro surfers, 20-plus free concerts, and 10-plus sports disciplines to the Virginia Beach Oceanfront — zero dollars to attend.
Nearly 20 Years Late to the East Coast, and Worth the Wait
The festival the East Coast should have had for two decades is finally arriving — and it’s bringing everything.
For nearly two decades, the Super Girl Surf Festival has delivered world-class women’s surfing, free beachfront concerts, and thousands of girls competing in everything from flag football to skateboarding — on the West Coast. Virginia Beach is finally getting its turn.
The festival — billed by organizers as the world’s largest women’s sports, music, and lifestyle festival — lands at the Virginia Beach Oceanfront over Labor Day weekend, September 5–7, 2026. This edition is the largest in the event’s history, with its footprint stretching along 1st through 12th Streets. Entry is free. Concerts require advance online registration per day but no payment — though registered tickets don’t guarantee entry once capacity fills, making early arrival essential.
Three Days, Ten-Plus Sports, Twenty-Plus Concerts, One Price Tag
Here is everything happening across those three days, broken down to help you plan.
The programming spans surf, sport, music, and wellness in one walkable beachfront corridor:
- The centerpiece is a WSL QS 4000 women’s surf contest at 1st Street Jetty — one of the highest points-earning events on the path to professional surfing’s elite circuit, with 100-plus pro female surfers competing
- Beyond surfing: skateboarding, inline skating, beach volleyball, soccer, flag football, lacrosse, field hockey, cheer, and dance — with youth and open divisions, not just pros
- 20-plus free concerts featuring CeeLo Green, Switchfoot, Lupe Fiasco, Gym Class Heroes, B.o.B., and Bryce Vine, plus women artists HIRIE, Hannah Wicklund, and Emily Zeck
- A “#Goals stage” hosting free yoga, fitness, and self-defense classes daily, with the full festival running 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
- A festival village with female-focused vendors, interactive art installations, and empowerment talks from athletes, creators, and advocates
Founder Rick Bratman launched Super Girl in 2007 after watching his daughter face barriers in youth sports that her male peers simply didn’t encounter. Industry skeptics told him a women’s action-sports festival wouldn’t work. The event now draws over 200,000 fans annually across its California and Florida editions. “There is no limit to what women can accomplish,” Bratman has said — a statement that, nearly 20 years on, reads less like a slogan and more like a receipted argument.
Virginia Beach Was Always the Right City
The city’s deep surf history and growing action-sports infrastructure make this more than a convenient venue choice.
Virginia Beach isn’t a random pin drop. Locals call it the birthplace of East Coast surfing — the 1st Street Jetty has hosted contests for decades, and the city is mid-transformation into a year-round action-sports hub. Atlantic Park, the Pharrell Williams-backed entertainment complex rising nearby, is part of the same current pulling Virginia Beach toward something larger than a summer beach town.
Bratman frames the Virginia Beach event as both a “celebration of surf heritage” and a “spotlight on the women and girls shaping the future of action sports.” Organizers are positioning this as a recurring annual partnership, not a one-time visit — a signal that the Mid-Atlantic is now a permanent stop on the Super Girl map.
Practically speaking, the 9th Street parking garage is projected to hit capacity on peak evenings, and central festival activity clusters near 3rd–4th Street. Concert tickets require per-day registration at supergirlvb.com — free, but mandatory, and subject to venue capacity limits. Early registration and early arrival are the two non-negotiables for getting the most out of a weekend the East Coast has waited nearly 20 years for.
