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Charged
In one short year, Samantha Cornish beat Lisa Andersen, got beat up by Trudy Todd and got barreled on the cover of Surfer Girl magazine. Will anything stand in this rookie's way?
by Alison Smith
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November 28, 2000 - Samantha Cornish stands on the beach at Sunset about to paddle into booming, solid 8-foot Hawaiian surf. She puts on her leg rope -- a slightly furrowed brow the only telltale sign of her anxiety.
At least she's in good hands. She's under the guidance of legendary big-wave rider Ken Bradshaw and his girlfriend, three-time world champion Layne Beachley. In addition to being the most celebrated female big-wave surfer at Sunset, Beachley's also a friend who Cornish looks up to like a big sister. Even with Beachley, Cornish doesn't let on about the butterflies swimming in her stomach. "It makes me nervous thinking about that day," she later recalls. "It was just such a rush; it was huge. But if someone else goes out there and does it -- another girl -- I want to do it. I want to be the best."
In her debut year on the World Qualifying Series, the 19-year-old charger from Crescent Head, Australia, quickly established herself as the one to watch. By July 2000, Cornish won some of the biggest events in Australia, including the Billabong Pro Junior Championships and the Quiksilver Roxy Pro, where she beat Lisa Andersen, Serena Brooke and Trudy Todd. She landed a lucrative sponsorship deal with Roxy, won the Chick Magazine Peer Poll Award for Most Promising Newcomer and crept up the WQS ratings -- all in her first year on tour.
An Indecent Proposal
Vince Lauder, the former team manager for Billabong, discovered Cornish when she was just a 14-year-old grom who blew all the judges away in the junior series. "When she was surfing, everyone thought she was a grommet guy," he says. "Once at Avoca, an official asked the male surfers to move out of the area to give the girls a fair go. It was actually Sam! She took off on a solid 6-footer, went out onto face and hit the left with a snap, changing direction into a huge roundhouse cutback and hit the lip with a backhand reentry. It was mental! She scored 9s. After that wave, one of the judges remarked, 'It's a girl, mate. She's in the heat'. When she came in, it was like any other surf. She'd been out there just having fun."
Cornish first approached Lauder for a clothing deal with Billabong when she was only 14, but he shot her down. "I declined her proposal at the time," he says. "A year later, she won the Australian under 16 title and the under 18s title and nearly everything else she'd been in that year -- including beating local guys in club events, which she thought was great."
She sealed the deal when she went to the World Titles in Bali and dared to compete in the 18 and under division even though she was only 15 -- and won it. "She proved to herself and me that she had the potential to become a future world champion," Lauder says.
Homegrown and Farm-fed
Cornish grew up in Crescent Head, a small town about six hours' drive north of Sydney on Australia's Northern New South Wales coast. There are no traffic lights or water pollution and very few people. With a population of 3,500, what Crescent Head does have to offer is great surf, a bit of bush and some pretty big sand dunes. That's why Cornish's father, Peter, a well-known goofyfoot from Sydney's northern beaches, chose to raise his kids there. Peter Cornish carved a name for himself as a surfboard shaper, working for top manufacturers in Sydney's northern beaches during the late '60s and early '70s. He moved at the height of the Country Soul period in the early '70s.
"Pete was one of many dedicated surfers to make such a move around then," says Australian surf chronicler Nick Carroll. "That's why Sam -- and so many of Australia's best young surfers -- are country kids. Their dads were among the best and most dedicated surfers of their generation."
Cornish's dad still shapes today, but can't keep up with his daughter's order of 18 boards a year. Now she works with Nev Hyman who is able to crank out a big quiver, even if most of her boards are small -- between 5'6 and 5'10. "The biggest board I have is a 6'2," she says. "But for Hawaii, I'll probably get a 7'2 or 7'4."
Jumbo Shrimp
At only 5 feet tall, Cornish's goes big whether it's enjoying good surf or looking for trouble. When the surf's no good, she entertains herself by finding mischief instead. On a recent surf trip to Queensland, while the rest of the crew was playing pool in the local pub, Cornish was teaching me how to jam public telephones to get free calls. On the road between surf checks, she'd yell for the car to stop and disappear into sugar cane fields, returning triumphant a few minutes later with giant stems and a matching size grin.
Her cheekiness is something some of the "old guard" on tour -- surfers who paid their dues without the benefits of sponsorship -- hasn't completely warmed to. The girls on the elite World Championship Tour often measure up-and-coming competitors by the respect they are paid, and success on tour can hinge on the ability to get along with them. Some of the WCT girls feel Cornish hasn't shown enough of it -- respect, that is. What she has shown is that she's a force to be contended with.
That tension came to a head at the Quiksilver Roxy Pro this year when Trudy Todd punched Cornish on the beach after losing their heat. How do the two get along now? "I don't really talk to Trudy," says Cornish. "And that doesn't really bother me. She tries, but I'd rather not talk to someone like that. One minute we were good friends and the next she did that. We always see each other, so I say hi and that's about it. I just want to let her know that it was not right, and to act like nothing ever happened -- I won't take it."
Jet Set to Jet Lag
Cornish is no stranger to competing, but she is new to competing away from home. Up until July 2000, she'd only been to California once to compete in a World Qualifying Series event. Now she's getting schooled in things like jet lag, food poisoning and living out of the pocket of girls hell-bent on ending your winning streak thousands of miles from home.
"It's my first year on the road. When you're competing, it takes the fun out of surfing," she says. "It's fun winning, but it's your job, and you have to be serious about it. It's not as easy as I thought it would be. You have to be mentally strong on the tour. I think maybe that's the hardest thing, not just surfing, but all the travel and having to go to the other side of the world to compete. My ability is good enough to beat those other girls -- it's just the traveling that makes it so hard. Having to do everything by yourself -- to learn the ropes and be away from home."
But life as a pro surfer isn't all that bad. "It's pretty exciting going to a new country, having experiences you wouldn't have at home. Traveling makes you grow up a little more. It's shown me a lot about the way the world works."
Mini Me
Beachley is arguably the most technically brilliant female surfer on tour, but she is also one of the most outwardly competitive, with a reputation for her occasional outbursts and frustration with losing. Interviews with Beachley don't merely reflect her potential to win, but her self-assurance that it will happen. It is a blatant confidence that some on the tour may find hard to swallow, but one that Cornish emulates.
"It's pretty cool to hang out with Layne. Obviously being world champ, she's doing something right -- she's got a lot of things I can learn. We get on really well, and we love surfing together. We've got lots in common to talk about. I feel she's even one of my sisters or something, and I've even told her that before. She calls me Mugwai from Gremlins, because she reckons when I eat chocolate at night I come alive like the Gremlins. I get that mischievous grin and can't control myself."
A few days later I'm trying to organize a time for a photo shoot when Cornish tells me she's going to be busy this week before flying off to South Africa. "I'm getting braces on," she finally offers as an explanation. "I've been wanting to get ���em for a long time so I'm prepared now, I'm ready."
When I ask why she waited so long, she goes quiet: "They cost $5,000 Australian. I'm paying for them myself."
Here is where the difference lies between Cornish and the majority of us who had braces. While we spent our early teenage years too shy to bare our parent-funded smile, Cornish was out perfecting her roundhouse cutback against a sunset sky in Crescent Head. At 19, she's now surfing her way into enough prize money to foot the orthodontist's bill herself. And as far as Cornish is concerned, this is only the beginning of putting her money where her mouth is.
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