"Corky Carroll: the Clown" ran in the 1964 issue of Surf Guide magazine without an author attribution. This version has been slightly edited. 

Corky, at 16, you have become one of the world’s best surfers; you must have begun surfing pretty young. 

Yes, I was about eight when I began—but it wasn’t till I was nine that I had a board of my own. I got it for Christmas—solid balsa with a pine skeg and a real narrow nose and tail. It was 8'7" but weighed almost 40 pounds. It was great! I kept it a year and a half, the longest I’ve kept any board. I had a ball. Using model paint, I decorated it with black and green polka-dots and things like Big Surf, Hot Curl, and Moon Doggie. 

I guess so. But that was before gremmies came out.

As young as you were, and living in Surfside, you must have been pretty isolated from the rest of the surfing world. Were there any local surfers who influenced you?

I really idolized Tim Dorsey. I still think he’s the best switchfooter in the world! I also admired several of the Seal Beach guys who used to surf around here, guys like Jack and Mike Haley and Robert August. Then in 1957, I went to my first surfing movie—Bud Browne’s 

 I saw Dewey Weber for the first time and was really stoked. I had a new idol! Also, about this time I took my first surfing trip. We went to San Onofre. It just happened to be 10-to-12-foot. It was huge! There were guys going over the falls on paddleboards and everything else. I had been surfing for about eight months and this was a completely new experience. 

Only eight months and you were riding ten-foot waves?

Well—with little or no success. I got some big waves, but I crashed a lot. When I was younger, I used to kamikaze quite a bit anyway. I always took off on big waves and get wiped out. I still had lots of fun.

Judging from your performances in recent contests you have more fun than anyone in the water. And it has also been said that you are more of a trickster than a surfer. What do you think of that?

Contests are fun, but every time I enter one something happens inside my head and I become a trickster. I can’t help myself. Still, in a contest, you have to surf for the judges. And judges are always partial to their own feelings about surfing. They have their own personal likes and dislikes. Like when Phil Edwards judges a contest, If you’re smooth and bob your head as you go through the curl—you’re on! Phil doesn’t go for tricks—it's all functional or non-functional. When Dewey Weber judges, on the other hand, you crank a big turn and run up to the tip in 30 million steps per half second, and you’re on. When Les Williams or Hoppy Swarts judges a contest, they like it smooth—waving your arms swan-style. You have to wire the judges to win. You don’t just walk out into the water and surf. You have to know what you’re supposed to do. I screwed that up for about four years before I got wise.

You mentioned that Phil Edwards doesn't like tricks whether they're functional or not. What tricks are functional?

A lot of them. Switching feet, for example. Say you’re a goofyfoot, like me, riding right. You’re a couple of feet from the tip and the whole thing starts to come down on you. There are two things you can do: squat down with your back to the wave and pull it through, which is good but not as neat as blasting through without holding on; or you can switch feet so that your left foot is forward and then you can crouch and lean into the wave. So by being able to switch, and thus face the wave, you can pull yourself in a lot closer and you have more control. Here's another way tricks are functional in contests: if you and another guy are riding a wave—you both make the turn, you both walk, and you both cut back, the wave walls off and you’re riding the soup. So, you’re both exactly the same up to this point. But if the guy on the right does a spinner and the guy on the left just pulls out, you have to figure the guy on the right will get at least a half-point more. That's why I try to ride all the way to the beach and do the most I can, even in the soup. You can do a lot of things in the soup. You can go right and walk up to the tip, turn around and do a spinner, then cut back and switch feet and walk up again. All in the soup! 

Some say that you have no style of your own. 

That’s true, I guess, because I surf differently at different times. I even change from one wave to the next. On one wave I might drive for the bottom and do a huge bottom turn. On the next wave, I might turn halfway down with a big power-turn and when I come out on the shoulder I might drop my leg and throw a big cutback. Then I might stop and do a spinner and follow up with a lazy turn—and then jerk a sudden cutback. I just change fast. I say I have my own style.

Controversial, I guess. It’s different and it’s individual. It’s real, though. It’s like with girls—I don’t like too much makeup. You shouldn’t be putting on an act. 

Speaking of which, what about girls and the surf?

I like to see girls in the water; I like to see girls with bikinis in the water; I like Robin Calhoun in the water! Girls who take surfing seriously should surf. The others should stay on the beach; the ones who are just trying to make an image. But getting back to what I was saying about my style being controversial—I just do things the way I want to at the moment. I do and say the things I want to, not the way I'm supposed to. That’s how I ride waves. Not how people think I should ride them. If I think it’s neat to put one foot on either rail and stand bow-legged, I will. It might look crummy, but I might do it just because it feels good. I don’t care what the next guy thinks about it. And because I have this attitude a lot of people think I’m conceited. 

Uhhhh . . . yeah! (laughter). It’s not that I think I’m really good. Because I don’t! It’s just that I try to get on top. I promote myself. I’m not going to sit in the background and say, “I’m a kook—don’t take pictures of me!” I try to get ahead, and then everyone says I have a swelled head. I don’t like that. It’s a bad image to have. There are always rumors that people start . . . like the first time I went to the Islands. That was last summer and the first time I paddled out at Ala Moana, I heard someone say, "There goes Corky Carroll, he thinks he’s so neat." I'd never even been there before. Then someone made up a story that I paddled out at Ala Moana and said, “I’m taking over this place. I’ll surf circles around you guys." I never said anything like that. It really made me mad.

It sounds as if there’s more behind your surfing than “fun.” And judging by your paddling record you must be pretty competitive, especially to have beaten so many great paddlers—many of whom outweighed you by fifty pounds and were nearly ten years older. 

I guess I just have something against those huge, musclebound guys who always pick on everyone. Some big burly guys have given kids like me a bad time. "Get off my beach, kid," and stuff like that. I’ve only been paddling for a year, but I’ve won every race I’ve entered except one—and I placed second in that one.

How did you get started in paddling competition?

The first race I entered was at the D&W Contest last year. Mickey Muñoz talked me into it. I don’t know why, but I was psyched out. Got a bad start. That’s another thing—in surfing contests I always catch the worst waves. Like at Oceanside recently, I really picked losers! And it’s the same with paddling. I never get a good start. But anyway, I finally got going and I won. My second race was the next day. There was a paddling race for Juniors at Doheny, so I entered. It was only about a half a mile, but I won it by a long way. After that, I was really getting stoked. Paddling was fun. I was winning! And paddling wasn’t like surfing contests—there was no quibbling over who the winner really was. Except I found out later that there are little things you can do in paddling races—you can’t really cheat, but there are a lot of things that go on. Like you’ll get to a buoy and a guy’ll come charging into you and blast you off your board. Little things like that. And you’re so far away from the beach, nobody can see. 

Anyway, I won a few more races and then I got a racing board. After working out on it for about a week, I decided to enter a contest at Redondo Beach. When I arrived were all these big guys—like what’s the name of that guy who kicked a hole in his board after the race? Some giant guy . . . Mike Gaughan, I think. Muñoz introduced me to this guy, Gaughan, and then Mickey took me over to the side and said, "You gotta watch this guy. He’s one of the best paddlers in the world!" I looked over and he was about twenty feet tall! 

Well, the race was about to start and I panicked when I found out it would be a running start. I was still pretty shaky on my new racing board and I’d fall down about every 50 feet trying to run with that huge thing. My balance never was too red-hot anyway. So everyone went running down to the water, jumped on their boards, and paddled off. I ran down, jumped on my board and went off the other side. By the time I crawled back on, everybody was halfway out to the buoy. I thought I was finished. But I paddled my brains loose and passed Gaughan just before we got to the buoy. He was grumbling something about his board. And suddenly, as I was trying to turn around at the buoy, I fell off again and six guys ran over me. Before I could get the board turned over they were all gone again. And while I was swimming around trying to turn my board over, Muñoz paddled around outside of everyone and got into second place. He and Bob Moore were pushing for the lead. I got back on my board and really got going fast—railroading the chop—paddling at full potential. I passed everybody, Gaughan was still grumbling as I passed him again, and I came in 2nd just behind Moore. The big thing was that there were so many big name paddlers in the race—and I beat them!

Yes, it was my first time there for the winter surf.

Great! The Pipeline in particular. Those waves are so hollow and hairy and perfect. If you get on your inside rail like John Peck does, you can do almost anything on those waves. I rode it a little differently. If you’re a goofyfoot like me, you drop about halfway down and then instead of cranking a big turn you move your feet just a little and angle—the wave actually seems to turn you. If you go directly to the bottom and turn, you lose too much speed. If you’re back far enough, you get halfway down, angle and trim your board so that when you hit the bottom you bounce up, trim again take a few steps and just crouch. What a great place! 

How about some of the other spots? Did you find the big surf somewhat more impressive?

Size doesn’t mean that much to me. I’m not impressed with big waves nor with big-wave riders. Not at all. 

I would have, but I didn’t have the right kind of board. All I had was my regular board, the one I use in California. I rode it at Sunset, Banzai, and Makaha—it only weighs 29 pounds.

Where were the biggest, most frightening waves you rode in Hawaii?

I got on one big wave at Makaha that people said was 22 feet! But that didn’t scare me half as much as 15-foot waves at Sunset Beach. Sunset is fantastic; the scariest place I’ve ever ridden. I nearly lost my mind there. The first day I went out, it was small—hardly breaking at all. I iust wanted to see what it was like. It was about four feet and mushy. All of a sudden this giant wave came through, about ten feet, and I took off. I had just come from Pupukea where it had been easy. You just dropped to the bottom and turned, ran up to the tip and hung ten and crouched through. It was easy. But when I got this wave at Sunset, I got to the bottom and leaned into a backside turn and just spun out, wiped out, fell on my board, went over the falls, and just ate it. It was a terrible wipeout. I never felt so bad. It was a good wave, too.

Sure. More times than not. I was famous for getting wiped-out. I swam more in the Islands this winter than I ever have in my entire life. Not just from doing crummy, but from just taking off in the wrong place and getting blasted for it. The second day I was there, Sunset was so big. In the evening it was about twelve feet. The first wave I got was about 15 feet. And 15 feet at Sunset is really big! As I was dropping down, I looked to my right and there was this giant cavern. I could see guys on the other side paddling out saying, “DON’T!” But I was already in, halfway to the bottom and driving. I saw what was happening and I remember saying to myself, 

 And I leaned a little as I came off the bottom and myself going left. There I was in a big-wave survival stance and the darn wave broke and nearly shook my brains loose! But I stayed up somehow and I made it. A giant left at Sunset. My first big wave there and I was really stoked! "Big waves are the only answer," I thought. "Now I can make anything!" 

So I paddled back out and caught another one. I was really confident—cocky. I took off way over to the left, faded into it and then turned, ran up and grabbed a rail about three inches from the nose—right in the hook at Sunset! The most I’ve ever been in the curl in my life. But the thing caught me and turned completely inside-out. My board came completely out of the water with me still on it. I bounced and leaned back and was back in the wave! I still had ahold of the board, hung for a split second at the top of that wave—then barrel-rolled over the falls. Over and over and over and when I hit the bottom, I fell right on my board. We went over about three more times before I popped up inside. Pretty soon I ended up taking off where everyone else was and doing the same things they were. Which meant taking off with the peak. The peak shifts, which is something I figured out after the first week of wipeouts. I had been taking off on what I thought was the right side of the wave and the peak would suddenly shift and I’d be in the curl—where I really didn’t want to be. It took me a week to get to know Sunset. After that, I wasn’t getting wiped-out quite so much. 

Corky, it seems you’re always around people older than yourself; surfers like Muñoz and your roommate, Mike Doyle. 

That’s right. I just like older people better than kids my own age. Most gremlins are sarcastic and screwed-up. I’d rather go to San Onofre and talk to the old guys there. They’re real! 

Corky Carroll (1964)

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