Girl On: Jamilah Star

On a Wing and a Prayer: The Globe-Trotting Life of Big Wave Charger


Jamilah Star, a.k.a. “JamStar,” is one of a small and unique breed: the female big wave soul surfer. The 29 year-old burst into the public eye in 2005 when she won the inaugural women’s category at Billabong’s XXL Global Big Wave Awards show, which awards cash prizes for the biggest on-record winter waves surfed. In 2006 she won the Billabong Girl’s Best Overall Performance Award for her (paddle-in) waves at Mavericks and Waimea Bay over famed charger Keala Kennelly’s wave at Teahupoo.

The only schedule JamStar follows is the ocean’s. When big swells appear on shores worldwide, she tends to be there waiting. Last year she spent most of her time in Tahiti, living right in front of Teahupoo. She also spent a lot of time at the “Mexican Pipeline,” Puerto Escondido. The rest of the year she was in Hawaii minus a month in Half Moon Bay surfing Mavericks and two months in La Jolla surfing Wind n’ Sea. She is currently in Santa Cruz after spending time training on Oahu and Maui.

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Star grew up surfing in the tight knit community of Santa Cruz, California. Her dad Reve pushed her into a wave when she was five years-old, and she was hooked. As the years went by and her water skills matured, she surfed bigger and heavier waves. She also trained her body as a junior lifeguard, wrestler (she competed against the boys in high school), lifeguard and champion Jujitsu martial artist.

Famed Steamers Lane provided opportunities to push herself in heavy surf. “Depending on what you feel big waves are like I was surfing like 12-foot Hawaiian waves out there since I was probably around 15 years-old,” she says. “So that was kinda my first training ground.”

Following high school, Star moved to Costa Rica and competed in professional surfing events all over Central America. It was a beautiful time in her life, as she was able to spend a lot of time with her Native American mother, Windy, who traveled along side her. “We were best friends,” Star recalls.

After a couple of years, she headed to the North Shore of Oahu to cut her teeth on bigger waves. “I trained for a whole year at Waimea before I went to Mavericks,” she says. “Waimea that year had been so much huger than anywhere else that it ended up being the biggest year in a long time and everything seemed small since that first year.” Sadly, her mom passed away the first week Star surfed Waimea Bay, nearly seven years ago.

Star has no corporate sponsors, no steady or traditional job and no sugar daddy or trust fund. She doesn’t sling drugs, either. She treats her body like a temple and doesn’t even drink alcohol. So how has she managed to work her way around the world to tropical nirvanas as the seasons and swells dictate for the past decade? Star relies on faith. She waits for a break-a free board here, a plane ticket there, an extra room to crash in or a borrowed car. Sometimes a company is willing to give her a grand or so to buy a ticket to her next destination. Her lifestyle is based on serendipity. Others could probably pull it off as well, but not many would want to try it.

Star is leading the charge for women in big waves – it’s only a matter of time before some wise person at some company gets behind her and helps her go even bigger. In the meantime, she follows swells for the same reason she always has. “The high you get from big waves is so amazing,” she says. “There’s nothing too much besides love that can equalize that feeling. Some big waves make you happy every time you think about it, you know? Every time you
think about it.”

Santa Cruz Stories: JamStar on Growing Up in California’s Northernmost Surf City

Santa Cruz doesn’t breed wimps. In a manner similar to Darwinian evolution, weaklings don’t last long. The water is frigid, there are huge great white sharks, heavy waves and unwelcoming locals. JamStar grew up surfing Steamers Lane and had to deal with it all. “The best thing (about Santa Cruz) is the waves,” Star says. “The waves are so consistent, and they’re so fun, beautiful and powerful. I think after growing up there and surfing so many years, it makes anywhere kinda mellower, ya know? The pack I grew up with were the gnarliest guys I’ve ever been around in my life up until now. Now they’re all my best friends.

“When I was growing up it was a little more challenging. It was like I had to fight for everything – even physical fighting, which is how I ended up becoming a wrestler and doing Jujitsu. I had to wrestle the guys all the time and you know I wanted to win. It was pretty crazy and my dad was gnarly, too. I’d say ‘Dad, they burned me into the cliff or they beat me up,’ and it was like, ‘If you can’t handle it don’t surf the Lane.’ It was all the same mentality, you know? There was no respect for girls at all. The guys don’t even really like girls. I don’t know what they like, you know? It’s kind of trippy. But growing up with my dad, I felt like I was one of they guys, anyway.”

But she did find friends who were super supportive, such as Beth Pitts. “She was one of my best friends from junior guards to when we were lifeguards together,” Star recalls. “She was an amazing inspiration surfing with me, paddling out with me, competing with me, always supporting me. She was my major influence in surfing, by far.” Pitts died in 1995 while surfing at The Lane.

Star left Santa Cruz 10 years ago to begin her wandering, wave-chasing ways, and has not lived there permanently since. But there are two things that pull her back for visits: her father Reve and the jewel of Santa Cruz surfing, Mavericks. A true testament to how good she is in big waves can be taken from the founding father of Mavericks. “I met Jeff Clark,” Star says. “And Jeff Clark was the first person to actually say, after watching me surf and talking to me, that I could surf Mavericks. He made me my first board.”

When Star exploded onto the world surfing stage with appearances (and wins) at the Billabong XXL Awards, she represented Santa Cruz big time. Although she took some heat growing up there surfing, she now feels accepted. “The same guys in the Lane that used to beat me up tell me they love me now,” she says. “They all say ‘I love you, we’re so proud We can’t wait til’ you catch big waves. We’re all rooting for you this year.’ They were telling me that before I left Santa Cruz. ‘We’re waiting for you to do something big.’ It’s just like, so funny.”

Santa Cruz doesn’t breed wimps – it breeds Stars.

Training: How JamStar Does What She Does

Training to surf the winter swells of Oahu’s North Shore, Mavericks and Teahupo’o is an entirely different game than, say, paddling out at two-foot San-O. One can kill you, the other might earn you a killer tan or maybe a phone number or two. Star’s waves of choice can go from smooth to life-threatening in mere seconds. Perhaps more important than wave count is preparation and training time. So how does Star do it?

She follows a strict regime while in Hawaii. “My training recently has evolved a lot. I’m putting in a lot more hours now,” she says. “I’ve always been training. It’s kind of junior lifeguards training – running, swimming, paddling, everything beach-oriented. Dealing with currents, ya know, learning how to deal with different weather conditions. Always being in tuned with the swells. I do a lot of visualization. It’s really important. Right now, basic training for me would be like, if I’m on the North Shore, maybe a run from Backyards to Keiki and back, a short swim, push ups, sit ups and some yoga on Monday. Then maybe the next day I’ll do a long-distance paddle, a swim, a short run and then push ups, sit ups and yoga.” The run from Backyards to Keiki, in case you are wondering, is “a four-mile run in soft sand.”

She focuses on long workouts rather than short sprints. “I’m more of a long-distance (person). I really have a lot of endurance,” Star says. “I love to do long, aerobic runs and then I do sprints at the end. But I don’t run anaerobic. When I’m running it’s like I have full oxygen and I do a lot of like counting seconds to hold my breath and go up, like in intervals of five seconds every like 30 seconds until you get up to almost one minute.”
Star also trains in the ocean. “(I do) a lot of swimming underwater,” she says. “Just diving down, holding breath through currents. Just trying to spend as much time in and under the water as possible.”

Star recently became certified to tow people into waves. Her man is a fellow big-wave rider who goes with her on many of her adventures, and is in contention to be her tow partner. Combining surfing and love make for a happy life. “I think surfing is sexual,” she reveals. “Cause it’s like you’re paddling out with all these cute guys, you have so much energy and so much attention, and you feel all this mana from the ocean all at once… like you get out of the water and you just want to go to bed, you know? And I think that if you truly love yourself, you don’t even have to worry about a relationship – it will come. I think of the guy I love the most, he’s been surfing big waves with me for like five years, his name is Arial. He’s so encouraging of my own career.”

She follows her own star, for sure. Star trains hard and always tries to help others, giving away some of the money she earns to other girls chasing their own big wave dreams, behind a bit of stardust as she hops on a plane to chase another swell…

Q & A with Jamstar

Lat34: Single or Taken?
JS: Taken.

Lat34: What kind of music do you like?
JS: All music.

 
Lat34: What kind of car do you drive?
JS: No car.

Lat34: Bedtime?
JS: No bedtime.

Lat34: Countries you’ve been to?
JS: A million – off the top of my head, Panama, Costa Rica, Finland, Russia, Vietnam, Guatemala, Mexico, Tahiti, Switzerland, The Philippines… that’s enough right now.

Lat34: Number of boards in your quiver?
JS: I think about 10 right now, in three locations. 12 because I have two in Tahiti.

Lat34: Countries you want to go to?
JS: I want to go to all countries. Immediately, I want to go to Chile and Brazil. Actually, I’d like to go into politics and start a revolution, that’s one of my goals.

Lat34: What kind of revolution?
JS: My first revolution would be overtaking the government and giving Hawaii back to the Hawaiians.

Lat34: Favorite alcoholic beverage?
JS: Yuck, I hate alcohol.

Lat34: Dream car?
JS: I don’t like cars.

Lat34: Dream date?
JS: I don’t date.

Lat34: Ideal man?
JS: Someone that just loves me for who I am and takes me surfing.

Lat34: Night owl or morning bird?
JS: I’m a morning bird.

Lat34: Ideal Friday night?
JS: Go to bed and surf Saturday morning.

Lat34: Favorite flower?
JS: I love all flowers.

Lat34: Point break or beach break?
JS: Both.