Aussie phenom from a small beach town dominates the junior surfing circuit in her home country, qualifies for the ASP World Tour at age 18, cruises to the title her rookie year, then captures three more in a row鈥攁ll while radiating a perpetually sunny disposition. So went the fairy-tale life of Stephanie Gilmore. At five foot ten and 140 pounds, she was a new breed of female competitor when she won her first title, in 2007: tall and powerful, but with an artistic, flowing style. She won events so consistently and projected such a carefree charm that the surf world dubbed her Happy Gilmore. She wondered if it would go on forever.
And then, suddenly, it stopped. In late 2010, a homeless man outside her apartment in Tweed Heads, New South Wales, breaking her left wrist and cutting open her head. She was out of the water for eight weeks. When she returned, her trademark smile was missing, although she still managed to .
It took a year for Gilmore to fully bounce back: she and once again became the brightest light in professional surfing, . In 2014, she , putting her just one shy of the all-time women鈥檚 record, held by Australian Layne Beachley*. Going into the 2015 Tour, Gilmore swears she is indeed as happy as she seems 鈥99.9 percent of the time.鈥 (If that sounds hard to believe, 鈥攜ou鈥檒l see.) The joyful path to victory, in her own words:
“You can pull a lot of things from surfing into your everyday life, and one of them is there鈥檚 always going to be another wave. If you fall off and get smashed, you can get back out there and have another chance.”
“I鈥檝e never been at ease with calling myself an athlete. To me, an athlete is someone who wakes up at four in the morning and trains for three hours, has a smoothie, then goes back to training. I鈥檝e never had that frame of mind.”
“At some point every day, I have to put on some music that I love.”
“A lot of my success comes down to finding balance in my life. If I wake up and there鈥檚 no surf, I鈥檓 not going, 鈥淥h, I should do a hundred sit-ups.鈥 I鈥檓 going to just enjoy exactly where I am.”
“I鈥檝e always had the ability to remove myself from a situation and adopt a third-person point of view. In November in Maui, at the last event of the season, I lost in the quarterfinal and thought I鈥檇 blown the world title. That was probably the angriest I鈥檝e ever been with myself. But no one died. I鈥檓 still here. I can get over it pretty quickly and move on.”
“Imagine being paid to do something you absolutely adore doing. You have the freedom and flexibility to do it whenever you want and no real schedule or routine. How can you not be happy?”
“Australians aren鈥檛 obsessed with material things the way Americans are. We enjoy what we have. This is a beautiful country, and everyone lives around the coast. We go to the beach.”
“Women have a better perspective on things. Like if a huge wave comes in, a guy will put his head down and go for it, whereas a girl will stop and think, If I paddle for this wave and don鈥檛 make it, I鈥檒l probably face-plant on the reef. Maybe it鈥檚 common sense.”
“When I was attacked, everything came crashing down. I鈥檇 finally had something taken away from me. As much as it was horrible, it was also one of the most valuable experiences of my life. You can get so wound up in things that have already happened. But you can鈥檛 ever rewind and alter the results, so there鈥檚 no point in thinking, Why me? What have I done wrong?”
“After the incident, I really had to stop and look at everything. It made me think about what else I could achieve. It also gave me perspective and a little faith in the universe and the way things work.”
“I like to keep things simple. One reason I鈥檝e never had a coach is that I hate that feeling of somebody pushing information into my head. I鈥檝e seen a lot of surfers who are naturally talented paddle out into a heat after they鈥檇 spent two hours on the beach with their coach. You can just see that their brain is overloaded. Instead of feeling what they鈥檙e doing and listening to their instincts, they鈥檙e thinking about it鈥攁nd they make mistakes.”
“I don鈥檛 particularly like getting up early. It鈥檚 funny, everyone thinks that surfers are all about dawn patrol, but the only people in the water at that time are the ones who have to surf before they go to their office jobs. When surfing is your job, you go to the beach when normal people go to the office.”
“I鈥檓 extremely competitive, but it鈥檚 really the performance of surfing that I get excited about鈥攏ailing an incredible ride in front of thousands of people. I鈥檒l take that over a great ride all alone any day.”
“Just smile. That鈥檚 something a lot of people need to do more often.”
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*The print version of this story mistakenly identified Layne Beachley as Hawaiian. She is Australian. 国产吃瓜黑料 regrets the error.