Image: Billabong Girls Pro winner Samantha Cornish (Towner/ASP Covered Images)
Australian Samantha Cornish has won the Billabong Girls Pro Itacare Brazil, beating Brazilian Silvana Lima in the final to take her first WCT title in four years. Samantha Cornish now lies in second place in the Tour rankings, behind tour rookie and fellow Aussie Stephanie Gilmore, who Cornish knocked out in the semi finals. Chelsea Hedges, who was tied with Gilmore before the event, now lies in third place after she was also knocked out by Cornish in the Semis.
Of her win, Cornish said, 'I feel pretty amazing, it's awesome to finally break the ice and come back with a win. To be up there in the world title race with the likes of Stephanie Gilmore and Chelsea Hedges, they're both amazing surfers and I feel very honoured and privileged and I am going to go for it too!'.
Keep reading for more and full results...
Brazillian native Silvana Lima lost out to Samantha Cornish but was happy just to make the finals, 'The waves didn’t come to me, I don’t know what happened, but I did a good job. It's my first ASP World Tour Final of my career, it's awesome. I am very happy because I always reach the Semifinals but never the Finals, so this is great.' She previously took out Australian Rebecca Woods in the Semis, who said, 'I'm feeling very upset but I'm happy that Silvana made the final. Both of us haven't made a final so I am happy for her. I know that to beat someone in their home country you've got to beat them convincingly and that was my mistake. I just needed a second score and we were both hunting and it was tricky.'
In the Quarters, former world champs Sofia Mulanovich, Chelsea Hedges and Layne Beachley all got knocked out, by Stephanie Gilmore, Samantha Cornish and Silvana Lima respectively.
Here's the full results from the Quarter Finals onwards, see here for results from round two and three or visit the Billabong Pro site.
Billabong Pro Girls Itacare Final Results
Samantha Cornish (AUS) 12.00 def Silvana Lima (BRA) 8.10
Billabong Pro Girls Itacare Semifinal Results
Heat 1: Samantha Cornish (AUS) 14.75 def Stephanie Gilmore(AUS)9.00
Heat 2: Silvana Lima (BRA) 8.25 def Rebecca Woods (AUS)7.75
Billabong Pro Girls Itacare Quarterfinal Results
Heat 1: Stephanie Gilmore (AUS) 8.50 def. Sofia Mulanovich (PER) 8.00
Heat 2: Samantha Cornish (AUS) 12.00 def. Chelsea Hedges (AUS) 11.40
Heat 3: Silvana Lima (BRA) 17.00 def. Layne Beachley (AUS)14.25
Heat 4: Rebecca Woods (AUS) 10.25 def. Melanie Bartels (HAW) 8.30
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