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Ask the expert: Is Laird Hamilton a nice guy?
March 7th, 2008, 9:21 am · 2 Comments · posted by Laylan Connelly, staff writer
Q. We are getting ready to take a vacation to the Virgin Islands. My husband wants to take his surfboard, but I have never heard about surf down there. Would it be worth it to drag it along or not?
A. Yes, there is good surf there. St. Thomas, as well as Tortuga, offer excellent surf during the winter months. It is not very consistent though, so you might want to check out local conditions before you take the board to see if there will be any swells during the time you are there. It can be flat a lot of the time.
Q. Why do you ride boards airbrushed like cows?
A. Cause I’m a suuuuuuuuurf cowboy….hahahahaha. Actually I started doing that many years ago to try and get a smile on the faces of all those horrid little meanies who 
refused to give me any waves at Huntington Beach. Just one extra wave a day or week. I don’t know if it worked or not, but then I got to like them and have stayed with that color scheme. And it sort of fits now that I am “out to pasture.”
Q. Is Laird Hamilton a nice guy?
A. OK - this is a funny question. I can say that he has always been nice to me and also that he is probably the most amazing surfer in the history of the sport. And he is kind to animals. Not sure how nice he would be to you if you dropped in on him, though.
Three-time international surf champ Corky Carroll is here to answer your questions. Hit him up at corkysurf@aol.com
2 Comments
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Quick correction: the VI island for surfing is Tortola, not Tortuga. Few here on the British side venture to St. Thomas, USVI to surf because the locals can be nasty to outsiders, word is.
Your right Corky, that is a funny question; but I know where it may come from.
Laird is a nice guy, a great guy actually; but he doesn’t stand for any bull… And he can be intimidating.
I know his wife Gabby well, and I know that she wouldn’t be with him if he were otherwise. I was there the day they met at Baldwin Park. I was the one that got to say “Laird-Gabby. Gabby- Laird.” And they’re still together twelve years later. That says a lot about Laird as a person.
As for why someone would ask such a question… If you remember, Laird played the evil Lance Burkhart in the 1987 movie “North Shore.” Laird once told me that people would still come up to him years later and say, “Aren’t you Lance Burkhart?” Granted, this was before “The Wave” and before the Strapped Crew from Jaws got YouTubed to Middle America; but reputations like that are still hard to shake, and many may still be influenced by the dastardly image of the evil Lance Burkhart.