In The Booth With Jesse Starling

The latest face in the WSL booth may be unfamiliar to some viewers yet Jesse Starling has been hustling away for years.

With a lengthy background in competitive surfing, Jesse saw a fork in the road, switched tracks and is now working in media, interviewing past rivals and calling their heats.

In between gigs, Tessa Hoult spoke to Jesse about kicking goals and following your heart.

Crouching behind a towel rack whilst shopping on the New South Wales Central Coast, Jesse Starling was trying with all her might not to burst into tears. She’d just been given the news that she was about to take a big leap in her career. Jesse was heading to Margaret River to sit in the booth and commentate her first Championship Tour event.

“I got a call from Adam Huban who I know from my junior career and Surfing Australia. He runs the CT’s and the Challenger Series out here,” recalls Jesse. “I was trying to act so cool and on the inside I’m going ‘don’t cry, don’t cry, you’re in public’”.

Turning to her partner, CT competitor Joel Vaughan - who thought something terrible had happened and was trying to stop a cascade of towels from falling on her - Jesse gave him the news with tears running down her cheeks. 

“He was so proud,” says Jesse. “I’d done it. I had hustled so hard for years and years.”

Jesse on set at Margaret River, squeezed between the double shakas of Joe and dress sense of Vaughan 'Biggles' Blakey

That hustling had started at a young age on Sydney’s Northern Beaches. North Narrabeen to be exact. With the encouragement from mum, Megan, and under the tutelage of dad, Daniel, Jesse and her sister Tru rose up through the ranks of the Junior, State, and QS competitions. 

“I competed from twelve up until two years ago, so almost ten years of competing,” says Jesse. “Then COVID happened, and we stopped competing for a couple of years.”

When competition resumed and Jesse went back to the QS, something had changed in her mindset.

“It was fun, but it wasn’t the same. It felt like there was all this pressure that I was putting on myself,” explains Jesse. “I felt like I was surfing to try and do three turns to the beach, get a six-point ride and I was thinking ‘I just want to surf’”.

Although the competitive spark was fading, Jesse still wanted to be involved in the competition machine. She had started her own magazine MURMUR, begun writing for STAB and had a few commentating spots here and there.

“I’m really into telling stories,” says Jesse. “So, I felt I’d be good at doing that on the mic. If I can write about it, I can talk about it.”

With a background in television production, Jesse turned to her dad to learn the ways of the microphone, camera techniques, and mold the budding journalist in her.

“When it came to doing more in front of the camera stuff I would practice with Dad,” recalls Jesse. “We’d practice tones, like highs and lows, how to host, and then it all snowballed into this TV series that I pitched to Hyundai on a whim.”

That television series has now turned into the Surfing Australia program ‘She’s Electric’ which centres on the up-and-coming female surfers charging their way through the boardrider competitions around the country.

“I was down the Australian Boardriders Battle [ABB] one year for MURMUR and Dad pointed out the Hyundai people and I was like ‘I’m going to talk to them’,” says Jesse. “I pitched them an idea of doing weekly or monthly episodical shows where we break down the state rounds, who’s qualifying, who’s in the team, who the highlights and lowlights were, dialling up people to get their opinions and then when it came to the big event I’d come and work for the event.”

After six months of emailing back and forth, Jesse got the approval 48 hours before the first competition. Needing to film a pre-show and hype up the event it was all hands on deck at the Starling house to build a makeshift set.

“The heat draw wasn’t even finalised yet, so we didn’t even know who the surfers were,” recalls Jesse. “We had just moved into our family home and I was like ‘screw it, just put the couch in front of the boards in the boardroom, then we’ll bring the plants in and set the lights'.”

With Jesse and Tru hosting, that first show ended up getting 60,000 views. Not bad for a tight deadline and thrown-together set production. Surfing Australia loved it, promoted it through MySurfTV, began broadcasting episodes on Channel 9 and took over the production rights in its second season.

“This will be the fourth year this year. It turned into a podcast series last year, so we did a five episode series,” says Jesse. “It’s cool to know it’s still going and now they have a camp for women where they get five of the best surfers from the ABB to go and hang out with Laura Enever and work with some of the best coaches for a couple of days.”

Having to write scripts, interview various faces from the surfing world, get a crash course in editing from Dad and learn the ropes of production, this was the perfect arena for Jesse to step up towards the bigger stages within the surfing sphere. With numerous events running at once and hundreds of surfers across multiple continents competing, Jesse has now been either in the booth or roving reporter at all tiers of competition. However, there does seem to be a clear favourite.

“My heart and soul soars for the ABB, that has to be my favourite two days of the year,” says Jesse. “It is so intense, there’s so much going on, and you have no idea what each day is going to bring.”

If it’s not sideline reporting and shoving microphones in surfers faces that have collapsed from exhaustion trying to give their best Usain Bolt impression running up Heartbreak Hill, then it’s navigating the crowds of fans in the natural amphitheatre that Burleigh Heads provides.

“You’re dodging runners and there’s so many people on the hill,” explains Jesse. “The energy of the weekend is the best feeling in the world. I love it.”

Jesse mixing with the hoi polloi at the ABB (Surfing Australia/Nathan McNeil)

Whilst the all-round Aussie froth fest that is the ABB is a full-scale production, the CT was another beast all together. With a larger audience, international sponsors and the best surfers on the planet, Jesse wanted to be as prepared as possible.

“For the Burleigh CT I worked on the beach comms and asked if I could go to the broadcast meeting and look at how it all works,” says Jesse. "Then I reckon I started researching maybe a month out from Margaret River.”

Jesse went back and watched last year’s competition and the 2019 session at The Box, studied how the wave breaks, past champions, the reef itself, and how the winds and swells worked.

“I probably had hours of personal information on each athlete. I made athlete bios for all of them based on Margaret River and their past results there, what this time last year looked like, went to their Instagram and saw what their results were at Burleigh,” says Jesse. “Then found stories like Tommy Carroll’s the only man to win there back-to-back and so got quotes from Tommy.”

She also paid acute attention to how the commentators performed, especially veterans Joe Turpel and Ronnie Blakey. 

“Not what they were saying, just the pitch of their voice and how they used tone to keep the audience engaged in the slow moments,” explains Jesse. “I was like ‘I want to make a career out of this, so if you’re going to do it, do it right’.”

Ronnie and his brother Vaughan have been monumental not only in inspiration, but in encouraging Jesse to go for it when it came to stepping up to the big leagues.

“I know the reason I probably got the call up was because of Ronnie and Vaughan. They pushed me and tried to get me on those stages,” says Jesse. “I said to Ronnie at Margs, I had a moment with him and again I was trying not to cry, when I just said thank you so much.”

However, once she was in the booth, Jesse was now faced with some familiar faces. Many of the women currently on tour she had once been in heats with. Some are good friends and others she’ll always remember for their competitive prowess. 

“Gabby Bryan used to come out here and compete in the pro juniors - I beat her one time,” says Jesse with a sly smile on her face. “Now she’s number one and I'm like ‘should’ve stuck with it, Jesse’.”

Clearly joking and admitting she wouldn’t have made it surfing Margarets herself, she does admit to enjoyment watching one of her best friends, Molly Picklum, compete.

“When we were 14, 15, 16 we just spent every weekend going back and forth to Ettalong. We’d catch the ferry over and she’d catch it back to Palm Beach,” recalls Jesse. “So, when I saw her around [the event site], I was so nervous and she was like ‘you got this one, mate, you’ve got this’.”

Openly admitting she’s not allowed to call any of Joel’s heats, she really did feel for the competitors who missed the dreaded cut line, especially the surfers she knows personally.

“Watching George (Pittar) really pulled on my heartstrings because we grew up together, we did all the State camps together, went to all the Aussie titles together, did all these inter club tag teams, we were the same year at school and went to all the parties together,” says Jesse. “But, he’ll be fine. I have no doubt he’s going to be back on tour in no time. I don’t think it’s going to be too long.”

It wasn’t too long before Jesse saw George and the 'cut crew' again, as she flew straight to Newcastle after Margaret River to sit in the booth for the opening Challenger Series event.

“The Challenger Series is the mongrel of the QS warrior and what you go through on some of those QS’s mixed with the talent of the Championship Tour,” explains Jesse. “Every heat is so different. I do love the Challenger Series because you see they’re really going for it out there.”

After watching the performances at Newcastle, Jesse believes we’ll be seeing some familiar faces back on the CT next year.

Morgan Ciblic? "Absolutely."

Julian Wilson? "Going to be back."

Jacob Willcox? "Yep, for sure....that's if Mother Nature plays nice."

“Competitive surfing is an emotional roller coaster - you lose more than you win,” says Jesse. “When you think about heats where the wave just didn’t come. For example, Miguel Pupo and Joel’s heat today [at Trestles] where he [Miguel] only had one score. It was the highest score of the heat, but sometimes the wave just doesn’t come.”

Navigating this emotional roller coaster is a fine line for a commentator. Especially when people’s careers and livelihoods are on the line. However, finding that line is an art unto itself. 

“It’s pretty wild knowing how far to push,” says Jesse. “Joe said something to me which I relate to. He said ‘if you’re not saying what the crowd is thinking, what the people watching the broadcast are also thinking then you’re not doing your job properly. It is our job to have an opinion and address what the audience is thinking’.”

Although occasionally they may get a memo from WSL HQ telling them not to talk about something - for example, the recent announcement of the new Challenger Series schedule until the press release was out - they've been encouraged to speak freely and ‘have a dig’ as Jesse puts it.

“It’s not like all of us on the broadcast are mean people,” says Jesse. “We just have a passion for surfing and we’re all professionals. I think the people that do [have a dig for no reason] aren’t doing it for the right reasons.”

When asked about who her favourite booth partner is, Jesse struggles to choose just one fellow commentator (although she does give a shout out to hosting with her sister, Tru). Describing Joe as "Kelly Slater, just so professional" and Ronnie as "Mick Fanning with Andy Irons, a little bit more cheeky and fluid", she does admit to having a third contender in the mix.

“I have to put Vaughan in there because Vaughan and I have the best chemistry, we just giggle the whole time,” says Jesse. “We just exchange stories, so those three, I could never pick one. They’re just the best.”

Jesse indulging in essential field research (Shield)

Having stretched her vocal pipes on this side of the Indian Ocean, Jesse’s next stop is Africa. Getting the confirmation during the Newcastle Surfest, Jesse will be in the booth for both the CS Ballito Pro and J-Bay CT.

“I know I’m working with Paul Evans. I worked with him last year in Taiwan and then the World Juniors,” says Jesse. “He has to be one of the funniest people I’ve ever met.”

Also hoping to be alongside Rosie Hodge for a heat or two, Jesse does have a dream team roster she hopes may happen at some point in the future.

“If I anchored a heat with Flick and Rosie with AJ doing the sidelines, that would be sick,” says Jesse. “Just an all-female broadcast team for a few heats.”

With the dreaded sense of imposter syndrome rearing its ugly head throughout Jesse’s time rising through the ranks of the WSL team, there is another main reason she tries to push through any self-doubt, alongside telling stories.

“I want to commentate so that young girls who are watching it right now around the world feel confident enough to have their say in surfing and not be afraid to be in surf media. The cold hard facts are women in surf media are a minority,” explains Jesse. “I really want young girls to feel confident and safe enough to see me on screen and think they could do that too.”

With the outlook of bringing a young female voice to the booth - that gets doused in peppermint tea to keep the throat from drying out between heats - Jesse still turns to her parents for any advice, crediting them for the encouragement and push she needed to go after her dream.

“Everything I learned from my dad I still use today. He’s the first person I call in the mornings before I broadcast and he’s the last person I call to breakdown the day,” says Jesse. “Mum is the best cheerleader in the world and the best critic. Whenever I finish something, I show her and get her feedback, then rework it.”

At the ripe old age of 23, her career is just beginning within the world of broadcasting. However, there does seem to be one event on the commentating bucket list that will truly show Jesse she’s made it.

“I have this big dream of doing the Superbowl one day,” says Jesse. “Do the sidelines on the Superbowl, after that I’ll hang up the mic. Like...it’s done.”

// TESSA HOULT