"Every Episode They Were Trying to Build Up to My Elimination": An Interview with Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Model Search's Jenna Spilde

RealityNewsOnline: How did you find out about the audition?

Jenna Spilde: I found out about the Sports Illustrated audition through my agency in Dallas. They knew that I always wanted to do Sports Illustrated and be a swimsuit model. They called me up, "Jenna, Jenna, there's an audition in a couple of days! You need to call, sign up, hurry, you gotta go!" They called me up and were really excited for me and I was excited about auditioning. I remember going home and telling my roommates, "Oh my gosh you guys, there's an audition for the fresh faces for Sports Illustrated." I remember telling them how badly I wanted this, and it was a dream of mine.

Then I ended up getting on the show and they called me and I was, "I made it! I made it!" And they're like, "Aaaaah!" It was a cool experience, but I had no idea auditioning for it that it was for a reality show until I made the final round.

RNO: So was it a pleasant surprise that it was a reality show?

Jenna: Yes. I was like, "Oh really. Are you serious? That's awesome!" So it was cool.

RNO: In the first episode, you were knocked over by a strong wave. What happened with that?

Jenna: Well, you know they didn't really show it on the show, but when I got knocked off the wave, that actually happened within the first few minutes of my 20-minute shoot. As soon as I hit the wave, I just got up and was like, "All right, I gotta finish the photo shoot" and I went on with the photo shoot. So all the photos you saw of me were like, it happened after that, but they didn't show that. I didn't let it affect me.

RNO: You seemed very hurt that Joel [Wilkenfeld, one of the judges] called you a pin-up. How do you equate that with pornography?

Jenna: When he called me a pin-up, I didn't really know what he was meaning by that, but he also said some other things. I was probably jumping to conclusions and maybe I shouldn't have. [The judges are] like, "You're too sexy" and stuff like that. So when they're talking "sexy" and "pin-up," I didn't want to be known as that. And then they [the judges] are like "You're like Marilyn Monroe. She was a pin-up girl. That's not a bad thing." So I was like "Oh, OK." I felt kind of silly afterwards for relating it to pornography.

RNO: Did Joel ever elaborate on how not to look like a pin-up?

Jenna You know, [sigh] the reason why I was very curvy was because Roshumba [Williams, another of the judges] was talking to us ladies one day and was like, "You know, ladies if you're going to go up, you've got to give everything a 10. If you've got to curve your butt, if you want to curve your back, you curve it to a 10. If you're going to curve different body parts, everything you do, you do it to an extreme." And I remember Roshumba saying that. So I took that and I used it. And she was like, "If you're going to too much of an extreme, the photographer will tell you to relax a little bit and not be so sexy."

But if you remember listening to the judges, they were like "Jenna moves great. She's a great mover. She really knows how to work that camera." They said that. But yet they can still go on the judging panel and say stuff like what they said, and it's like, "But you guys told me to give everything a 10, so I'm giving it a 10!" It was kind of confusing.

RNO: After the volleyball match, in the endurance competition, were you ever told not to rest your arm against your head? It wasn't amongst the rules aired on the show.

Jenna: You know, we were told not to do that, but I had no idea I was doing that. By that time, over an hour into the challenge, you kind of get to feel woozy. I was totally shocked I rested my arm on my head. I was like, "Are you serious? No way!" I was very disappointed because I could have beaten Alicia easily.

RNO: She seemed to agree.

Jenna: Yeah, that was very immature of her. And I was not crying. I don't want you to make a mistake. I was not crying because I was upset. I did not care about losing a competition; I was crying because I have a very injured back, and that was the only reason.

RNO: Speaking of Alicia, you went from saying in one episode that you have a soft spot for her, to calling her a diva in the most recent episode. Are the two of you still friends?

Jenna: Alicia and I were friends. The only reason why I called her that was because of the way that she was acting. It really shocked me whenever she completely turned like that. She can be such a nice girl or seemed as though she was. And then she pulled crap like that, and I was like, "Whoa!" She hasn't been in modeling that long and I don't think that you should try to take over something like that. If you get a job, you do what people ask of you, unless it goes against your morals.

RNO:What have you been doing since you were eliminated?

Jenna: I have been continuing modeling. I live in Los Angeles. I moved here a couple months prior to the show. So I've just been living it out in Los Angeles. I learned how to surf. We couldn't surf on the show, but I learned how. I got a surfing coach and now I'm a surfer girl.

RNO: Was there anything on the show that we didn't see that you wish we had?

Jenna: I just wish they would have shown some more relationship between the ladies in the house. In the house, we did a lot of funny things that they never really got to show.

They didn't really show some of my determination and I think that every episode they were trying to build up to my elimination - kind of make me look worse and worse in every episode. I know that there were a lot of pictures that they chose not to use that I know were a lot better than some of the photos [that they did use], like the runway photos. I mean, come on, I know I took better photos than those! They chose the worst two pictures on purpose to build up America for my elimination. So I'm like, "What the hell are they doing?" It's all politics and I understand that, but I hope America realizes that.

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