Australia's Samantha Cornish is the women's world No.1 surfer for the first time in her professional career, despite bombing out in the semi-finals of the Rip Curl Girls Festival world championship tour event in Spain.

Peru's Sofia Mulanovich, the 2004 world champion, won the event, defeating Brazilian Silvana Lima to win stop number four of seven on the women's world tour.

Cornish finished equal third when she was ousted by Mulanovich in the semi-finals.

"It's amazing," Cornish said.

"This was my plan for the whole year, it's really tight with five world title contenders and it's not going to be an easy road.

"Hopefully I can keep it together and you never know what could happen."

Cornish was awarded the ASP injury wildcard at the end of 2006 after nearly falling off the tour.

"It was a little disappointing to lose to Sofia in the semis, but at the same time it's another great result," she said.

"Unfortunately the waves let me down, Sofia just happened to have priority when the best ones came through and I did all that I could on what was given to me."

Fellow Australian Amee Donohoe secured her best result in her first year back on the tour, finishing equal third when she was defeated by Lima in the other semi-final.

"I can't complain, it would have been nice to make the final but this will improve my spot on the ratings and I just really want to stay on tour," Donohoe said.

Highly rated Australian Stephanie Gilmore, who was rated world No.1 going into this event, lost her ratings lead, dropping to world No.4 after a disappointing equal ninth.

"It's pretty disappointing to drop to fourth," Gilmore said.

"The waves were definitely a factor at this event but you can't change that.

"I am just looking forward to going to Manly now and I guess this takes a bit of the pressure off. The points are still really close so it's going to be an interesting one."

A standout in the left-breaking waves, Mulanovich posted the event's only pair of nine-point rides in the earlier rounds, as well as an 8.50 against Lima in the final.

"I am so happy, I haven't won a contest for a while so this feels amazing," Mulanovich said.

"I needed a pretty good score in that heat and I just thought to myself I can do this, these waves are perfect for my surfing and there is no way she is going to get this one off me, this is my wave."

The victory was Mulanovich's first of 2007 and has bumped her up from world No.6 to world No.3.

Lima's runner-up finish sees her move up into the world No.2 spot.

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