Sara Jean Underwood

 

Oregon's Sara Jean Underwood has been named Playboy magazine's 2007 Playmate of the Year. Her selection came as a surprise to the 23-year-old, who figured her freckles and low-profile native state would make her odd girl out.

"I didn't think I was pretty enough," she said of her modeling prospects. "I'm 5'3", short, freckle-faced. I'm from Oregon. It wasn't a thought in my mind that I could do something like that."

In fact, hearing she'd managed to reach the top of the bunny heap made her feel sick.

"I thought I was going to puke," she said. "I thought I was going to faint. I thought I was going to cry. It was every emotion you can imagine one would feel when given such an honor."

Underwood beat out 11 others to become the magazine's 48th Playmate of the Year. Check out a surfeit of photos (some revealing) along with a smattering of trivia about her (she's afraid of "spiders and semi trucks") at her MySpace page.

Her title and the start of her yearlong reign were celebrated Thursday with a backyard luncheon under a tent at Hugh Hefner's famous Playboy Mansion, with the yard filled with current and former playmates, more than 50 dating back to the 1950s. (Take a tour of the mansion here.)

Playboy photographers first met her when they visited Oregon State University looking for candidates for the "Girls of the Pac 10" pictorial. She did her school proud by ending up on the cover of that issue in October 2005. She went on to pose for the centerfold of the July 2006 issue.

Sara Jean Underwood nude

Underwood now heads to Louisville, Ky., where she will host Playboy's Kentucky Derby party. And she'll make an appearance in downtown Portland on May 11 at Rich's Cigar Store.

She may be a typical Oregon girl, but for now, at least, she's ready to live large. "It's incredible to get to experience a different life," she said. "I was in a very small bubble where I came from."

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-- Staff and Associated Press