I do feel fear but that fear is actually
one of the underlying motivators of why
I arrived
are we ever meant to truly grow in our
lives if we don’t occasionally step out
of that comfort zone
feelings of fear I opened my arms and I
welcome them thank you guys very much
I’m Greg long I’m a professional
big-wave surfer I have dedicated my life
to following the greatest ocean storms
around the globe in pursuit of riding
the biggest waves in the world as you
continue to ride larger and larger waves
the stakes at play in order to do so
continue to escalate eventually you get
to a point where you become walking a
fine line it’s a line between riding
that next greatest biggest wave of your
life or possibly dropping down the face
of the one that could end it for over a
decade I walk that line until one day I
stumbled over the other side thankfully
I’m still here today to share with you
guys my big wave journey one is
literally taking me to the edge and back
with a playing field that’s constantly
in motion and always changing
it’s very easy to make mistakes
moving west may bring us better day and
the consequences
they are very real get this weight off
but when you reach deep within yourself
bringing your mind and body into
momentary sync with the rhythm and power
of the swells and for a brief moment
seemingly defying nature and
successfully riding one of those waves
for me there’s no other feeling in the
world like
thank you so I grew up in the small
beach town of San Clemente in Southern
California it’s a popular surfing
destination known around the world but
not for its big waves it’s known for its
small perfect cobblestone point breaks
that allow your average surfer to go out
there and just really have a fun joyous
time when I was 14 years old I started
seeing these photographs in the
magazines photographs of a newly exposed
big wave break by the name of Toto
Santos and Toto Santos is on an island
off the coast of northern Baja and it
was renowned immediately as one of the
best big wave breaks in the world and at
15 years old I got to go down and surf
this wave Toro Santos at the same time I
was competing competitively in the
amateur series and the progressive
surfing doing the turns on the small
waves that’s what I grew up surfing and
I had a very decent amateur career and I
actually won was the National Amateur
Championship title and immediately I had
all the surf industry taking notice
saying okay he’s the next kid that we
need the sponsor well I was 18 years old
and I used that opportunity to sign my
first professional contract but in doing
so I knew that’s not where my heart was
I could have cared less about these
contests I wanted to ride these big
waves so inside of that professional
contract I was allowed a travel budget
that I could use to go to the contest or
as I figured at my own disposal
okay so I turned my back on competitive
surfing and I set off on this life of
adventure it became an obsession of mine
beyond the passion and obsession I’d
pack up my bags and I would go and I
would live down in Cape Town South
Africa the bottom of Africa and during
the most torrential storms of the
roaring 40s all in hopes of waiting for
a wave by the name of Dungeons to awaken
it’s called the Cape of storms for a
good reason and it seemed like every
single week we were constantly battered
with another storm and an opportunity to
surf these big waves you had all these
incredible harsh elements against you
and then sometimes the most daunting of
them all was the real locals I wouldn’t
serve with these locals but all those
elements they hardened my Southern
California ass up real quick and it gave
me this confidence that I could then
take to any other Break around the world
which is what I did
sometimes it was Mexico it was one of my
favorite destinations wave called Puerto
Escondido West Australia all of South
America Chile and Peru South Pacific
Tahiti Fiji now people often ask me
great do you ever get scared
I do feel fear but that fear is actually
one of the underlying motivators of why
I ride big waves why I choose to put
myself out there are we ever meant to
truly grow in our lives if we don’t
occasionally step out of that comfort
zone and that’s what big wave surfing
has taught me and one of the greatest
lures of it is embracing that fear in a
positive light simply acknowledging it
as a space where I can grow in my life
now over the course of my surfing career
in my later years there was one wave
that captivated me beyond comprehension
and it’s called the Cortes bank
an underwater seamount that sits 100
miles off the coast of Southern
California it’s mainly recognized as a
maritime hazard but the big wave surfers
it’s our Mount Everest Cortes bank has
the ability to produce the largest
rideable waves of anywhere in the world
but it also has challenges and dangers
that no other big wave break has your
horizon line it extends 360 degrees
around if there is no landmass in sight
no reference point as to where you’re
going to actually sit and line up
there’s no continental shelf so these
open ocean swells are traveling at
speeds upwards of 50 miles an hour
that’s twice as fast as your typical big
wave the currents out there moving at
the pace of an easy flowing river so
it’s impossible to stay wherever it is
that you want to without paddling
incessantly and then the line up it
spans over the course of about three
football fields there’s no rhyme or
reason as to how and where these waves
actually break out there on the seamount
then in late December 2010 another
massive low-pressure system forms off
the coast of California I see that
there’s an opportunity to go out to the
Cortes bank and I had one goal all I
wanted to do was paddle into the biggest
wave of my life I’m out here on the line
up and here it is before me I turn
around I put my head down and I paddle
my heart out and I go I go I go right
over the front of my board and onto my
face but that story didn’t end the way
you guys thought it was going to
they usually never do and well I was the
happiest man alive why you may ask well
one I was okay – I was an opportunity
that I’ve been waiting for I would have
rather have gone on that wave and eaten
wiped out then not and sat there and
wondered for the rest of my life could I
have made it I paddled back out and I
wanted to do it again not wipeout I
wanted to make one of these waves so
after about an hour back in the lineup
and I see a great set approaching lineup
the way that I like just I done so many
times before I put my head down and I go
farther on the shoulder I was joined by
fellow surfer Garrett McNamara and
together we take the plunge down the
face of this wave we get to the bottom
and we both immediately realize that
we’ve misjudged the speed and our
distance to the shoulder and were
immediately overtaken by this mountain
of whitewater now I’d ridden bigger
waves in my life I’d wiped out in much
more dramatic fashion in my life before
but there was something about this wave
the way that it hit me with the power
and the force it’s like nothing I’d ever
experienced it was like a five-story
building of whitewater being dumped on
my back I was immediately pushed into
the abyss and I’ve been down so long
running the risk of what’s called a two
wave hold down where you don’t actually
make it to the surface before the second
wave passes over you but I still have
the time to probably swim to the surface
and get that breath before it hits and
as I’m about ready to penetrate this
aerated water and get that breath that
second wave powering wave four stories
tall lip comes pitching down and it
lands right on top of me
my body instantly felt like it was torn
in two pieces and shaken to this violent
state of semi paralysis but even worse
all of the wind was in my lungs was
immediately expelled out not straight
out of me but as that wave that lip hit
me it pushed me right back down to this
place thirty feet below the surface
my body was begging me to breathe to
reinflates but I knew that I couldn’t
but if I did I would most certainly
drown in that very instant so my
thoughts go a little something like this
well you’ve really done it now Greg but
don’t worry just relax you’re going to
make it to the surface
you’re going to be okay at the same time
the turbulence from that second wave
that had hit me began to subside as I
started to think about swinging for the
surface I heard and I felt the third
wave pass over the top of me and I
immediately go back into those
cartwheels and spins caught in the
turbulence of it realized that you know
these full-body convulsions began to
slowly settle down hands again the
tingle just feel the overall life and me
start to slip away flashes of light in
the corner of my mind I’m still going I
let go of the tail section that board
the last energy that I have in me I let
go and I take one more double arm rest
stroke reaching for the top I know it’s
coming and then blackness
blackness and silence I come to the
surface face down though they pulled my
lifeless body onto the back of the
rescue sled and I was completely
unresponsive as fast as they could they
rushed me back to our support boat would
you see in the distance here and they
begun readying themselves to give me CPR
but first they’re checking my vitals to
see if there’s any signs of life and as
they’re getting ready to start CPR and
hopefully bring me back I let out the
most feeble gasp for air all the while
there’s just water and foam and blood
coming out of my mouth but I’m still
trying to breathe completely unconscious
it’s about three minutes they sat there
waiting those gas got larger and larger
and then finally the lights came back on
the Coast Guard was called but we’re 100
miles in the middle of the ocean it’s
going to take them some time before they
can get there four hours later the Coast
Guard arrived I was packaged up friends
walked me out to the bow of the boat
under the cover of darkness and massive
seas I was lifted in a basket up to a
Coast Guard chopper I was life-flighted
to San Diego immediately admitted to the
hospital why I wonder went a whole
series of tests cat scans x-rays
checking for the brain trauma internal
damage internal bleeding and then
monitored for secondary drowning making
sure that my lungs didn’t backfill the
fluid as I slept through the night next
morning the doctor comes in signs off on
the paperwork and says you’re good to go
home Greg
I promised myself I was done with big
wave surfing that I pushed it to the
edge I was given a second chance that
I’ve got no reason to go back there I’ve
explored my greatest potential what I’m
capable of I know it now I don’t care
about it anymore three weeks later there
big swell forms in the North Pacific
yeah you guys can see where this is
going and I get a call that they’re
going to have the Mavericks big wave
contest Mavericks is one of the premier
big waves in the world and this contest
is one of the most important in the big
wave surfing world this big wave surfing
community so I pack up my car and I make
the eight-hour drive north to Half Moon
Bay and I paddle out and I surf the
contest but things were different I
would immediately disappear back into
that deep dark lonely place beneath the
ocean and Cortes bank or my mind would
flash back to the physical agony that I
was experiencing when I was lying on the
deck of the boat desperate to breathe
but for the next six months I continued
to push myself and surf every single big
wave traveling to all these destinations
just as I done so many times before and
eventually I became so exhausted
physically mentally emotionally I just
had to stop I realized in that moment I
was living my life in fear all I’d ever
known was a life in a world of surfing
big waves you know frightened me to
think of things any different but it was
also in that moment that I realized I
had all the answers to this riddle I was
trying to solve in my mind now the ocean
is this amazing metaphor for life when
you think about it you know on this
constantly moving playing field the
wind’s tides currents are always
changing tides go in goes out there’s an
ebb and a flow to everything and I was
always so good at adapting to those
chain
changes in the ocean those new feelings
of fear that I’d never experienced
before I opened my arms and I welcomed
them just as I had always done and
simply acknowledged them as places in my
life that I was meant to learn and grow
from I started to regain that confidence
and I started moving forward in my life
I was having more fun than ever and then
the world gave me the opportunity once
and for all go back out and face those
deepest darkest fears once and for all
yeah I didn’t get much sleep last night
I was just kinda turning reliving
everything that I went through last time
I was out here last time last thing I
remember I was literally on the bow of
the boat like this you know looking up
it
card helicopter
out of here in a tricky basket
all right thank you guys
love you all for being here appreciate
it let’s go through you
thank you guys for being here love
respect and gratitude
you
one of the underlying motivators of why
I arrived
are we ever meant to truly grow in our
lives if we don’t occasionally step out
of that comfort zone
feelings of fear I opened my arms and I
welcome them thank you guys very much
I’m Greg long I’m a professional
big-wave surfer I have dedicated my life
to following the greatest ocean storms
around the globe in pursuit of riding
the biggest waves in the world as you
continue to ride larger and larger waves
the stakes at play in order to do so
continue to escalate eventually you get
to a point where you become walking a
fine line it’s a line between riding
that next greatest biggest wave of your
life or possibly dropping down the face
of the one that could end it for over a
decade I walk that line until one day I
stumbled over the other side thankfully
I’m still here today to share with you
guys my big wave journey one is
literally taking me to the edge and back
with a playing field that’s constantly
in motion and always changing
it’s very easy to make mistakes
moving west may bring us better day and
the consequences
they are very real get this weight off
but when you reach deep within yourself
bringing your mind and body into
momentary sync with the rhythm and power
of the swells and for a brief moment
seemingly defying nature and
successfully riding one of those waves
for me there’s no other feeling in the
world like
thank you so I grew up in the small
beach town of San Clemente in Southern
California it’s a popular surfing
destination known around the world but
not for its big waves it’s known for its
small perfect cobblestone point breaks
that allow your average surfer to go out
there and just really have a fun joyous
time when I was 14 years old I started
seeing these photographs in the
magazines photographs of a newly exposed
big wave break by the name of Toto
Santos and Toto Santos is on an island
off the coast of northern Baja and it
was renowned immediately as one of the
best big wave breaks in the world and at
15 years old I got to go down and surf
this wave Toro Santos at the same time I
was competing competitively in the
amateur series and the progressive
surfing doing the turns on the small
waves that’s what I grew up surfing and
I had a very decent amateur career and I
actually won was the National Amateur
Championship title and immediately I had
all the surf industry taking notice
saying okay he’s the next kid that we
need the sponsor well I was 18 years old
and I used that opportunity to sign my
first professional contract but in doing
so I knew that’s not where my heart was
I could have cared less about these
contests I wanted to ride these big
waves so inside of that professional
contract I was allowed a travel budget
that I could use to go to the contest or
as I figured at my own disposal
okay so I turned my back on competitive
surfing and I set off on this life of
adventure it became an obsession of mine
beyond the passion and obsession I’d
pack up my bags and I would go and I
would live down in Cape Town South
Africa the bottom of Africa and during
the most torrential storms of the
roaring 40s all in hopes of waiting for
a wave by the name of Dungeons to awaken
it’s called the Cape of storms for a
good reason and it seemed like every
single week we were constantly battered
with another storm and an opportunity to
surf these big waves you had all these
incredible harsh elements against you
and then sometimes the most daunting of
them all was the real locals I wouldn’t
serve with these locals but all those
elements they hardened my Southern
California ass up real quick and it gave
me this confidence that I could then
take to any other Break around the world
which is what I did
sometimes it was Mexico it was one of my
favorite destinations wave called Puerto
Escondido West Australia all of South
America Chile and Peru South Pacific
Tahiti Fiji now people often ask me
great do you ever get scared
I do feel fear but that fear is actually
one of the underlying motivators of why
I ride big waves why I choose to put
myself out there are we ever meant to
truly grow in our lives if we don’t
occasionally step out of that comfort
zone and that’s what big wave surfing
has taught me and one of the greatest
lures of it is embracing that fear in a
positive light simply acknowledging it
as a space where I can grow in my life
now over the course of my surfing career
in my later years there was one wave
that captivated me beyond comprehension
and it’s called the Cortes bank
an underwater seamount that sits 100
miles off the coast of Southern
California it’s mainly recognized as a
maritime hazard but the big wave surfers
it’s our Mount Everest Cortes bank has
the ability to produce the largest
rideable waves of anywhere in the world
but it also has challenges and dangers
that no other big wave break has your
horizon line it extends 360 degrees
around if there is no landmass in sight
no reference point as to where you’re
going to actually sit and line up
there’s no continental shelf so these
open ocean swells are traveling at
speeds upwards of 50 miles an hour
that’s twice as fast as your typical big
wave the currents out there moving at
the pace of an easy flowing river so
it’s impossible to stay wherever it is
that you want to without paddling
incessantly and then the line up it
spans over the course of about three
football fields there’s no rhyme or
reason as to how and where these waves
actually break out there on the seamount
then in late December 2010 another
massive low-pressure system forms off
the coast of California I see that
there’s an opportunity to go out to the
Cortes bank and I had one goal all I
wanted to do was paddle into the biggest
wave of my life I’m out here on the line
up and here it is before me I turn
around I put my head down and I paddle
my heart out and I go I go I go right
over the front of my board and onto my
face but that story didn’t end the way
you guys thought it was going to
they usually never do and well I was the
happiest man alive why you may ask well
one I was okay – I was an opportunity
that I’ve been waiting for I would have
rather have gone on that wave and eaten
wiped out then not and sat there and
wondered for the rest of my life could I
have made it I paddled back out and I
wanted to do it again not wipeout I
wanted to make one of these waves so
after about an hour back in the lineup
and I see a great set approaching lineup
the way that I like just I done so many
times before I put my head down and I go
farther on the shoulder I was joined by
fellow surfer Garrett McNamara and
together we take the plunge down the
face of this wave we get to the bottom
and we both immediately realize that
we’ve misjudged the speed and our
distance to the shoulder and were
immediately overtaken by this mountain
of whitewater now I’d ridden bigger
waves in my life I’d wiped out in much
more dramatic fashion in my life before
but there was something about this wave
the way that it hit me with the power
and the force it’s like nothing I’d ever
experienced it was like a five-story
building of whitewater being dumped on
my back I was immediately pushed into
the abyss and I’ve been down so long
running the risk of what’s called a two
wave hold down where you don’t actually
make it to the surface before the second
wave passes over you but I still have
the time to probably swim to the surface
and get that breath before it hits and
as I’m about ready to penetrate this
aerated water and get that breath that
second wave powering wave four stories
tall lip comes pitching down and it
lands right on top of me
my body instantly felt like it was torn
in two pieces and shaken to this violent
state of semi paralysis but even worse
all of the wind was in my lungs was
immediately expelled out not straight
out of me but as that wave that lip hit
me it pushed me right back down to this
place thirty feet below the surface
my body was begging me to breathe to
reinflates but I knew that I couldn’t
but if I did I would most certainly
drown in that very instant so my
thoughts go a little something like this
well you’ve really done it now Greg but
don’t worry just relax you’re going to
make it to the surface
you’re going to be okay at the same time
the turbulence from that second wave
that had hit me began to subside as I
started to think about swinging for the
surface I heard and I felt the third
wave pass over the top of me and I
immediately go back into those
cartwheels and spins caught in the
turbulence of it realized that you know
these full-body convulsions began to
slowly settle down hands again the
tingle just feel the overall life and me
start to slip away flashes of light in
the corner of my mind I’m still going I
let go of the tail section that board
the last energy that I have in me I let
go and I take one more double arm rest
stroke reaching for the top I know it’s
coming and then blackness
blackness and silence I come to the
surface face down though they pulled my
lifeless body onto the back of the
rescue sled and I was completely
unresponsive as fast as they could they
rushed me back to our support boat would
you see in the distance here and they
begun readying themselves to give me CPR
but first they’re checking my vitals to
see if there’s any signs of life and as
they’re getting ready to start CPR and
hopefully bring me back I let out the
most feeble gasp for air all the while
there’s just water and foam and blood
coming out of my mouth but I’m still
trying to breathe completely unconscious
it’s about three minutes they sat there
waiting those gas got larger and larger
and then finally the lights came back on
the Coast Guard was called but we’re 100
miles in the middle of the ocean it’s
going to take them some time before they
can get there four hours later the Coast
Guard arrived I was packaged up friends
walked me out to the bow of the boat
under the cover of darkness and massive
seas I was lifted in a basket up to a
Coast Guard chopper I was life-flighted
to San Diego immediately admitted to the
hospital why I wonder went a whole
series of tests cat scans x-rays
checking for the brain trauma internal
damage internal bleeding and then
monitored for secondary drowning making
sure that my lungs didn’t backfill the
fluid as I slept through the night next
morning the doctor comes in signs off on
the paperwork and says you’re good to go
home Greg
I promised myself I was done with big
wave surfing that I pushed it to the
edge I was given a second chance that
I’ve got no reason to go back there I’ve
explored my greatest potential what I’m
capable of I know it now I don’t care
about it anymore three weeks later there
big swell forms in the North Pacific
yeah you guys can see where this is
going and I get a call that they’re
going to have the Mavericks big wave
contest Mavericks is one of the premier
big waves in the world and this contest
is one of the most important in the big
wave surfing world this big wave surfing
community so I pack up my car and I make
the eight-hour drive north to Half Moon
Bay and I paddle out and I surf the
contest but things were different I
would immediately disappear back into
that deep dark lonely place beneath the
ocean and Cortes bank or my mind would
flash back to the physical agony that I
was experiencing when I was lying on the
deck of the boat desperate to breathe
but for the next six months I continued
to push myself and surf every single big
wave traveling to all these destinations
just as I done so many times before and
eventually I became so exhausted
physically mentally emotionally I just
had to stop I realized in that moment I
was living my life in fear all I’d ever
known was a life in a world of surfing
big waves you know frightened me to
think of things any different but it was
also in that moment that I realized I
had all the answers to this riddle I was
trying to solve in my mind now the ocean
is this amazing metaphor for life when
you think about it you know on this
constantly moving playing field the
wind’s tides currents are always
changing tides go in goes out there’s an
ebb and a flow to everything and I was
always so good at adapting to those
chain
changes in the ocean those new feelings
of fear that I’d never experienced
before I opened my arms and I welcomed
them just as I had always done and
simply acknowledged them as places in my
life that I was meant to learn and grow
from I started to regain that confidence
and I started moving forward in my life
I was having more fun than ever and then
the world gave me the opportunity once
and for all go back out and face those
deepest darkest fears once and for all
yeah I didn’t get much sleep last night
I was just kinda turning reliving
everything that I went through last time
I was out here last time last thing I
remember I was literally on the bow of
the boat like this you know looking up
it
card helicopter
out of here in a tricky basket
all right thank you guys
love you all for being here appreciate
it let’s go through you
thank you guys for being here love
respect and gratitude
you
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