Nate Florence lives with his foot pressed firmly on the gas. A quick scroll through his YouTube and you’ll see vlog entries from Ireland, Oahu, Maui, the South Pacific, Fiji, Iceland, Tasmania, South Australia, and most recently, New Zealand. And that’s just in the last six months.
Talk about redlining life. And it’s not like he visits these countries to surf fun waves. No. He chases 12-foot slabs, 20-foot outer reefs, and every terrifying wave in-between. Like this one, a marginally rideable, cold, wedging beachbreak that looks like a mix between Pipeline and Puerto Escondido.
“You can see these huge wedges rolling through,” says Florence, while casually suiting up at a wave where he’s never surfed before. “Looks pretty chaotic: Big, wonky beachbreak, with a lot of paddling and a lot of beatdowns, but we’re gonna try to go get a few.”
Spoiler alert: Florence gets a few.
Would you expect anything less? It must feel amazing being so confident in your ability to ride (and also survive), anything the ocean can throw at you. Broken board? Broken leash? Two-wave hold-down? No worries.
Florence is built different, no doubt.
Related: Watch Nathan Florence Surf and Survive ‘Crazy Session’ at 25-Foot Mullaghmore