This Is The Wild Ride That Is The Life Of Kai Lenny

what's the goal i mean the goal is to be the best big wave rider on the planet bar none how fast is the water flowing over the foil [Applause] i basically grew up on an island and it became a part of my dna watching the best water people on the planet do their thing right before my eyes it only seemed natural that i would adapt into that this training schedule is like i've never heard of anyone doing what he does he's sacrificed a lot of freedom to stay focused on where he wanted to go now he's accomplishing that he's always been a creative thinker and a kinesthetic learner you know movement is how he absorbs things he has an internal level of energy that most can't even fathom if you can keep up you know it's a unique experience [Music] for me i think it's chasing true freedom there is true freedom in big waves because how can anyone regulate something as powerful as that um and so when i get on those waves it's just me and the wave and mother nature and there's that human connection that i think we all have deep inside to connect with the world around us and that's where i connect best is when the waves are really big hmm where do i start maui of course where everything starts it's the 80s pops was a windsurfer he came to maui in search of the world's best ways lo and behold he met another windsurfer that's my mom they had me i've been in the water ever since i could remember i love the water i love big water over the years i've done a few things but this year is special i can feel it i'm more dialed in than i've ever been and i'm itching to push myself so i'm taking on a series of missions this winter i want one big wave tour events i want to take my foil into some giant surf i want to do things on a surfboard that have never been done before yeah i know big goals plus i've got a few other crazy ideas up my sleeve and on top of all that we thought it would be rad to have a film crew capture everything that happens during my winter season so here we are episode one thank you i just got back from oahu where i was doing a lot of surf training and the pipeline masters were on and then you just get this call that the jaws events on and it's funny because you train all year and you never know when it's gonna happen it usually just catches you off guard like okay like it's on bring two toe boards i think i'm as comfortable as i've ever felt for jaws but still the nerves are there so that's the process it's like hurry up and wait hurry up and wait and but before i know it's gonna be the morning and we'll be waking up at 5am and headed to the harbor and going through this roller coaster like i have the last four and a half years five years now the ultimate for me is to win in my own backyard at jaws hi lenny's gonna get the entrance beautiful bottom turn pulls up high in a big barrel here it's my home big wave break it's one of the best big waves on the planet and anything can happen flip the switch you can have the best barrel of your life or you can get absolutely just destroyed and it's very uncomfortable when you do worst case scenario for kai lenny ouch the jaws challenge is the one event that i want to win so badly i've always loved competition i've always loved big wave riding and both of those things were born here on maui from the first day i saw surfing which was at jaws to the first competition i did here in the islands it's always been the place where everything needed to come together never look back imma go full force bodies on bodies and floors turning straight to a corpse if i could win out at this spot it'll mean the whole world to me that is my main focus is take this event out and become the champion of jaws oh look at it this my friends is maui glass and what that means is it's only 20 knot wins but man it's i think it's going to be perfect tomorrow it's kind of scary how perfect it's going to be because that means you just have to put yourself in the pet yeah so there's my boat she's a giant jet ski hello hello he's so cool new friends it's just me on the boat right [Music] just like in terms of uh athlete though like boards right yeah yeah perfect okay well the anticipation is really almost killing me wanting to just get out there and do it is what i've been waiting for all year so waiting one extra day seems like an eternity i was training every single day every day in the water consistently working on my equipment and trying to come up with new ideas to have a better performance everything just seemed like it was falling in line for this winter season so that i could have the best winter season yet but at every opportunity i wanted to be out at payahi or jaws to do some training and even if it wasn't giant and if it was windy we would go out anyway [Music] but on this one particular morning all the signs were pointing to no don't go but of course we decided to go forward with the mission up to jaws once we got there we realized that the swell actually didn't really arrive but whenever there is waves out at jaws they're still considered big so i definitely got out there and was learning new maneuvers that i had never done previously and i felt so comfortable by doing them like this is this is awesome i'm making huge ground right now but when things went wrong was when i caught a left-hand wave and i rode it all the way to the end and i ended up falling i got picked up by victor lopez i jumped off the jet ski to grab the board victor looked at me for a second and looked back over and there was a big cresting wave and it ended up sweeping him off the jet ski and now the jet ski was ghost piloting things were wildly running out of control quick next thing i knew a wave came in i hopped on the jet ski it started okay we're good i go to hit the throttle throttle cable is severed jet ski was dead so i was bailing i leaped into the next wave the carabiner hooked my hand and in the process just cut through my hand [Music] hello hello are you okay definitely not okay [Music] no no i'm i'm out it's bad completely shredded between my thumb and my pointer finger it's just a major speed bump okay bye i thought my winter was absolutely over but within two weeks a lot of positive thoughts and good treatments i was able to bounce back and fix this old hand of mine just in time for the jaws championships [Music] when the call does come through that hey in three days the big wave competition at jaws it's on yeah sure in that moment i would be ready to just jump in there and let's do it but you have three days to think about it and in the process everyone's talking to you about it's gonna be the biggest ever it's gonna be so gnarly this the wind's gonna be like that and in that whole kind of like swirling around it's almost exhausting i'd rather just know the day before and just go out just the exhaustion of having to imagine big giant waves and potentially getting eaten alive but that being said every time that i end up back in the water after those long days of waiting it just seems like i'm at home i think if you learn to accept it and enjoy the process it doesn't affect you if anything it gets you amped being willing to put yourself in a position of real harm it's like walking out to the road and knowing you're going to get hit by a car hunt create space sense look left feel for the swell know what the tide's doing if it's dropping the swell's picking up never move never drag drag your prey across the lineup everything seems set my mindset is there i know what i have to do now it's just whether the waves will cooperate and come to me first thought when i opened my eyes in the morning is let's do this we're all at the harbor launching to go up to jaws for the contest it's pure chaos i got a radio for you i don't know the channel people are amping people that aren't in the event are like talking to you oh i heard it's going to be this it's going to be huge and you're just like trying to launch your jet ski and boat and stay focused there's lights people are filming and everyone's just amping to get out there best moments when you're coming around the corner you can see plumes of spray going 150 feet in the air you start seeing these boats and jet skis in the channel and you realize wow it's on i think that's the moment where i get the most excited scared everything all at once it's like these emotions are flooding in look at that barrel oh my god whoa so makeable oh my gosh have they taken off deep impact it's big it's really big you better buckle in the cbd md jaws big wave championships it is on it's the perfect day i've been waiting for my performance is gonna be stellar everything my son does it's dangerous it's really dangerous when we're on that boat it's focus i've caught this surfer right tribe is happening which translates to 50 feet on the face pretty much consistently [Music] check out kai lenny drops into this monster [Music] holes up high in a barrel oh my gosh contest is on the anticipation is really almost killing me wanting to just get out there and do it is what i've been waiting for all year if there's one event i want to win more than anything in the world it's this jaws championships if i could win at this spot it'll mean the whole world to me oh my god oh my gosh [Music] they say context is everything i totally agree but let me provide a little context here we are at payahi the place i grew up big wave surfing it's game day the cbd md jaws big wave championships this is the event i want to win more than anything else in my life it's my fifth time competing here i've never won it though i've made it to the finals twice and last year i came in second i was so close i could taste it that trophy so here we are again another chance at it it's just me ahi and a bunch of badass chargers who also happen to be the world's best big wave surfers standing in my way let's go you better buckle in the cbd md jaws big wave championships it is on [Music] it looks like it's going to be a fantastic day a solid 20-foot hawaiian with a couple 25-foot sets which translates to 50 feet on the face pretty much consistently that's my call first heat as the competition's about to start the nerves sort of start coming up competitively you can feel those butterflies and it's like okay i hope in 45 minutes i can catch two waves that will be able to beat some of the best big wave surfers in the world [Music] a young man out of australia off the bottom in the barrel traveling through there big spit for russell again [Music] that was a trip over a giant waterfall there he is it's good to see he's made it back to the surface he was able to claw his way onto the rescue slab oh until his board ripped him off uh jamie oh do you see kai oh he's on the boat [Music] [Music] i always try to just approach it in the most positive way thinking right on it's the perfect day i've been waiting for my performance is gonna be stellar there is a real calm to going out there it's like all of a sudden okay you know what to do you know it's just focused [Music] second heat of the day is out in the water kai lenny and ian walsh making this sixth surfer field check out ian walsh dropping into this one former champ out here completes his first ride this is will scooten on the back hand grabbing the rail and takes the hatchet to the dome mark healy going left it's the first time we've seen this wave less a bit different good speeds down the line and you feel like you're on the shoulder and all of a sudden you're not i get asked more than anything like does what he does scare me i kind of feel stupid saying it but it doesn't you know i'm so comfortable watching him chase these giant waves and i know how calculated his decisions are he's not doing it for the ego side of things he's not going to just hug himself over a wave just to get biggest wave you know it's he's doing it because he loves it here comes something kai's paddling to the west bowl oh here comes something drops into this monster he made the drop get it oh my gosh sierra two let's go lanceline landslide landslide cr2 let's pick up kai let's take him to his drop-off zone i copy yes you don't just decide to paddle out to jaws one day you gotta train for this year round and the big wave performance camp is one of the key parts of my annual training regime op can we get eyes on kai right now i'm unconscious as a drill so i'm not going to raise my hand to them and i'm basically going to have to force them to try to like bring another person to carry me on top of the jet ski so here we go okay all sierras here's the situation unconscious surfer down ties in zone three right side everything my son does it's dangerous it's really dangerous it's damn right serious and so when we're on that boat it's focus surfing big waves is dangerous and that's also partly why it's so exhilarating for us but inevitably bad things are gonna happen so the better you can prepare for those bad situations the better you can try to neutralize them when they do happen good morning it's been a huge week big training day today out at piahi objective for today is two things repetitions and clear concise communication drill between the entire team and the reason we want to get that done is our primary objective is when the athlete gets on the wave there's no question that we can pull every single athlete out of the surf zone as fast and as safely as possible every red bull high performance camp that i've done i've learned some incredible things and this one in particular is no different if anything this is the greatest one yet because the stuff that we're learning is pretty crazy this particular week we're heavily focused on communications we're heavily focused on high stakes high stress environments so the natural solution to that is to bring in some staggering talent from the special operations community people who've pushed the edge in the toughest environments in the world we then sort of bring best in class behaviors from the military group we modify that so that it fits in with the community of big wave surfers and then they are able to extract the best parts of it out okay let's go exercise let's do it to be at a point that i get this really valuable information that will take me to the next level hey i'm all open because i just want to be the best i could possibly be now switch up speed right past that switch switch switch switch up it ain't nothing [Music] money go green on the moon low key chilling with the booth thing i been getting money in a new thing pull up with 500 horses right off the boat it's a foreign [Music] biggest takeaway from the entire camp is just being prepared for every situation one of my favorite things from the whole thing was be ready for the perfect scenario but prepare for the worst not falling back on luck or succumbing to fear instead of rising to the occasion you fall back on your training and i think that is going to be what changes the game in big waves this year here we go speeding in through some frothy water do they have him or is he oh no he just ducked didn't he under yeah i thank you copy that one wave being ridden by all of our competitors kai lenny ian walsh and nick von rupp moving into the semi-finals we'll be back with heat number three when we return good job kind of a slow heat 9.4 for that one it's pretty big for not making a wave i made it and i thought i was fully gonna but the shockwave hit the tail and i lost all my speed because it grabbed it and then i was it was just over it's funny because i had no idea what was going on the entire heat i had just gotten flogged on a huge wave broke my leash got pounded pretty disoriented in that time there could have been all-time rides and i could have had no idea and so i didn't know i advanced let alone won my heat it just went to show how difficult the heat was based on the conditions were so treacherous how hard it was to get more than one wave but that's big wave competition sometimes it can be the wave you don't make that gets you through to the next heat we are into the semi-finals top three surfers moving on into the finals magu kai rothman's out there in the white jersey hi lenny a top performer out here in the black jersey and ian walsh a former winner here is in the yellow jersey when you're in the heat and you look around and you see the best big wave surface in the world and each one is really good at maybe one particular facet of big wave riding it can get into your head easily but the trick is is just knowing what you can do and not focusing on them for a second just be like i know what i need to do i know how i need to ride this is what i gotta do and that's all i gotta focus on coming in hot hi lenny's scratching into this one it's gonna be a late drop for lenny long line down the face kai controls it and hangs on before getting [ __ ] off by a mountain of white water hi lenny finn drifting down a drop skipping all the way for a finish here he's out in the lead and we'll continue to be in that position he is like he said in total control even when it's just the last inch of your tails touching the water the common thing i'm asking what are kai's goals how what does he want to do we'll be happy with third we'll be happy with second no no no he he his objective is let's win he is dedicated he is disciplined so that he can win if he's in a competition if he gets second we don't have a celebratory party because kai really wants to reach that benchmark in this thing it's full commitment we're ready to win kai looks like he's in compete mode kai lenny the little progressive approach medium-sized wave gets a top turn in he's putting himself in the right place and giving himself multiple opportunities ian walsh dropping into this one tippy toes there but he gets blasted on the bottom oh now the inflation vest comes into play makua stalling and surviving what a bomb that is a massive wave and then right here just skirting it by just millimeters literally his back arm touching the wall of water and he loves it that feels good the veterans on to the final we have our first three finalists set kai lenny out in the lead followed by kairofman and [Applause] oh [Applause] i hope you're strapped in because it's finals time this is for all the marbles six surfers on the water one's gonna be a champ and this is a final that we have been anticipating for the finals it's a sense of relief that i got that far but it's also where the most pressure hits it's like okay this is the time to perform and this is the time to put it all on the table when that big one comes go no matter what of course who's gonna be kicking and scratching on the first wave billy kemper off to a quick start negotiates the drop long bottom turn for kemper looking for the barrel finds the barrel finds an exit and billy kemper with a strong start i think billy's my biggest competition and everyone else's biggest competition out of jaws he's one of the best if not the best big paddle and surfer at jaws he's won almost every single event except for one he seems to have the place on lock waves always seem to come straight to him and he gets all these incredible rides whatever he's doing he's figured it out and i know everyone's rushing to dethrone we talked about kai lenny how he's gonna be dangerous in the final he's up and riding carbon off the top brilliant control kai lenny making it look easy here at jaws jumbo oh falling from the sky falls and washed sending it down the drop bottom turn right in the pit incredible ride this is going to be kailani gliding effortlessly down a giant wave face top turn for lenny and he negotiates that but the white water just clips them on the corner all right so billy has taken a very big swing i'm kind of looking to see if kai lenny's going to take it up a notch this is when all the money's on the table this is when legends are made down to under a minute 57 seconds oh this is it who's gonna turn on this hero wave go go go do it come on historic accomplishment billy kemper making history as a four-time jaws champ oh today was a lot of ups and downs i just never felt like i could find my rhythm the whole contest i felt like it was my event to win and uh just in the finals i got some ways but i just could never be in the right spot and it was so frustrating oh there's nothing worse than losing a contest out there again we all knew what i needed to do and i didn't do it in the way i wish i could have you know without a doubt it's like absolutely frustrating in my weakest moments i would feel like i'm not a worthy big wave surfer if i can't win at my home spot a place i spend so much time but that's not the way to think about it [Music] you got to take your losses like you take your wins and realize that there's a lot to be learned from losses so just look in the future i have some clear goals win the jaws contest next year and do whatever you can to train so you can give yourself the best opportunity i'm so far down this road that i want to keep chasing it like i can just see this carrot at the end of the tunnel that i'm like almost there the light is there that's what i'm telling you kai right now i'm headed to nazareth for some of the biggest waves on the planet i'm just so ant nazareth the scary beast in europe by coming here and surfing this place over the years i've been confronting the greatest fear of all which is drowning and total destruction it's crazy to be teaming up with my most competitive rival you know what can two of us do together as a team i think the plan this morning is grab the hydrofoil give it a whirl is like building the formula one of foils for the best rider in the world of formula one taking a hydrofoil and potentially riding maybe one of the biggest swells ever that would feel amazing the challenge for kai is the speeds at which we can probably go with this foil is something that i don't think anybody's ever experienced so we're gonna find out [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Red Bull Surfing

Views: 2,255,653

Keywords: red bull surfing, red bull, surf, surfing, surfboarding, big wave, waves, swell, big wave surfing, big waves, surfers, ocean waves, professional surfing, surfer, surf travel, pro surfing, pro surfers, professional surfer, surfing videos, redbullsurfing, catchsurf, surf ranch, beach, barrels, ocean, professional surfers, action sports, redbull, surfing big waves, wsl, extreme sports, surf videos, pro surfer, big wave surfers, windsurfing, monster waves, red bull surf, travel

Id: oRwX9IHWg4M

Length: 32min 55sec (1975 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 21 2020