A little while back, Kai Lenny and his brother Ridge did something pretty incredible: they threaded a Pe’ahi tube together.
Ridge was behind, while Kai led the way and the footage, as one would expect, went viral. Kai and Ridge recently released a vlog explaining how, exactly, it happened.
“My brother and I had this idea that we wanted to get some shots that no one has ever seen before,” Kai said. “And basically do it while we’re both riding a wave, and that’s this tracking shot.”
The day was a special one, to say the least. It was the first real Jaws swell of 2023. Light offshores dusted the tops off 15-to-20 footers. The weather went from sunny to overcast and back again, the shifting light casting golden rays onto the infamous cliffs overlooking the wave. And as it turned out, it was a perfect day for the Lenny brothers to attempt that shot.
“Ridge kind of was motivating the idea of ‘hey, let’s try this today,'” Kai said. “Like, ‘what would it look like if we were in a barrel today?’ I just kind of shrugged it off, like ‘I don’t even know if there are any barrels out here today.'”
But there were barrels, and plenty of them, so Ridge and Kai picked a wave and partied their way onto it.
“I remember just looking down the line and being like ‘oh my gosh, this thing’s fully going to barrel,'” said Ridge. “Which is kind of a scary thought to have at Jaws. Even by yourself, it’s really scary when you’re that deep.”
At first, it looked nearly impossible for Ridge to come out. The barrel was too narrow. He was too deep. Kai had a decent line, but Ridge? He was going to pay the price for trying to get the footage. But lo and behold, just after Kai came out, Ridge did too.
“I felt the lip graze my head as I’m going up,” he remembered, “and all of a sudden I could barely see anything, but I was like, ‘oh my gosh, I’m still going. Maybe I’ll get a bit of a clip. Just keep going, just keep going. It just kept opening up, and next thing you know I came out into the light. I can’t believe I made it through that thing while trying to film him.”
