Mark Healey spends an inordinate amount of time chasing big waves. He’s logged more time surfing waves of serious consequence than almost anyone else. Remember THAT Puerto wave? Or THAT Pipeline wave? Yeah, he’s logged time on huge waves. He’s calculated about his surfing, though — as one must be to last in his business — so when the swell that would eventually turn into one of the biggest and best weekends Hawaii has ever seen popped up on the horizon, Healey didn’t just throw himself headlong into it. He’s spent his life preparing for moments like these, and that’s why he’s able to score harder than pretty much anyone else on earth.
On Saturday, he headed out to an outer reef off Oahu. John John Florence was there too, as were Koa Rothman, Ezekiel Lau, Kohl Christensen, Grant “Twiggy” Baker, Mikey Wright, Anthony Walsh, and a handful of others. From the outset, it was clear that it was going to be a day for the record books, but even Healey, with that vast wealth of big wave knowledge under his belt, was taken aback.
“It was crazy!” he told The Inertia. “Probably the biggest wave I’ve paddled. Yeah, I’ve never seen a day that big and that clean.”
It was huge. The wind was offshore. Massive lips feathered back towards the sea in the warm Hawaiian breeze. PWCs buzzed in the lineup as the moving mountains of water charged towards land. And what transpired was a day unlike any big wave surfing day before it. Thankfully for us, Jesse Yonover was flying a drone above the lineup, and he cut together the beautiful edit you see above.
Learn to push yourself, keep calm, and manage fear in heavy surf with Mark Healey’s Guide to Heavy Water.
