Garrett McNamara of Waialua, Oahu, is on record as having ridden a larger wave than anyone else in the world, in 2011 in Nazare, Portugal, and unofficially he probably topped that record just last month at the same location.
The earlier wave was estimated at 78 feet, exceeding by a foot a wave ridden in 2008 at Cortes Bank off California by Mike Carson. McNamara’s more recent wave, which has yet to be confirmed, was estimated at 100 feet.
Also known as "GMac," McNamara has been riding large waves since his teens. Now 45, he was just 11 when he moved here with his mother and younger brother, Liam. They took up residence on Oahu’s North Shore, where both brothers became fixtures in the area’s surfing lineups, including Haleiwa, Sunset and Pipeline, the three spots that comprise the annual Triple Crown of surfing, in which McNamara participated at age 17 and won a small sum of money. Thus began his career as a professional surfer and "extreme waterman," which has taken him around the world in search of huge waves to ride, includingat a river in Alaska where the waves were generated by a calving glacier.
Many of his exploits are viewable on the Internet. On his own website, at www.GarrettMcNamara.com, he also lists many of his corporate sponsors — he calls them partners — who help finance his travels and projects.
His immediate partner, in business and life, is his wife, the former Nicole Macias, who previously was an environmental science school teacher in Florida. He also has two daughters and a son from a previous marriage.
He is a graduate of Waialua High School, but says he acquired most of his "ejumacation" in the surfing lineup.
Because of surfing, he said, "we’ve been fortunate to travel the world, so we got a lot of understanding of all different countries and how things work."
He also operated a surf shop in Haleiwa for a few years, "which gave me a hands-on business degree." He gave that up at age 35, he said, because he wanted to devote his life to surfing.
"I still had a lot of passion for surfing. So I wrote it as my goal to keep surfing. Then under that goal I wrote everything I needed to do to keep surfing. And I followed that little map. You know, you make a road map, a map of how to do things, and everything is possible."
QUESTION: Considering what you do for a living, does your family ever worry about you?
ANSWER: You know, you’d have to ask them, but my understanding is no. It’s like a way of life for me. Riding big waves is what I’ve always done.
Q: Well, do you worry about you?
A: No.
Q: I didn’t see it myself, but a friend of mine said she saw you on TV after the latest Portugal ride and you supposedly said something like you weren’t sure you wanted to keep doing this because you almost hit the rocks or something. Is that true?
A: You know, every day is a work in progress. One day I’ll be on top of the world, so happy, the best waves ever, and then the next day you get pounded and your arm’s sore and you’re not a hundred percent and you’re thinking, "Should I even be doing this?" The injuries are kind of what kind of weighs on me. I don’t like to go out unless I’m 100 percent. It’s a rule I’ve made for myself, but I do break it once in a while when the waves are so good and I just have to go out. … I’ve always loved it, and that’s where it stems from: love of surfing. But it’s also my career.
Q: Do you consider it work?
A: The surfing itself I don’t consider work. The work is the before and after. Like the interviews — this is the work, right here.
Q: How did you become a professional surfer who has become known as an "extreme waterman"?
A: It was a 100 percent fluke. At 17 years old, I didn’t know what I was going to do with my life. I had no expectation of being a professional surfer. I surfed for fun, because I loved it. Then Randy Rarick put me into the Triple Crown — it was right before I graduated — and I won money!
Back then, if you take the money, you’re automatically a pro. I won $250 so I was automatically pro, and that’s when I went, "Wow, I’m a pro surfer." It was a fluke, a total fluke.
Q: How do you make your living? You have sponsors, right?
A: Yeah, we have some sponsors that we’re really happy with. The sponsors are the reason, pretty much, that I get to go do what I do.
Q: So they pay for the travel and stuff like that?
A: Recently it’s been more projects than actual sponsors paying for some of the travel.
Q: Like what would be a project?
A: It could be a commercial, it could be a movie. It could be an ad campaign, it could be working with tourism, or the government. … There’s a wide range of different projects. We get an email every day with something, and it’s up to you to respond to the emails or not. If you respond, then all of a sudden you go to work. If you don’t respond, then you get to relax, but then the money doesn’t come in.
Here’s a good example of how the sponsorship works. Like, say we were going back to Portugal and I was bringing safety guys with me. So to not have it come out-of-pocket, which I would have gladly done to have them with me, I called Kona Red. Kona Red stepped up and paid for one of the tickets. I called Body Glove and they stepped up. And then the City of Nazare paid for some. So we had to come out-of-pocket a little bit but not as much as we would have had to because of the support of our amazing … I don’t like to call them sponsors. The people that I work with are more like partners. They’re people that I stand behind, they’re people that I believe in, and I believe in their products.
Q: In terms of the surfing, why the huge waves?
A: I love huge waves. From the day I started at, like, 16, I was just drawn toward big waves. They just seemed much more appealing to me. I felt much more natural. I didn’t have to struggle to perform. It was just a natural performance. I could complement the bigger waves without even trying. It was just a natural progression. Little waves it was a struggle and the performance in little waves was not natural for me.
Q: As far as the large waves go, do you have a favorite spot?
A: That’s such a broad question. Every wave is so different. It depends on what I’m looking for. Jaws (off Maui) was always my favorite. At Jaws you have so much time to think as you’re coming down the wave.
Q: As far as that Portugal wave goes, the only view of it that I’ve seen so far is from above, and there’s sort of a distance-distortion factor going on where it looks like you’re right up against the cliff. How far out is that actually from the shore?
A: That spot is about 200 yards out from the rocks. But I ended up about, like, 10 feet from rocks at the end of it. We’re usually riding the left, which kind of goes right along the rocks.
Q: Have you had the size of that wave verified yet?
A: I am not having it verified and I don’t care. I just surf and I love it. I have no desire to have it verified.
Q: Wouldn’t that be a marketing feather for you to have it verified?
A: You know what? I’m so over it.
Q: Well, you have the previous record, right? So I guess it really doesn’t matter.
A: The one thing that appeals to me with this whole thing is just bringing it home to Nazare (Portugal), because it’s such a special place and everybody is so supportive and so amazing and has so much pride. And they already got it (the record). They got the Guinness record last year.
Q: How did that whole thing in 2007 with the Alaska waves come about, and how did you work it so you’d be there when the glacier calved?
A: Well, it’s really funny what friends can talk friends into doing, and a friend of mine talked us into doing that. He wanted to film it. I thought it was a good idea until I got there. Then I wanted to go home after the first ride.
Q: That’s basically riding a tidal wive.
A: Yeah, exactly — under a looming 300-foot-tall glacier, waiting for it to fall, hoping it isn’t going to land on you, and then working to catch the wave.
Q: You had a partner with you out in the water, and you took turns towing each other into the waves on the Jet Ski, right?
A: The first wave that we caught, I rode, then we took turns, Keali’i (Mamala) and I, back and forth. I had about 10 rides, he had about 10 rides. So, yeah, at the end of the day, we both caught waves generated from a totally different form of power, from a tidal wave.
The crazy thing is we didn’t know where it (the glacier) was going to calve, or how much it was going to calve, or if it was going to create a wave or not, so it was like the great unknown. In big wave surfing, we know where the swell is going to be, how big it’s going to be and when the biggest wave is going to come and what direction the wind’s going to blow. So this was a total different way of surfing, something we weren’t used to at all. That’s what was so amazing and intriguing about it — surfing something that was generated from a whole different form of power.
Q: I’m amazed that you guys had 10 rides each. How did you get 20 rides?
A: You wait every day under that glacier. The days are 20 hours long.
Q: Was it a warm period of the year?
A: Yeah, we were there from Aug. 1 to Aug. 10th, and somehow I made it home.
Q: How do you put up with the freezing weather?
A: You know what? After Alaska, anything is pretty comfortable.
Q: What are some of the other spots in the world that you’ve ridden?
A: Fiji’s amazing. Indonesia’s amazing. Tahiti’s amazing. Australia is amazing. Right in my back yard is amazing.
Q: When you were a kid, did you have any idea that there were such rideable huge waves all around the world like that?
A: Yeah. But I didn’t have any desire to surf big waves. I didn’t think I was going to be surfing anything over 6 feet. But once I started riding big waves, and once I started getting into the science of how waves are created, and where the low pressures are forming, that’s when I realized there are a million waves out there that haven’t even been ridden.
Q: In terms of surfing, what’s your favorite part of the ride?
A: The barrel. It’s like time stands still. You’re in your own little world. For just a brief moment, it’s just you, in this little room, that’s just blue and beautiful. You can actually feel and hear your heart beating. It’s amazing.
Q: You can do that on a huge wave?
A: Once you’re in the barrel, yeah. Working on getting into the barrel is the challenging part.
Q: Since you’re 45, how long do you think you can keep this going?
A: Forever. There’s no age limit for this sport. (Laughter) We’re going to see how far we can go.
Q: How do you get in shape to handle such large waves?
A: Yoga and gym.
Q: What does gym consist of?
A: A lot of different strengthening of the ligaments, muscles and tendons. When you get older, you gotta make sure everything stays strong. Pretty much all I need is yoga because I do a pretty good Bikram yoga class. But it’s always nice to go to the gym, too.
Q: How do you keep track of waves around the world? Like, "Oh, let’s head for Portugal." How would you know to do that?
A: I watch the FNMOC, the Navy site (the Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command, on the Internet). And if I ever need a specialist, I go to Pat Caldwell; he’s an oceanographer at the University of Hawaii, and he’s amazing.
Q: So you’re a wave chaser?
A: I look at the site a minimum of five times a day, if not 50. So if there’s a big swell, even though they change it only twice, I still look at it 50 times.
Q: And what is the deciding factor for you to say, "Hey, I’m going"?
A: Wind and size. If it’s over 60 feet, and the wind is right, then I will consider going. If it’s over 60 feet and the wind is no good, then I won’t go.
