Balz Muller wing foil interview- Blue Planet Show Episode #2

The Blue Planet Show

Transcript: Aloha! It's Robert Stehlik Stehlik with Blue Planet.

I hope you like that new introduction video at the beginning. This is the second episode of the blue planet show. I'm just recording it here in my home office, in the garage. So I'm trying to slowly improve the quality of the show. It just got a new microphone and a better webcam, and then also working on improving the wifi connection.
So the quality of the video will hopefully be better in the future. Yeah, cause I'm just using zoom calls, recorded zoom calls to do interviews with the wind foiling athletes and thought leaders all about the sport. And it's just blowing up right now, wind flooding or wind, ding, whatever you want to call it.
And hopefully this show will just throw more fuel on the fire and just get everyone stoked on the sport. I'm super excited about it myself. And it's really cool to learn things from. Athletes like Baltz Mueller who is super inspirational, just doing all these crazy moves and hearing him talk about visualizing and dreaming about a new moves and then pulling them off.
So he's really on the cutting edge and it's so cool to, to get him to on the show here. And at the end of the show, I asked him who to interview next and he suggested I should talk to a female and then particular Annie Reichert from Maui. So I'm trying to get her on the show. Next. I messaged her. The best way to watch this show is on YouTube.
So you can follow the videos and the visuals along with what we're talking about, but these are really in-depth long videos. So if you want to listen to it while you're driving or doing other things, it is not also available as a podcast on both Android and Apple devices. So if you go to Google podcasts or Apple podcasts, you can just search for the blue climate show.
It should come right up. And you can listen to it while you're driving or doing other things. And the first episode with Zane Schweitzer is available on the podcast and this new interview is going to be available within a couple of days as well. Thank you so much for listening to the blue planet show.
Of course, make sure you subscribe to the blue plan and surf channel down below. Give it a thumbs up if you enjoyed it. And without further ado here is Baltz Muller. All right. Balz Muller. Thank you so much for joining me. How are you doing today? Awesome. Yeah. So for you, it's at eight o'clock in the morning, right?
And all my coffee for me in Hawaii. It's 9:00 PM. We have an 11 hour time difference, but I'm going to bed soon. You just getting up. So what have you been up to? We just had an awesome weekend and now I'm looking out the window and it's not snowy, so it's a good day. And it's gonna be windy as well.
It's actually, it's it was windy the past weeks and Combined with some very nice snow. It was a, it's a dream to live in Switzerland at the moment. And I can, I realize that the industry realized now these days that we need good wetsuits and it's insane to see how this sport, how this water sport is growing insane.
And there've been so many people on the water the past weekend. Yeah. Some people ever even scared and they were telling me all how this will end up in the summertime. When now in the middle of the winter time, they're already like 40 to 50 people on the water, and yeah, so basically a lots of action on the water these past days.
And and as you can see also some action in the smoke. Come complacent only missing the waves. Oh, only really missing the waves Bob out. That's what I'm always telling the waves. We come precise with the wing and the foils because we really start surfing the flat water with the wind and those foils.
They they, with those FA those forests, we pretend we actually surfing waves. What was it?
That's my tree to follow the smell. One of these next one of these next days, we got to figure out how this is gonna this gonna work. As you can see, it didn't really work so far, but all the friends are telling me it's supposed to work. Cause the tensity of the snow is probably like 10 times.
They kid and water, but if we would have a steep Hill and lots of speed, it would work. Everyone is laughing, everyone was laughing and they were all like you're choking and it's completely full, but I think it's possible. And the reason why I tried it now, it was the past two seasons. I was always talking to the one that we got a snow for it.
Like everyone was like, you.
So frustrated. Tell us a little bit about your background. You're I think you're a 26 year old, or how old are you? Actually, I'm 20. I'm not sure if I'm 26 or I stopped counting, but I feel I'm still young. I still feel young even though in the morning, a bit stiffer after a long day of sailing yesterday when you yesterday.
No, but I'm I'm born and raised in Switzerland. It's not that common for a watersports and also did lots of snowboarding as a kid. I still love snowboarding and I grew up in a family with two brothers and were all fully into water sports. So with the parents, we always traveled to the sea.
And I think that's the reason why we got into a whinging windsurfing, all those sorts of sports. And my background is windsurfing. I'm still a professional windsurfer, even though I feel like I should train more for windsurfing and Too much into winging lightly. My job is still professional freestyle windsurfer.
It turns into professional winging, I think as the industry is turning into winning as well, so yeah, that's basically my short story. Tell us a little bit about how you got into wink foiling. Like how did you first get started with it? Now I think one and a half something some summer to one and a half year ago, I was quite late.
I saw the first guys already trying the first champs and I was like, Whoa, we got to do this. And I've, I'm into foiling since the very beginning and windsurfing almost. So Dean it's been almost six or five years foiling with the winter skiing and this, this feeling of foiling it changed my life.
I always, when I'm back on the normal fin board, I feel like it's ridiculous. Ridiculous straight. It's not that loose and free and the foils they changed my life. It feels like riding on a cloud. That's what the very first beginning the guys were telling her, it's like cloud surfing, you're flying and this loose three dimensional feeling.
It's just insane. The change from the wind foil with the sail to the wing was not that. Crazy. But in reality, the fact that you're not connected to your board anymore with windsurfing, it, it blows my mind from the very beginning. So like the first day on the first day on the wing, I already tried, I don't know, three sixties and everything like spinning around.
I had most trapped on the board on the very first day. And the board was like hundred 40 liters. So a very good beginning. The second day I took the board with the straps and I tried straight to three 60 in the air. Took off instantly. And and from that day on, I couldn't sleep anymore without dreaming about women winning and winning tricks and flips and any sort of rotation.
So it took off like this. It's pretty amazing that the stuff you've been doing. So w who is your partner here that you're winning with? Yeah, I'm actually living together with my girlfriend ever. Together we're mostly always motivated some, one of us is always motivated to get on the water.
Like yesterday, everybody was even more motivated than me. Cause the wind, it seemed to be nothing. And then we run down to the beach in the wetsuits and it was, it's five degree. The water is even colder. So we ended up at the beach. There was almost no wind, no Whitecaps that we were like for pushing each other.
So there's a great community with my girlfriend, of course, with a raw ham. I think Rowan Michael is a very close friend and we're daily pushing what's possible on the phone, but it all started together with my brothers. They they also jumped on to the first, we were freestyle windsurfing together.
Then we jumped onto the wind foiling, a freestyle stance, and we started to push each other, like the level. One guy was trying a trick on his foil. The other guy tried a trick on his foil. That's how it started. We were like pushing each other to get insane. And the funny thing is now my brothers, they're not into wing falling yet.
And that's the craziest thing. Cause they're still like, There still Oh, I want to keep stick. I want to stick to windsurfing. Cause otherwise I will stop it there. I think there know what's happening, what happened with me? So they're a bit scared that they now they got one project Catholic kind of child.
So he's, his time is limited on the water. So he's more focused on freestyle windsurfing at the moment. I'm pretty sure next summer, like they won't resist, they can't resist anymore. When you see how many people are now winging yesterday, it was a random winter day, freaking cold. And I saw so many wingers on the water.
It's it's so cool. Actually almost a bit scary. Yeah. Here in a way I've noticed that it's almost more people whinging than wind surfing now here on the wall. Who anyways. Yeah. And it's also diverse is safe. It's surfers it's stand up for others and paddlers windsurfers kiters.
Anybody wants to try it? So it's as a very broad appeal, it seems and this well, quite a big community of newcomers with no, or actually almost no work. The sport background. Which for me is I still remember two years ago, everyone was super like against me. They were like, Oh, one another water sport.
It's gonna kill. It's gonna kill our community. We anyway, that's small. And there are not enough people in both. This will ruin it, and then over the last summer, I could realize that there were so many new faces at the beach, and now the windsurfers, which are fully against it, they're still like, Oh, now there are so many people on the water, but slowly and surely they all start whinging.
And then he, from the first session, you have a big smile. The first moment you're flying it. It's changing your life. It's like the best powder free ride snowboard day, or like the greatest surf day. That's what I feel. So this is some footage here from, is this some Brazil when you were at that world cup?
Can you tell us about your trip and what you did over there? Brazil, it was very unsure if it's going to happen or not, but we were invited for the first wing for a world championship. It was the second one. That was the first one in silver planner. But it was not yet like officially.
So we, we got invited to for the less than Brazil and it's a city spot in the middle of this huge city and the condition usually are not that great, but they're awesome for winging. It's funny. It's funny to see how you. How you can actually travel around the whole globe, get to a spot where the conditions are not awesome.
And then having such a blast winging with the world best best riders. And that's what actually happened. Yeah. As you can see now, there's for the lecture for the recipe. Yeah, really. We were living the dream in the middle of this pandemic. Beside, beside we took a COVID test almost every day and had to get to strict strict borders to enter the water.
It was so much fun in the water.
How was it traveling like w was it difficult to get there and. And it was good to show at first sight of what could be possible in this new sport, especially with Misa the Brazilian who's surfing. So nice. And also the one who, who makes us dream and really like small or flat waste, they're writing it and they're making it look so good.
It's it took off there. But where it really took off was the week after the competition. When we all went to Jericho Quora, and we were like, everyone was a bit stressed out because for the competition, it was weird. We didn't know what to expect. We didn't know what the church gonna reward or not.
So they were they were definitely what they wanted to see were tricks in the waves. They wanted to see us riding the waves and doing tricks in the waves. But the waves were so hard that we almost couldn't get into into the waves because it was basically only a short break. So we were riding the shore break and that was very scary.
I saw some wipe out zones going to play that. Let me see if I could find it back in Brazil, but there's so much lately there's so much content. There's so much writing. Pretty much in the short run. There's the wash. Yeah. Together with Rohan. It was the first official competition and we pushed hard.
I would say the more than five guys can completely pounded in the short break cause we just wanted to right away and there was no wave. We ended up being most of the beach. And as I said before, in the end, they was good. We all came together and then we tripped for to cherry Coke war up in the North.
And that was such, it was such a nice trip because there was the, of course there was the F1 photo shooting, so left in all invited and we were scoring some awesome waves together. And pushing the limits forward falling weavers. Yeah. So it looks like a lot of your inspiration for the moves that you trying to is from freestyle windsurfing, right?
Like you trying the same moves and then, but it's actually, it's, it looks like it's almost easier to do without the wind being attached to your board, right? It is definitely on there much more possibilities. And the craziest thing is that it's actually easier to get into it in windsurfing till you get to a certain level, your champ, your port, I don't know.
It takes you maybe two or three years. And in winging, I would say after two months, you're able to do your first tricks and yeah, you should look at the numbers of writers doing tricks on the water. There's very limited freestylers out there. Maybe, the world tour is like the Brighton 40 people in the world, freestyling and it got so complicated with all those weird double tricks in there that no one could follow anymore.
And I was already now after just one, one season of freestyling, I will tell that they're more wing freestylers that Windsor freestylers. Cause it, it simply, the. So do you is growing now, not anymore into winter freestyling, they're starting straight with Winfrey styling as it's something you, and it's combining the kite free stylists and the winter freestylers.
So they're already double as much writers involved. And the cool thing is how it's combining the styles of the surfers, the freestylers, the kite freestylers. As as Maxim Tablo, for example he's one of the world's best freestyle kiters and these he's putting his moves on to the way now his cart moves and it's combining all the disciplines like kiting surfing, windsurfing.
I it's good to see. And as you said, it's with the right gear. It's. It's accessible for everyone and the right star. Yeah. So let's talk about that a little bit. Getting started. Can you give what kind of pointers do you give to people that are getting into the sport? What would you recommend in terms of equipment and technique and all that kind of stuff?
I think the most important is that you better not looking for a board to buy for your first session. Maybe the best is even to make three or four lessons on basic beginner gear. As you can see, the sport there I was using is a 60 liter board. I would say it's the advanced board for a really good writer, but for getting into it, you need a big board.
Do you need something with 140, 160 liters? So you're floating on your first day. And then on the second day, you can almost go down 40 or 40 or 50 liter going down on a hundred liter board. And then I dunno, after one week of riding, you probably will find your 80 liter board as your prime board for a gusty, like wind conditions.
And some of them probably after one month right at 40 liter port. So if I could give any advice is if you want to get straight into winging something new and you haven't any water sport or for sport background. It's easier to learn wind foiling than any other fall sport I would say, but with the right gear and the best would be probably to rent some big gear or get yourself a beginner lesson and then buy yourself a medium volume board.
You can progress some, and don't think too extreme, not plan to do any flips in your first two months, but. Planned to get all those free writing tricks, which is so nice. You don't need to think about the jumping for me. I was almost one year. I was riding 182 board, so quite a big board, but I was mastering all the tax, the chives, and this gets unlimited.
You can keep on trying, and training your your tricks. Yeah. And the foil, it's like a 2000 square centimeter foil. But what kind of, what size spoils do you use now? Mostly like for years freestyle and wave riding and things like that. Yeah. I think it's what I'm using these days is like a three foil set up like three wings.
So I still love to use the 2,100 foil, which is the beginner foil. But it's also my light too and foil. So in conditions like yesterday with eight nuts, I used the 2,100 in conditions. Like the day before, where we had 40 knots, I'm using an 820, so a much, much smaller. And for me, when I figured out with 1,500, 1,720, I can pretty much compass beside all conditions.
But it's a difference between the steady wins in Hawaii or the gas, the Swiss conditions. That's what I realized. In Switzerland where we have conditions between five to 50 knots to good day and the wind tolls, they're so crazy. There is no, no wind at all. You drop down even on your big wings.
So I realized we're using quite big wings compared to two ocean spots where the wind is steady and nice. But I still recommend if you get into waning to use a big foil for your first sessions, cause it's just way more fun and it's much, much easier. You can also fly that lower speeds and take off earlier and all that kind of stuff.
Yeah, it definitely, for beginners it's much nicer to have a bigger foil. Exactly in her way. Here in a while, we don't really have super strong wind either. You're not like modeling, but if you're riding waves, I just find a smaller oil is so much nicer on a way because you don't get overpowered by the, before it doesn't reach this.
And as well, I realized riding waves on a big fall. You're constantly pushing yourself. Down in a bad position as you're not really using the way, if you're trying to escape the way. So when it comes to surfing, you need a high performance surf foil who actually does too much. But that's, that's, it's another sort of, it's another discipline, even I would say it's still winging, but it's a good point.
I'm wondering in which direction it will turn. If it will be. As it is now, like all in one, that bit of racing, a bit of surfing mean the freestyling, or if you will turn ridiculously into racing as it did in any other world to sports. I hope not. If you could design your own contest, like what, how have you what's like a perfect competition to you?
Like what if you could say, this is how I want the clients to be, what would you do? I would do a serve freestyle race competition, all in one like that. Yeah. But it's like the, it's like the old school surf competition where the hat you get racing through the short break, I'm doing tricks in between.
This would be, this would show the ultimate Waterman and that would even change to gear. Like you need to control any and every gear, like a Waterman's leak. So that would be my ultimate competition. If it would exist. It's, it already exists.
Tricks. And, but you also have to go as fast as you can surf the waves as well. Okay. We had a raised in Tarifa at the second world cup. We had the race, it was called the surf race. There was a. Two upfront laps, and then a down moment lab where we had to serve. Like you can see now in the back of, we put the wing behind us and we were surfing down.
It was hundred meters surfing down with the waves. We were not allowed to lift up the wing. As long as the board would touch the water, we will be on zero speed anymore. So we had to go up wind full speed with quite a big foil. And then we had to surf down the chop. And the feeling was nice. Except some of the guys took very fast equipment and they were much faster upward than the other guys.
And then they have to struggle on the down when it was a cool format and it needs to keep, we need to keep the fun in it. Otherwise it won't be America's cup and only polished high performance foil will we'll have any or any Chinese. We will see
your wig. It's that was that was a stupid stand, a in a very safe like Uber, where the wing would just blow up the shore and that everything would have been safe, but it's very dangerous. And I wouldn't recommend anybody to get out on the ward to, without at least treat out the wing leash. And if the conditions are freezing cold, like they do here, if you lose your board, you're also screwed up.
So it's much safer to use a leash, but also the question like, any, or every question in in waiting at the moment, it's hard to say what's perfect. It's hard to say. Wherever we need it. I mean their wrist leash. I use my wrist. I use the wind leash now around my belly, so I have all my hands free.
That's what I do. It's unlike this. We can even swim. For a short second, you can swim normal with both hands. But then if your board leash and your wing leash gets get screwed together, it's also pain. Yeah. It's hard to say. I would, anyway, these days I would say nothing anymore.
Cause in probably two or three months we looked like easier. If we did it that way, I won't, I personally, I wonder how the Wing's gonna look like in three months, right? Is there any kind of, do you have any new developments that you're working on and or board or coil designs that like you're experimenting with new prototype?
We, last night I almost couldn't sleep. That was always like my brain is spinning and thinking. And they're definitely a few, if you knew you progress, I'm not sure if it's a progress all the time, we try something. It feels like trial and error. And you're not really sure if it's a benefit or not.
And at the moment as well in Switzerland, it's very hard to get new products with the pandemic crisis. So it takes us almost. Sometimes it takes us three months from the moment we had an idea till we get the first try and then it ends up being very frustrating. And you realize that you're not, you're stepping you stepping back sometimes almost.
So the moment it's not that easy, buy them a goal or a wish for me would be for freestyle. I'm talking for freestyle when it will be a boom. Cause I still prefer the boom compared to the handles for freestyling, but there's so much benefits. And also, the boom is, again, it's more weight.
It's not that simple anymore. It's hard to say at the moment with MCs, we have a very cool and easy product where we can do freestyle tricks, whether it's surfing waves or even just beginning winging. It's not bad, but we can now no, for sure. But yeah, I agree. I really like having a blue more or like a planned or not makes it much easier as a, before the wing and grab it anywhere you want and you can use to rest, and do the small movements.
I realized a lot. We have such performance wings. But if you twist your hands, nothing moves on the wing, he just stays in one place. So then I'm asking myself, why are we using such high performance wings? If we don't even can do the fine tuning, the final test mean by the, by your hands.
In windsurfing and kite surfing, it's the smallest wrist change can make a huge difference. So I'm sure there will be lots of development in this direction just to, to progress the sport. We'll see. But everything is still, it feels like everything is just at the beginning. Yeah. Maybe it's only been around for about two years commercially available where you can buy a wage.
Hasn't been that long. What about your boards? I noticed like the, your Emmy boards, they have those parabolic rails we'll make this snowboard rails. Yeah. So what is I do? What is the thinking behind that sheet? , for sure it comes from snowboarding, the designer, Woah.
He's he used to be a very good snowboarder and what he wanted to get into the water sport were those carving abilities of a negative rails. And for sure, the negative res they, they need a certain flex to work, but we it's, we're not able to make flexible snowboard style surf boards at the moment.
Still be from the very beginning. What's so cool about this project is Amie project it's from the very beginning we tried outside with, we thought outside the box and we tried something else. And from lots of common and very famous shapers, I'm old, they're very traditional they're. They don't really think outside the box.
They don't want to, I don't even want to try something that feels unnatural. So the coolest thing about this this Ambi project was just we try retry and we fail and we realize stuff. And what I realized with the negative rails, one of the biggest benefits. Now we're talking about just foiling as the tail is quite big.
You can fully stand into your straps before you get going. So the volume is very compact below your body. And you got a super good balance. So that makes it easy for the takeoff before you're flying and as well, the negative rails, they keep to keep you more straight going forward on slower speeds.
So you, it feels like you're taking off earlier with the negative rails. And of course when we using the boards without the fall, you can feel the CARF. There's a certain different card to it. Did you S you almost, it feels like you're gaining speed through the CARF. It's a very cool project and it's different now.
I like trying new stuff and Yeah. Sometimes it works out if it or everything comes together. And with those Ambi boards, the greatest thing about Ambius that Burnwell as a shaper is not telling me, Oh, you're crazy. This won't work. He's just Oh, let's try it and see where it goes and where it brings us.
And it even brings us into big storms, this clip. Yeah, that's actually on Saturday, we were expecting a store like this as well, and then it just didn't happen. It was it was flying water at certain points, but it was between zero nuts to 50 knots. And and it was almost it was unsaleable and wind surfable.
But with the wing, we had quite a lot of fun. It was just super Gaston. So you would say super strong winds. It's actually easier to wing foil then to Windsor for you if it's gusty. Yes. Because with the custody, yeah with the custody, with the gusty winds, the problem is if you get a gust in your sale, the forward movement is not really happening.
It's just blowing into your sail and you feel a lot of power in your sale. You're not going anywhere. And with the wing as the wing, you're always able to stabilize the wing and put it in uterine so you can release much more wind. So a very strong gusts are are much smoother written with a wing.
That's true. Right then. It's a cool thing that year. It's still involved in all the business sports, like wind surfing and that crossover. It's pretty passive. Yeah. Even today I want to go kiting today. So that, that's the cool thing you're trying any and everything.
You just do what you feel like and then get out on the water. See, you're always wearing a helmet. Have you had some really bad experiences? I've had some bad white box where you hit your head. Yeah, I used to have very bad winter five pounds, but I'm wearing this helmet already since I think 14 years.
It's still the same helmet. No, my dad, when I was, yeah, my dad, he bought me a helmet. When I got into doing the first pre-style windsurf tricks and I'm still wearing the same helmet, just took, I took out of a layer of foam. So now it fits again. Perfect. But In the past. In the past years, I had so many gnarly crashes.
And when you look at this home, it probably wouldn't be a, it wouldn't be a certified safety product anymore. It's full of scratches and cracks. But , even with the helmet I knocked out in the water. So it's definitely a good relationship to that helmet.
Probably. I probably would miss. Yeah. That's the crazy thing. The crazy thing about water sport is if you, if something happens on the water surface and you're lying, knocked out in the water, you probably won't surf anymore. Any other day, you probably will become. So you always need to, you always need to keep in mind that you're playing.
Playing on a dangerous surface, but that's also nice the surface. It's a big playground where you can do whatever you want. But I'd rather be safe than sorry. And then missing out on any or many good sessions to come. That's why I'm comfortable with my helmet. Yeah, that's good. Let's see. So you're lucky, but now I also need to find A good safety rest, because I think with those flavors, they're good impact.
This is really important during these days, it's getting a bit scary and to foster so sharp. So I'm not that I'm not sure in which direction we'll go. Maybe this voice needs to get a bit softer, even soft edge or something is I think it's you don't want to stop yourself on your on your winglets. Yeah, pretty sharp down.
Yeah, I see the industry and are producing lots of safety equipment as well, which is definitely good. Yeah. Yeah. So talk a little bit about your training and arm also like visualization, like you said, like you dream about it and stuff like that, but like when you learn a new trick, like what's the process I don't know when you learn how to do a back flip or something, walk us through the whole process.
As you said, for sure you need to treat my budget drink. And I'm always telling you need to be able to close your eyes and visualize your body movement from 360 degrees. So if you're not able to visualize in which position you're gonna pull yourself or throw yourself and British, so you will go half rotation up and then drop down straight and nothing happens.
So you before you're trying it, you can always say trial and error, but if you try and there, or you're only going to hurt yourself, it's much smarter to try. We try to visualize your movements or maybe try them before you get on the water on the beach, on a trampoline. And I even took the ring on my, on the trampoline and I was doing flips.
I, I didn't put too much pressure in the wing. So I was trying to flips on the trampoline with with the wing in my hands. And I ended up landing on top of the wing on the trampoline, almost chewed out the trampoline. It's safer. It's safer too, to be able to do the body movements before you get onto the foil and then destroy yourself.
Cause it's different and awkward with the foil to do a flip, but but that's definitely the most important is to Treme about the trick dream about the rotation and And maybe even before you get on the water, close your eyes one more time and then get out and try it the way it feels safe and the way it feels natural.
And for sure, for me, it's this, as you can see this flip here, it's from the winter background, it's almost the same movement or the same move as it in wind surfing. So that definitely helps if you're all at the If you're already at a certain level in wind surfing or kite surfing but still it's for me, it's it's exploding my mind.
What's still to come because it's like a combination of a back loop and a push loop and you but you never really get back when you're not in the mood. You just yeah, but still I see people already trying some. Back when that air rotations, also also by mistake, I had some backward pushes and as you said, it's increasing the speed enormous, but it's probably also the way how we going to do doubles spins or something as we're doing it in windsurfing.
Now these days with almost seven, seven, 1250 rotations in the air. So there's still lots to come. Yeah. And again, I w I'm really thankful these days that the wetsuit industry realized that surfing is not only happening in Hawaii. Now these days I feel comfortable more with a very, with with with the good suits we're having, because it's not only board shorts riding, sadly for me at the moment, that's still, yeah.
Yeah. So what kinds of, what do you use when it's like freezing cold outside? Yeah. Now these days I'm using the O'Neill suits and I'm mostly, I'm even warm in a four, three, but what I'm always telling everyone is it's useful to make like a onion layer. So you have a thin, like crappy low, and it gives you an extra layer.
And that keeps you warm. And these are lates yourself. And the problem are only the hands it's on the body. You won't feel cold anymore. These days with the suits, it's just the hands and the head of the feet. We, the
exactly. I'm wearing a very cat, like almost a five millimeter hat, but the problem. The problem with those tech hats. It closes your vision, the closest, your orientation, and you feel like you're yeah, you feel like you're in a bag or something and you can't really function.
So that's the problem, but it also gives you a bit of safety. It feels like you're on destroyable as you're progressing. You explain what you do here. Like you switched the wing before the rotation, when you're still on the water, you're already starting to spin like a wing man. Exactly. And on this movement, it's the main part of district is happening before the takeoff.
As you said before, when I'm pulling the wing backwards, I put so much tension on my body. And as the wing is pulling the reverse and the board is still shooting forward. It generates such a fast rotation and it's it's very similar to the takeoffs in snowboarding. When they're going over a big kicker, they throw themselves before they actually India into the rotation.
And they they generate those weird core rotations. They're cold. And yeah, as you can see it's happening now also in winging, watching this, that you, I guess that, is that something that also that you learned from windsurfing freestyling, whereas this sort of thing, this is something you, but it's the.
The way I started doing it. I was thinking about I was thinking about the wind surf tricks and with the freestyle tricks, we're talking, the says, are we putting the sail back winded? And we load it up in a, in an awkward position. And as it gets loaded up in this awkward position, it wants to get back to neutral again.
And as it twist this back, it generates this rotation. There's definitely much more to come in this direction also, really. This is both sides jumped out of those sides. Now we're also jumping in all of the regular stance and this is a backwards rotational. I'm also sure it's possible with a fro forward rotation.
So there's still much more to come. And when we get through this clip here, At the, at one point a bit later, there will be a double pop move and it should, it's supposed to come soon. And I think those back to back, chumps going to be something for the future as well. This one here, this one is just a regular moves and now this one, so there's the first rotation landing and straight to second pop and And then the other one that land backwards and you ride the flow backwards.
Okay. Exactly. But what I think what's definitely also possible is like this year, the back loop and a landing perfect on the wing and taking off straight again, like the air chair, the air chairman's sitting on their forests and they're doing like one flip landing, another flip landing and other flip landing.
I'm curious maybe all industry believers turn into some, maybe we will get some, one offers, so only one wing, and then we could go probably better both ways like 20 kiting. It's already existing 24 Berlin where we're forced actually can go both ways. Definitely not about the cat. Look it up.
It's a 20 filing. Yeah. They're like two same similar wings and they can go both ways. I'm excited to the time to be alive. Yeah. That's awesome. Very interesting stuff. And you're working on some new moves is there anything that, that you're trying to do that nobody's done before?
In winging there at the moment, latest trick is it's the chief's role, et cetera. It's a common winter move. One of the first rotations in winter thing it's existing, maybe 40 or so. And I'm stoked. I'm able to do it in windsurfing now almost with closed eyes and just the past week. And I was trying some cheese rolls with the wing.
And the rotation felt awkward and weird, but I might need to rethink the take off and it's definitely possible. That will be another three rotating over the strep. I was twisting my front hand and I was pulling the strap backwards and turning, like throwing myself over the leading edge.
The problem was actually the takeoff as the wing was churning the rotation, but the foil was still behind me in the water. And then when it tripped over me, it just just stopped the rotation and nothing's been, they just did like a straight air with the foil above my head in a scorpion position.
No about them. There's much more to come. And at the moment, I'm just waiting for warmer conditions. Cause it's the forecast for next week. It's all below zero, zero degrees. So it's going to freeze the wings again, and I'm not realized when the wing is frozen, everything is so stiff.
You just don't feel like you want to try some new stuff. But but still it's just so much fun being on the water and writing. Have you damaged a wing because of the free does it break easier or crack or anything or the bladder breaks or something like that? No. Have you had any problems with it about the ladder?
I'm not yet. Sure. If it's definitely, if you pump up the frozen, when you got to be careful. But what I realized with the window material there they cracked quite easy with with cold temperatures. So that's also a main reason why our first wings, they had wing windows.
Then we put them out of the GAM. Again, the windows. Now we get windows again on our wings cause we need it for the safety. We don't need it for the performance, but we need it for the safety. And at the moment, yeah, with the winter says it's the same, this PE material. It's just get stiff when it's frozen.
The cannot be material is more brave. It doesn't really. It doesn't really hurt the call, but but the bladder, I'm not sure. And the other day when I was pumping up my frozen ring, I was like, Oh no. So I was very careful, but so far sometime. So when, I guess like between snowboarding, when surfing, winging, kiting, you basically get on outside pretty much all the time.
Do you ever do any other sports I cross training or other exercise? Yeah. Yeah. I just wanted to say that, as you said, with all this action sports with lots of physic effort I really am when I'm going and getting back to bed, I'm bummed. The main focus I really need to, you really need to look at is staying flexible.
Does it as when it gets into the shoulders gets into the arms you actually gain your muscles where you, but which you haven't experienced before and so important that you stay flexible. Cause it's a it's your it's your insurance for your old days? I would say that's what my dad always tells me.
I'm doing lots of yoga. I'm doing lots of pounds or thing. On a rolling on a skateboard. I really liked this this sort of exams and it's, I wouldn't say I'm into CrossFit or anything like this, cause I'm doing the CrossFit on the water, but besides that, I really need to stay flexible and I'm doing yoga on a regular base.
It's good. It's good for the soul and good for the body.
I think we. Went over most of the questions I had for you. I, what kind of, what do you think will happen with wing filing in the future? Do you see it becoming very, a very big sport, like bigger than wind surfing, kite surfing and all those sports? Or what do you think? Oh, that's ECS as football as it material.
It's a lot of gear involved. So that doesn't really, that doesn't really puts swinging in a, in a. Benefit position compared to windsurfing a win, but definitely I see it lightly. It attracts lots of people and it will be there and it will be there to stay just as any other world to sports.
I'm curious to see if it makes the Olympics. It probably will take 40 years or something to convince everyone that it's. It's it's nice to look at and definitely this the question of the spore will be if it gets too crazy and too complicated, especially the freestyle part and At the moment, the way it is now, it's accessible for everyone and that's why it's boosting up and it's exploding.
And I hope it stays that way and it gets many people into water sports and puts a big smile on our faces. Yeah. When people want to find out where body, Is the best place to look at your YouTube channel or your Instagram. If you want to find them on Instagram, it's ridicule.
And then your YouTube channel is just yeah. Yeah. Awesome. So what else do you want to talk about? Any, anything else you want to cover your youth wing, floating in the snow? That's a pretty good one too. Yeah. What that, what the hope is that Yeah. As you can see here with the freezing hands it's it's, it didn't stay.
You see how people go into that much pain to just get on the water and enjoy this sport. And just yesterday I was thinking we were all out of our minds. There were like almost 15 to 20 wingers on the water and in the summertime, they only used to be like three or four people out.
And it's just as winning recently hit our beaches and yeah, it's so cool to be part of this new revolution. Let's say it's a revolution and yeah, I just hope it's we're not gonna have any future body damages with all that spinning and flipping around because it looks a bit awkward there as I'm trying all those weird tricks, those new tricks.
But it feels good being out there and I can't get enough of it. I want to get out again and excited to get on the water in 30 minutes. Yeah. It's so cool to watch you per your progression too. I remember seeing some videos of you maybe a couple of years ago when you were trying some of these spins or just wiping out, I've been out.
And I was like, what is he trying to do? But then now you're pulling them off and it's. So amazing to see that. Thank you. Thank you. So who's your, who do you think I should interview next for the show? It's a good question. I would tell what I'm really curious about is the girls side, especially the Hawaiian girls like army.
I just saw her throwing a backflip yesterday in the star. On these thoughts. Okay. I saw her showing a backflip, but I'm so curious if some of the girls will do backflips soon wing back flip soon. And I think there are a few girls up on the list. Olivia on the, and also, or my girlfriend. Definitely.
It's cool to see that also the girl's side is pushing that the wing sport. And even yesterday there's been a few girls on the water. There was no, none of them was kiting or wind surfing and there'd been a few girls swimming. So it's cool to see that it also gets to go. Walter. Yeah, for sure. No, that's really good.
A good idea to get a girl on the show. I should do that. Yeah. Awesome. Cool. Otherwise it gets another dickhead sports like all those tight, tighter windsurfer. We actually suffering. We self create too many mans at the beach being like testosterone. And it's good to see the change also in winning it's.
Many new faces on the water. Now that's a good hype. Yeah. Awesome. All right. Let's get started. Yeah, so you have fun today and get on the water and post, keep posting all those videos. That's great. Thank you. And I'm looking forward. I'm looking forward to wa to visit Hawaii one of these days. I hope that it's still off my, on my pocket list.
I haven't reached that far yet. Hopefully one of these days it'll be great to meet you here. Okay. Awesome. Looking forward to working with you guys for sure. Cool. You take care.
All right. So that's it for the second episode of the blue planet show. I hope you enjoyed it. Please give it a thumbs up. If she liked it, subscribe to the blue planet, surfing YouTube channel down below, listen to the podcast. And I hope to see you next week for the third episode of the blue planet show.
Thank you again for watching. See you on the water. Aloha.