Sam Loader PPC Wing Foil interview- Blue Planet Show- Episode #6

Sam Loader is the owner of the Pacific Paddle company in Auckland New Zealand and the designer of the PPC wing.  

Interview transcript:

Aloha it's Robert Stehlik, welcome to another episode of the blue planet show, where I interview wing foil athletes, designers, and thought leaders. These are unrushed, long form, in-depth interviews, where I'm trying to learn not only about wing foiling technique and equipment, but also try to get a deeper understanding of the guests, their background, what inspires them and how they live their best life.

This show is available on YouTube, where you get video, and also as a podcast in audio only, just search for the blue planet show on your favorite podcast app to listen to the long form interviews on the go. This show has a lot of video where I'm filming myself, wing foiling with a back mounted camera and people always ask questions about that.

So just preemptively. I wanted to show you how I record it. If you can see this GoPro max camera, a 360 camera mounted on my back. And then afterwards I can edit it and show the footage from different angles. So it's a cool system. So this is a homemade harness windsurfing harness with Camera pole.

These are also available commercially. So I'll put more information down below in the description. So check it out. If you have any questions about that.

The last time I went on a trip off the Island of Oahu was to New Zealand in February, 2020. This was when the virus was raging in China and right while we're also opening a new shop and so on.

So it was a crazy time for me, but I made it over there to visit with Dan Regan. Who's our New Zealand do planet distributor. Thanks so much for inviting me. And we went to a beautiful place called Paula Nui, where they had the Auckland paddle Fest. And that's where I met Sam loader who owns a business called Pacific paddle company or PPC.

And we stayed in touch afterwards and he emailed me about this new wing he developed. So I was curious, he sent me a sample. I tried it. And, to be honest, I've tried most wings that are available on the market today. And I can honestly say that it's the favorite one I've tried so far, just the combination of a lightweight pot, very powerful for its size, easy handling, very neutral on the wave and just so many nice features that I like about it.

So we talk a lot about the wing and the development. And so on in this video here, I'm also planning to make a detailed product review video that I'll post on a YouTube channel shortly, probably within a week or two. So stay tuned for that. And for now you can go to the link below or appear to get more information about the wing on our website.

So without further ado, here's my next guest sound loader with PPC. All right. Sound loader, welcome to the Duke science show and stoked to have you. And it's been a while since I saw you I guess right before the pandemic we met and Paula Newey in New Zealand and he took me tow and foiling, which was awesome.

So thanks for that as well. But let's talk a little bit first about your background, like where, where did you grow up and, how did you get into the whole watersports and your business and so on? So I grew up in Christchurch, which is South Island of New Zealand. And I actually grew up skiing.

So in the mountains a little bit. So a lot of people don't know I've a ski background and competed a little bit and traveled and went to the U S and stuff. But yeah, The, I guess the whole water thing came about. We used to go to Fiji as a family just once a year, pretty lucky to do that.

But my parents just said they couldn't get me out of the water from the start of the day to the end of the day. So I was, they were pretty much going down to the beach at night time and try to find me and whatever I was doing, trying to swim with fish or whatever. I don't know. I was just, I've just been addicted from those are my first kind of memories of just being addicted to the feeling of just being in the ocean and now I just kinda need it.

And I'm actually a bit more comfortable in the ocean. Just like all of us, I think all of us addicts. Do you remember where that was in Fiji? Like I was there a couple of years. It was Castaway Island. That's where he needs to go. And it's kinda, it is, it's kinda near like tomato and Tavarua. Yeah, we actually went there by boat.

Yeah. Castle. It's a beautiful spot. Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty cool. Little family spot, but. And then obviously later in life, went back to Fiji and went to spots like the Moto and sift around. And I was just thinking, cause we went a year before the pandemic and I was just thinking how good the wing would have been over there.

Surf in the morning, there's always a breeze that comes up. So it would have been pretty unreal having the wing then make star.

Okay. And then can I ask you how old you are now? I'm 34 coming up. And then, so how did you get into business? Like how did that come up? Probably it's a long story. Went to uni. Didn't know what I wanted to do. Like probably most of us I just got an office job in Sydney and I thought this isn't me.

Went back to New Zealand, saved up, did a bit of building. And saved up and bought a plane ticket to the U S and ended up working for a company over in the U S for a little bit, just a surf retailer, and then met up with some shapers and stuff in San Clemente. And yeah, I guess worked over there for a year, came back here.

This was around the time of the boom. So I, yeah, just started learning to design and designing SOPs and yeah, I imported my first container. I think I was about 27 imported the first container to New Zealand. I think it was like 12, 2012, 2013. Those it's not even, yeah, it's the boom.

This was growing really fast at that time, man. You obviously pretty. Pretty deep into it. I was pretty young obviously and sold the first container in two weeks. And I thought, what is this crazy? This is too easy sort of thing. I I've got another one, and then I just, and then it just went from one thing to another and I really just love designing boards and yeah.

And now here we are quite a few products later. Things keep changing, which makes it interesting. So this is your website Pacific paddle company.com. And this is your shop that you so yeah, so that is the shop in Oakland. We've been here two years. I actually, I should have had a photo of my first shop was in it, it was in a paddock just with a couple of containers just when I started out.

But I sold this premises a few years ago and we just made the move and never looked back really. Nice. So that's in tech Poon in New Zealand and it's it's 15 minutes down the road from me, so pretty good location, pretty good lifestyle. And then I guess when did you start getting into foiling and selling foil gear and all that kind of stuff?

So I remember seeing foiling, I think it was like Kai and Connor and stuff. They were on the kind of rice boards cut in half and I just went that's ridiculous. I have to try that. So I think it was the first batch of foils that came to New Zealand. I think it was go for at the time. So I, I got my hands on one of those and yeah, I was just thinking how hard it was.

I think it was a little, it was a little wing and I was just thinking I got dad to actually tell me behind the GSC. Cause I went straight out in the surf. Actually, I thought I can do this. And I just got rolled. So I got dead to, we hired a jet ski learned behind the ski and it was, yeah. And then from there on out, I dunno, just things have just been developing so fast.

And now just the amount of different folds that I've tried. I'm sure you're the same. It's just being crazy, like development from where they began. I think it's so much easier now for anyone to pick it up. It was pretty hard back then. Small board, small wing, small everything, and yeah. Yeah. It's yeah.

I'm looking at your Instagram page here. It looks like you're deep into wing link. That's like your main thing, huh? Yeah. It's it probably needs to be, I probably need to maybe get some stand-up pedal action bag in there, but I dunno, it's just been. Yeah, it's just been so easy to, to wing lately, just with I dunno, it's just looking for waves as I still love surfing.

Still love it, but winging is just so much easier. So I'm just enjoying the fact that you can just drive down the road two minutes from the shop and jump in the water and have a good to ask question. I'm sure you relate to being busy, having a shop and a brand. I was going to ask you cause you're probably one of the only guys that I know actually, who has the shop and the brand.

So you it's a funny scenario sometimes to kind of way to cap or you think. Yeah, we're definitely similar in that respect. I've been in business since 1993, so it's been, like almost 30 years soon. And I learned over the years to delegate, try to delegate as much as they can.

And definitely the shop is run runs more or less without me being there all the time. So I'm fortunate that way to be able to take care of that kind of the backend stuff. And then do you try to get in the water and so on? But your feet, like before you got into Wingfoot and you were definitely into more to stand up paddling and stand up surfing and all that.

Yeah, a hundred percent. Yeah. Yeah. And like looking at your store sales, like how does foiling compared to standard palling? I know for us, like during the whole pandemic standard paddling has been super popular and, people just getting in the water, especially entry level boards and equipment has been selling really well for us.

How has it been? I think to be honest, it's been refreshing just with the whole foil thing taking off and new Zealand's quite a small market, so set pedal got pretty, pretty saturated pretty quickly here. Like everyone has this standup paddleboards may, maybe I'm not focusing on it that much anymore, but it just the largest sort of chains they bought in huge volumes of stand-up paddleboards and.

I just I just love the fact, I think I've jumped on foiling because it's pretty hard to replicate. It's quite Dean Nicole, and it's kinda, I love that kind of specialized, part of it. And I feel like it's not going to get saturated too quickly, stand-up pedal did, but I'm definitely going to push stand up.

I went for one the other day. Actually, there wasn't any wind, so it was, there were waves. So it was actually refreshing to get on a wave. You can't I dunno, you can't compare that feeling to winging, but yeah, it definitely looks, yeah, I was pretty sucked dominated wasn't I back in the, yeah same as I was in our shop, and we're still, for our shop, we still are, so it's a majority of our sales are still Santa paddle.

Boards and, I still stand up paddle eye and I just go into racing and that kind of stuff. We have a training group that meets every Wednesday and so on. Still doing that, but it's definitely like my, when I have time to go in the water, I usually try to go on a windy day so I can go a wink.

Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. You're going to go back up to the top here. Yeah, and I started standup foiling, but then once I got on a wing for a boy, just being able to be on the foil the whole time that to me made was so cool. Just to be able to be up on the foil for your whole session, pretty much not have to paddle it back out again, so that's definitely a draw, a wink flailing.

Yeah. Yeah. And not have to use the jet ski so much. I think about it like. Everybody's got their own jet ski, holding onto the wing. You're just getting towed back out to the lineup. It's crazy. Yeah. And no pollution, no noise. Yeah. Yeah. It's so good. I guess recently you had the America's cup in New Zealand and and I guess, tell us a little bit about that you had this posted this video of you guys foiling in between the races.

Yeah, it's been honestly pretty crazy with all the America's cup stuff going on lately. I think we're pretty lucky to have all the best sailors in the world in one location, for the last year, two years it was, it's just been crazy. This, yeah. Okay. This year was a bit of a mission.

So earlier in the, in this story, I meet the helicopter pilots. They came into the shop and they want some wind gifts or, yeah, like everybody's into this thing. So even the pilots filming this, filming these races yeah, we want to win. They came in the shop and then I just said, Oh, we might be out there.

Cause there were a bunch of us. I grabbed Josh from the shop and an Olympic say it was snowy. And we just went out to the course and I just said, look, there's going to be a chance we're going to be out there. We might be near the course, if you want to do a sneaky little fly by maybe in between races.

I just had my fingers crossed. They saw us, but they saw us and it was crazy. It's actually about five knots of wind here. I, so it was hard to get on the foil. It looks as though it's like windier than it is, but it's pretty light. So we all got up on the fall, luckily and heard the sound of the choppers come over.

We couldn't really believe it that they were going to film us in between the race, but I guess it's cool because it was on the live YouTube feed. We get this kind of, it's pretty sweet getting this around the world. So yeah, they came over and like they were filming us super close. Like I've there was one pass.

The chopper came over and I the wash from the blades, just seeing the wing and fly into my face and I just got nailed, but it was awesome. So we were, that was like an awesome memory. We got back to the boat ramp at an hour after dark and cause everybody's gotta go five knots back after the races.

So there's all these sort of boats. It's crazy. Just the most amount of boats you can imagine just going five knots the whole way back to Auckland the city. So now that was that was it was a cool day. Yeah. Yeah there's, those sailboats are just amazing. And I guess they're really driving the technology of the whole foiling technology and computer science and all that kind of stuff for it.

It's really amazing stuff that they're doing and the amount of money they're spending on it too. Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah, I was talking to the American magic guys. A couple of them. I shouldn't say this. I think they spend up to about, I think 150 million and, they do a couple of races and are out and it's pretty brutal.

So I got pretty as I was gutted at the time for them. Cause I got to know them pretty well, quite a few of the silence for American magic and yeah, it was just outside of the house actually when I put the hall through the boat. So yeah, it just goes to show the gear is.

Really pushing the limit and that, that close to breaking everything. Yeah. It's crazy. Yeah. Pull that was pulled goodness. And so he's the tremor for American magic. So he stands beside Dean Barker. Who's this, who's the helmsmen. And he's been like, as soon as they're out of the cup he's been like winging every day.

I think he just takes me just then he came for a win. So it will be all these guys are temporarily unemployed, so they, it's pretty, pretty cool to see. When he like every single opportunity. That's awesome. Yeah. So a little backstory. Like we met and stayed in touch, and then you had emailed me like that you're coming out with your own wings and if I wanted to try one, so I said, sure.

Send me a sample to test. And then I got it and I was really impressed. It's the, it was my favorite wing. I've tried so far and I've tried a lot of different wings just as really nice handling and smooth power and has that lofty feel, and is this a great wing? So congratulations on that.

And I've seen a bunch of footage of myself. Using the way the PPC Wayne, this is my friend, Jeff doing a one-handed jump, but a lot of this is shot with a GoPro max. That's mounted on a pole on my back. But yeah, so I just wanted to ask you a little bit about the, the whole process of making your own wing design and, the how you, the whole process of doing that, and how he came up with that design.

Yeah. Again, long it's a bef the wings came out and it was, I think it was yeah. 2000. Where are we now? 2000. So it was 2009 into 2019. When the first bunch of wings came out on the market. Something like that one, two years ago, right? Yeah. Yeah. We, I, yeah, so I made sure I got pretty much when they first came in and so I had a good amount of time using quite a few different brands and stuff and figuring out like, pretty quickly, like what I like.

And didn't like, I it was funny when I first grabbed a wing, I was like, sweet. I just grabbed my stop, a little foldable, which is 80 liters and went down to the light near the shop and I just got owned and everyone laughed at me. So I went back off and got like 140 liter board and then I got it.

But I've only got a little bit of exciting background. Like I said, optimist when I was a kid. So I don't have a huge sales background. So mainly just surf or board. So I got it, but I was pretty surprised at how quickly, like I progressed. And then understood quickly, like what a win should be or how it needs to feel to be an all round or kind of what you want.

So I kinda, they locked down happened. So then it forced us. We were, I was living at manga magnify at the time, which is an hour North of here. It's kinda this cool little area with thousand people and it's got an inlet and a bar and it's really good place to taste and stuff.

Luckily I had the jet ski as well I just started going for it really with with getting wings made and getting them seen and tasted them. I think we did about 29. 30 prototypes. Can you go a little bit into the the different variables that you tested in the prototypes and what made you yeah.

And what the final design was based on? Yeah I S I worked alongside a top seller maker and like we, so we started with a frame, we had something to begin with. And then from there, the main, there are so many different things that we played around with, but the span the leading edge diameter, that was actually probably one of the trickiest to get, right.

We went, too small, two 32 with the Strat and the leading edge. The leech tension was like a huge one. And I was lucky enough to actually talk to some top sellers here and they used the wing and checked it out. And, we we've had some pretty top people looking at the wings through the prototyping process.

Which is pretty unique. So yeah, just to get like the F the first wings were flappy and they weren't that good. So that through Twitter, I'm making these fine adjustments. We even got a pretty good wing around like 15 or something. And then we just tweaked a few things handle positioning was probably one of the hottest, just going back and forth.

Just to get these things balanced. Cause yeah I just found that so many wings were kinda, too far at the back or too far the front or something. And I don't know, I just this pure kind of middle kind of feel that you can just power on with you backhand. So that's the goal and it was amazing.

It's millimeters with handles. Like we'd go a millimeter too far back, and then we'd have to go, a little bit through the forward and just get them right. But yeah we got there in the end and just, we were able to kind of video from the jet ski and just, see the thing flexing in the air if there was too much flakes or, we got to a point where we got pretty happy.

It was pretty rigid. It was, on 90 kg and it was yeah. I feel like it's the combination with between, li like the white the balance and the path, without being too bulky, it is nothing worse to me than a bulky one. It's hard to use. And yeah. What was the dishes disadvantage of going with a thicker leading edge?

Cause I find It's the Wayne where it's great, but the tips are pretty flexible actually, right? It's not that it doesn't feel super rigid. The structure of the tips of the wing anyway, when you go to yeah. When you go too thick, every time we went to too thick and the leading edge, it just lighter stuff.

It's okay when you go when, but as soon as the wind just, decreases a little bit, it just doesn't fly quiet ride. It just, it's just a little bit too bulky and slow, and it's amazing how much the thickness adds to weight. That's what we were figuring out. It's yeah. So it's such a fine line between getting it right.

I think as thin as you can go by, but while keeping the frame as rigid as you can. And in saying that it sounds really simple, but it was different. The wing was definitely the hardest thing I've ever had to be involved with, designing and prototyping and made boards that people really easy.

The thing I really like about the wing is how nice it flies in neutral, when you're on a wave and you're just holding it next to you behind her, just flutters and sits there really like it's very well behaved. It's like a well-behaved dog on a leash versus the other wings. You always have to control them, the other wings are, they don't just sit there in neutral as well.

Yeah. So what, how did you have it, was that part of the prototype process too, or? Yeah, a hundred percent. Cause that's a big thing for me. I love surfing. So when I'm on a wave, when I'm winging it, I definitely want to be as unmindful or whatever the word is of the wing as possible.

Just to forget about it when you're riding. So I thought, yeah, with the design, without saying too much, it was definitely the Strat, which played a big part in that. And just bringing it a a little bit lower bringing it down a little bit compared to the leading edge which definitely helps Stabilize it my, my dad's a pilot, so I've got a little bit of flying background.

I've got I nearly got my PPO, but I've got to do a few more hours, but I do have a bit of knowledge with flying. Actually the coolest experience I've ever had was definitely been in a glider. And like I noticed is it two to one for a fringe trench wing? I think he's, I don't know how to pronounce his name, but I can see, he glides he skis and does all this stuff and he puts it all together.

You can see that he just puts it all together and it's pretty cool. Yeah. I recently just watch a video of him doing some amazing stuff on the waves, right? Yeah. He's pretty bad. Yeah. Yeah. That's my goal for sure. So just point breaks, wives the place that, you were in a power in a way with with the oven that that's a pretty cool spot for the wing when the winter.

Yeah. Yeah. I didn't have my stuff on my gear over there when we were there for the standard paddle race. But but yeah and I decided to say thanks to Dan Regan who invited me over there and he's our distributor and a distributor in New Zealand. And he's really, he really got into Wingfoot link two years where he was more of a standup paddler and then he got into stand up foiling and now he's heavily into winging.

And I think he said that you got one of your wings too, right recently. Yeah, he did. He's loving it. So I saw him last week, caught up with him for a quick coffee. He's good to have around. He's a bit of a froth, so he's yeah he grabbed it and loves it. So that's good. We're yeah we're getting a few wings out for sure.

And New Zealand, so yeah, it sounds like you've been selling out every time you get them in. Like how many have you sold so far of the, I think we might've sell it about 250, maybe in New Zealand. Mostly it's just in New Zealand. That's just New Zealand. Yeah. So that's, it's not too bad.

Because New Zealand only has what like 7 million population. Yeah. Five I think. Oh, 5 million. We have a lot of sheep, so yeah. No, I think it's about five, just over five. So yeah, it goes to show the amount of people that write, who are into watersports here. Yeah. It's pretty cool. But yeah, it's pretty satisfying seeing the wings out there flying well and getting really good feedback.

And yeah, one of the big things for me is just listening to customers and just getting really, and just listening to them with feedback. And, some of them might say some crazy stuff, but some of them, a lot of your customers say pretty stuff that you should listen to. So that's been definitely one of my designing definitely got always listened to the customer.

Yeah. So what about your board? We've got your boards in the store from Dan, which is cool. So we're starting to sell a few of those people are loving them. Yeah. That's awesome. Good. Glad to hear that. Yeah. Thanks for carrying our boards. Appreciate that. And then, yeah, I was going to say then this drawn footage I'm using the four eight, and then in the other footage, I was using the three eight analysis of a five eight.

So you have basically one F one meter increments. Two eight three eight four eight five eight, right? Yeah. Yeah. I know a lot of companies use percentage increments, but I wanted to keep it pretty simple. And we tried that with prototyping and we tried percentage increments, but it just worked out that 2.8, 3.8, 4.8 and 5.8.

Worked really well for the size and for the wind range that, that designed for, yeah. I was surprised that duo is going with past meter increments. Yeah, they're doing like four or 4.5, five and 5.5 and so on. And but I don't know anybody that's going to buy every single size in that range.

So it's like people want to only buy a one wing actually. Yeah, they do. I'm trying Convince people they need to for the whole wind range. And yeah, one of my things when designing the wing was definitely to design, like the 3.8 to me has quite a big wind ranch, like depending on what foil you're going to use, I can use a 3.8 and like 10 knots up to 25, which is pretty cool.

And that's what a lot of customers are saying as well that out the wind range without wings is really good for the size. So I noticed quite a few bigger wings on the bucket didn't really have the path that they should have had for the size. And that was my key thing. So making them as small as possible for as powerful as you could possibly give them.

But I think there's a long way to go. I think we're only scratching the surface. Yeah. I definitely agree with that. I think there's. It's definitely a lot of opportunity for improvements. Yeah, especially I think the wings and the foils too are, and just seems like the foils keep getting better too.

Actually I w so what kind of food, what's your favorite foil to use right now? What brand and what foil wings do you like to use? Ooh, putting me under the pressure here. Cause I, I know the guys at Armstrong pretty well. AMI and vivid and stuff. I'm loving the Armstrong stuff. Yesterday I went fishing with Adrian Roper who does exits, so I'm using a bit of that.

And I've been using a little bit of Moses as well, but I'm kinda coming back to Armstrong a lot for winging, just cause the white and jumping and it feels pretty good on it, my fate, but it's funny these questions cause you know, by having a shop, I've got a, I've got have the sh the shop cap on, and yeah, like the wing is probably like half the weight of an access foil with aluminum.

Yeah. Access has that way. It's sometimes it's not a disadvantage of, it makes it feel more solid somehow and more rigid and a lot of people loving it. Yeah. And the access, on the Armstrong foils, which what's your favorite wing T wings to use? I kind of chop and change between, I don't really ride anything over the 15, 15 hour, if it's super light maybe the 1850, but it's between the eight 50 and the 1250.

I and depending on what board I'm on. So if I'm on a little board and it's windy I've got a 33 liter little four O so I'll probably use the eight 50. And then if it's a little lighter, I'll probably use like a 60 liter board with the 1250 or 1550. It's 1250 as a lot of Lyft, actually. That's a really good fishing foil.

It's pretty, it's got a big window in Arik and it's a good one. Like for point breaks and stuff you can pump through sections and yeah. I'm just loving love. It's cool. Being able to, it's cool. Actually not having my own foil and being able to try all these different foils right now.

I know you've got your own foil, but you use anything, right? Yeah. I've been trying everything and I mean our Carver foils are the ones that we are on. Those are more, a little bit more entry-level are they really easy to use and forgiving and stuff, but they're not super, they're not the most high speed and most high-performance ones.

Yeah. So I've been playing around with a lot of different foils while at the moment. Like I recently just started using the axis eight, 10. Have you tried that one? It's yeah, that's a really nice one. I really liked that one a lot. Before that I was using mostly the seven 60, which is also one of my favorites.

It's a really good seven 60. And if it's really like the eight 62. But yeah, those are and then on the Armstrong, 1250, or even a 10 50, it's pretty fun doing in waves.

Yeah. It's very current. Yeah. Talk a little bit about boards. You just emailed me a picture of second late latest prototype. Yeah, let me, so they talked a little bit about board design and what you like to use and stuff like that. Yeah. So we've, we were lucky enough to have a shape next to the shop.

And it's been really cool with prototyping and just get the made so I can see the blank and get them done pretty quick and take them out on the water pretty fast. But yeah, so I'm gonna bringing out a new model, which is slightly wider. I just feel like, yeah, my, this model is, it was pretty good.

The only thing, it probably lacked a little bit of stability, maybe, for the bigger, slightly bigger new people for the board linked. So I kinda, it's probably what you're doing, I'm just trying to get as much volume as possible and keep a swing right down. Trying to keep a pretty parallel line and a kind of a square towel after this board had a port entail.

And I kinda, I, I realized, that it's okay for some people, but, you want to make it easy as possible, right. For people to grow, to grow the sport or whatever. So yeah. These are wider than a Dick concave, which is proving to be pretty cool. Yeah. And a, yeah, you have two stringers in there.

Yeah. Two cabin stringers that go right through and right through to the front of board through the track to the back. And yeah, I'm going to do a arrange of bullets made in New Zealand, which is a different thing for me. I've always got most things made off shore. So I think that after the pandemic is being a support local kind of thing.

So yeah, I'm going to, there'll be a ranch here made in New Zealand, so it's cool. Yeah, that is cool. Yeah. And the bottom shape, like what kind of contours do you have on the bottom of the board? So pretty smooth, kinda, it's just a double kind of double barrel kind of concave that actually runs through the whole board now.

I've smooth it out a little bit, not so drastic. And then the board's got the same amount of nose Carrick and a little bit of tau kick. I find quite handy getting up on the foil when you're whinging, but yeah, it's, the bottom is like our first model, but just, it just continues.

The concaves just continue straight through straight out in the back. Just getting the motor would have flow through the board or whatever. But yeah, it seems to be working pretty well. It's probably it's took it out the other day. I had a few people using it and yeah, people, so the size that it's pretty stable.

Yeah. On the wings, the biggest, you touched on it a little bit, like the biggest size you make right now is 5.8. Is that correct? Or do you make a bigger one?

Yeah, I was going to say personally, I find that like, when you go too big on the wing, it like, cause it also increases the wing span and it's it tends to touch easier on the water. And you end up not getting. That much more power by adding more surface area. It seems is that kind of what you're thinking?

Like I know some companies make seven meters even bigger than that wings, but I've never, I've tried, but I've never had the desire to buy one that big, because it seemed like at that point I'd just rather not go winging and do something else. Yeah. I totally agree.

My thoughts. Exactly. I think there's even like a nine out there maybe, but yeah. I a hundred percent agree. I feel like when you're holding something that cumbersome, it yeah. I don't know. It's odd to handle it. Just go towing, go surfing, go fishing. No, I, yeah I don't know. I'm considering doing something around six.

But on the only, only considering, but I'd rather play around with new materials and see if we can get the same amount of grunt and just reduce the weight a little bit before we just start going bigger to get more efficiency. Cause I think that possibly maybe with a material change in the design change, we don't have to go bigger to get more pal.

Yeah. Interesting. You talking about materials? I just talked to Todd from ocean rodeo yesterday and about there, they're coming out with the Lula fabric frame, leading edge and and this which is like a super light material, and still very strong that lighter weight. So is that what you're talking about?

New materials is, are you considering those. Yeah, I had it. Yeah. I had to look, I knew someone was going to come out with that about a year ago or two years ago. I looked at that material, but wise just, wasn't it doable with production, but it's different. It's pretty cool that someone's doing it.

I think I've got a couple of things going on right now in New Zealand, but I'll keep you in the loop with, but yeah, I the pricing is crazy. It's like twice as much as a regular wing house in terms of, yeah, like right now, I think like recreation wise I'm really happy actually with what we have and everybody getting into it, you can almost, yeah.

When you change materials and you make them super, super efficient, you're kinda dealing with a pretty small market. I think we're going to go there when we start racing if we do. But my things in the surf and in the waves, but I guess with every sport we're probably gonna, it's probably gonna go rice, isn't it?

With wing on my thoughts and then I think we will see some pretty drastic material changes. Like you do, with the Moss, the four-lane Moss, the sails are carbon cloth, like super, super thin been through a few international Semite, Sal makers factories here in Oakland.

And I've seen some pretty cool stuff being produced, but again, it's, cost-wise, I don't think people are going to pay 3000 or 2000 us for. Oh, they might, for always want to have the best, so if something is clearly clear, then I think people will buy it, but it has to be significantly better it's for them to spend that much money, I think.

But yeah, I was going to talk about the handles real quick too. I find myself on a 3.8 and 4.8 using mostly the widest grip, the front handle and the back handle. And then on the five eight, I use like the middle handle in the back. Is that the same, like you do or is that how you design them or, yeah, I go to the Y I go to the widest group as possible and least it's if it's absolutely nuking, I'll probably use a smaller wing anyway.

So I think with every wing I used the widest possible, but I've got a pretty wide span. I actually went a little bit narrower. But do you find the, have you used the widest the front and the back and the 5.9, do you think that's a little bit too wide? Is it is it both ways? And sometimes when I if I want to jump out, grab the back handle, but for regular riding, I find that on the five, eight, the second to last handle in the back work better for me, for some reason.

I dunno. Yeah. And I think it's just going to change with everybody's spans and whites and styles and, sorry. You think it needs more handles? I noticed some manufacturers. I came from the, I came from the duotone wings w whichever, boom. And then, yeah. Yeah. And for so it took me a while to get used to the handles, to be honest when attacking and stuff like that.

I would miss the handle though. I'd have to look where to grab and, but, over time you're going to get used to it. And now I can actually pretty much find the handle without looking for it most of the time, but having the rigid handle definitely has an advantage. And then I dunno, I think that's something that could be improved so on the wings is like the handles.

I think having the center inflatable center strap really helps with keeping the wing on the water, floating. And then also when you're flying on the wave, it's a neutral, it keeps it flying straight, it doesn't take talk back and forth, like the, without the center strata tends to do that wandering thing, instead of slacking.

And. But yeah, and that's what when I did the interview with Alan cadets, he mentioned that to the new duotone slick wing, cause it has an inflatable center strategy. It's more at handles nicer because of that. But yeah, I think that's something, I think I just had to get used to the handles too, but it took me a little while to figure that out.

Cause the nice advantage of having the stiff boom is that you can just slide your hand back and forth and you can just grab it anywhere. And then bringing it out. The water is easy to grab underneath the wing and describe the handle. So it took me a little while, but now that I'm used to the handle, I think it just as this is good and it definitely feels a lot lighter without the boom.

I tried to make the handles like as rigid as possible. So it had a Bloomfield. Cause a lot of people in New Zealand and obviously in Maui and everywhere and Hawaiian wind surfers who are quite boom orientated, but there's been a few people hardcore boom guys that have used outwin who've just gone.

Yeah, no, this is cool. We can deal with an inflatable Strat now. And so that's cool. So you sold about 250, there's a New Zealand. I find that amazing. Is that like when you go out on the water or like more than half of the people on your wings are like, yes. Yeah. I think like we we we are actually the only ones in New Zealand with a shop, whether on brand.

And I think that helps to be on it, and there is actually no one in New Zealand. These is Armstrong, but you know that they're more international. Yeah, I focus pretty heavily on the local market. It's pretty good for me and, but I just really wanted to have a good wing.

So my goal was never to just rush and put cause I had an opportunity to put a wing out straight away when the first ones arrived, but I just waited. I just really wanted to put a good wing out and yeah. So w we'll just update probably every year I've noticed a couple of other brands have updated quite a few, some are on like generation three or four or something now.

But I think I'm going to just every single year. Yeah. Have a different version and we're working on it now, but it's a long way off yet. And yeah,

right. Yeah. So anyone in the U S if you're interested in these wings, you can get them from us at blue planet surf. And I'm finding just to come out with, I told you I would make a video about the wings and I'm planning to still do that. Probably post that a little bit after this interview posts, but yeah, let's talk a little bit about just wing foiling in general, and then, some other random stuff, but can you talk a little bit about where you're at with your wing foiling and like what you're working on?

Do you have any new moves that you're working on or what are you into these days? It's hu it's tricky one. Yeah, I think for me now I've been going to the Lake a little bit to test product, but now I'm just every time that winds up, I'm looking for a surf spot. So it's and this is why I find winging really cool, because it's I I didn't mention that before, but it's bringing all these different kinds of sports together.

So you've got sailors and surfers and all these different kinds of sports coming together. And I'm noticing, the sailors, they love going fast. They love putting on a NHA wing and, or, smaller wing and going fast. It's not official, but my friend snowy, he's an Olympic style that he got like 30 knots here the other day, which is pretty fast, I think for winging.

And then for me yeah, it's definitely finding surf spots. So finding point breaks and. I like wave riding. And the wing is just the answer, you don't have to get the jet ski all fueled up and go. Although when there's no wind, I love toe foiling. But yeah, for me, what I'm working on right now, I guess just going bigger.

So bigger is like hitting the rents. You guys, it looks as though you got some pretty sweet conditions over your way. You'll so you definitely try to get in the waves too, but I find that sometimes, for winging or spoiling in general, you don't necessarily want to have the biggest steepest waves.

You just want a, more of a mellow not too steep of a wave basically. Cause it's hard to control the foil and the faster steeper wave, unless you have, if you're tall, you, then you can use a tiny foil. So it's a little different. Yep, exactly. I reckon you need it's you need a really good combination of waves and wind.

If you're going to drop your foil size. Especially if you're out somewhere on a point break and the tide's going out, like you you don't want to be stranded out there. And so I'm going, there's no one board that I'm using at the moment. So if I'm playing on a point break, I'm gonna use a board with a bit more volume because at least it's like really nuking.

I don't really want to get stuck out there with nothing. And Paula noise is pretty shocky. Is that Paul? I knew he, like, when I was there, the wind was like straight off shore. Is it, is that the normal conditions there? Or they getting like Southeast, which comes right out the beach, which is pure crusher.

So it's yeah. So it's perfect. It just comes straight up and hits the point. So you're just like round and round. And I dunno, I think even goes out for seven hours. He gets in trouble with the wife. That's such a beautiful place. Yeah. Yeah. What are you working on? I w all kinds of stuff that I like one that I've been trying to pull off.

This is my friend Daniel trying to do backflips. There's a couple of of he's starting to do that, and I'm thinking about it, but I haven't really throw myself backwards yet, but I have been trying to do the spins, into the wind, like turning the board through the wind, and then it's weird, cause I landed a couple of them.

By the first time I tried them. My first session, I tried it, I landed a couple. And then since then, like that was like three or four months ago. And I haven't been able to land a single one since. And I think it's all the way, getting the wing right on the landing, it's tough.

Same thing happened to me. Yeah. It's almost I don't know what, cause I, I used to be able to do threes and rodeos and back flips and front flips on skis and the snow. And then I thought, but I dunno with the whole wind thing, when you get here it's definitely a lot of, and that's why all these wind surfer, these guys like balls and stuff, they just know exactly where to put the wing in the wind to help rotate you around, which is, yeah, I need to try it a lot more.

When I did a three, I keep the wing just facing one way and I passed the handles around it's I did it, but it's probably not the right way to do it, but it would have for me, that's us Dean is doing it too and stuff, but yeah, you did that way. If you do it that way, you just have to stick the landing perfectly.

Cause you don't have any power in the wing if, until you grab it again, and so when you teach beginners or you get people into winging, what are your, like your top tips to give to beginner wing feathers? I'm in the shop cause we teach people we've got a jet ski luckily, and we take people out and teach them how to foil first, before the wings so that they don't have to at the same time to do together, which I think is crazy.

I think you should do it. I, my opinion, I think you should learn to foil first and then grab a wing, play with it on the land, maybe jump on a skateboard or something, but get a feel for the wing and then combine them and put them together. But I'm always just saying, just go big, just go bigger than you think with everything.

So big with a board, big with a foil and and yeah just make it easy and go out when there's wind. So 15 knots all over. When you're putting it all together. Yeah, definitely. When you're starting out it's hard. It's you need more power to get it going, like bigger wing, bigger foil, more wind.

And then as you get better, it seems like you can go down in size with everything because once you figure out how to pump it up and get it going. Exactly. Yup. Yeah. Any other tips? And then there's the whole, cause there's a whole thing. Like I think there's a fear with people buying a board that's maybe too big and then they progress and need a smaller board.

At the shop in New Zealand, we're gonna, we're going to lease some bigger boards. So it's seven foot by 32 kind of barges. We're just going to lace them and just the people can learn without maybe buying a board straight away. Then I'm going to buy it back and resell it again or something.

Yeah. Yeah, that's kinda, it's probably not like the greatest business side, profit idea, but I think it will grow the sport, what we need to do. I think. Yeah. I think you're right. The, it definitely, the, it's definitely much easier to learn on a bigger board. These, this board I'm using as a wing, the wing master for four six, and like it's no, no good to learn on.

It's just too small and too to, get on your knees and it's tippy and hard to use. And, but once you get the basics down, then that's kinda what you can use, so you all grow a big board pretty quickly. And I usually tell people, try to get a used one or borrow one from a friend or something like that instead of spending, and don't spend a lot of money on a really big board anyways, because you're going to offer exactly.

Yep. And yeah it's not most affordable sport in the world, but yeah it's quite a bit of gear. It's what quite a few people maybe put off with the gear or whatever, but I think that's definitely going to become more affordable and a lot of different options.

This set up here is actually one of the first times I used the PPC wing. I think I was the second day I use it and right away I felt really comfortable on it. Oh really? I brought it right away. Pretty balanced and yeah, no, that's a great way. It is. It did a good job on that. Okay. Let's talk a little bit about just life in general.

In terms of what else are you interested in? And do you have any hobbies or cross training or other sports or interests. Yeah, I'm actually looking forward to taking the wing to the mountains and I'm like jumping off some cliffs. I've seen some cool footage with Kai and stuff lately.

So that's been pretty sweet and yeah, we just saw I'm really pumped on like winter coming, which is weird. Cause yeah. So I'll definitely be taking the wings to the mountain. Where do you go? I guess on the South Island you go where do you go and which model? Hopefully down South, I've got some friends in Wanaka and Queenstown.

And so we'll stay down there. Actually. That's another thing, a lot of people are just winging on the lakes down here. I'm like, it's perfect in the summer they get heaps of wind. So a lot of people are yeah. Loving it down there at the moment. So yeah, there's that. And then I play a bit of golf.

And then I like fishing, cause it takes my mind off. Boiling. Cause I do it for, a job like you. I dunno. How do you get away from it all? A good question. I just try to do stuff that's meditative and not yeah. Where you can clear your mind, and I love to go hiking actually.

Like I was a score on solo hikes, try to go where no one else is around and just get out in nature and immerse myself and not listen to anything and just try to be almost empty, just clear the mind, basically not think about stuff too much. Yeah. Finding golf balls the other day golf course.

Yeah. I really got into golfing. I figured that's something I can do when I get old

for me. Yeah. It really takes my mind off things.

You have to focus. Yeah. I You have to focus on what you're doing. Yeah. That's quite frustrating. Like a daily routine. Like when you get up in the morning, first thing, there's certain things you just do it as a routine. I usually just get up and have a. Have a call. I have a coffee with my family four year old Tanika and and I'll check the wind straight away.

So like I never used to check wind charts, but everyday it's just chicken, the wind shot straight away. It used to be a swell chart that kind of chatting. So I'm checking that. And then and then it's kinda, no, I don't think I'm a UAE with a shop, so I've just got to be a little bit involved there.

And so what's yeah. So what's your typical day? Like a day in your life or what's it like? Typical day, get up, check the wind. If there's wind I'll definitely win. Cause I've got staff, I've got Denise in the shop she's really organized and I'm pretty lucky there.

I'll try and hit out of the water. If I can't hit out of the water I'll come into the shop and I'll pretty much figure out what I need to do to work on the wings. So the boards, or I'll go next door and have a look at some blanks and pretty much, and then just deal with a bit of production emails, how it is that affects tree stuff.

Just make sure everything it was running smoothly. Really. There's no day where, every day different, which I love and if I can get out, and that's why I love winging so much lately, because with when it was busy through the summer, I could at least get out on the water for an hour and just recharge with the wing and to get back to the office a little bit.

And then, yeah, I'm pretty I'm pretty cruisy guy. Get back, watch him, watch a movie with a family. Pretty chilly. You have a four year old, this is a Boyer girl. Izzy girl. And I can't wait to take her and get her into this, so I think she's ready to get on the foil board with me.

Nice. Yeah. That's, it's cool too. That seems like the younger generation is really interested in it too. This sport just has such a broad appeal, which is which I find cool. It's not just us older guys, yeah, exactly. That's what I think a lot about lately with wings and stuff and boards just, yeah.

Designing them for kids actually. And just I go, I went around quite a few of the yacht clubs here and a lot of New Zealand has a pretty good reputation for the sailors. I think in a lot of the clubs were looking at winging as a form to teach the kids how foil works.

With the latest America's cup stuff, it's how many kids would just fall on it. So I think, yeah it's actually an affordable way. How to figure out how foil works. The wings sit up. I was going to ask you, when you when you're wing feeling, do you switch your stance or do you keep it like in place?

Like I do I keep it in place? Yeah. I'm a surfer. Yeah. If people are people have somebody all the time about it, but I don't really care. I've learned twisting and point my back foot, you forward a little bit to open up my body and I can put pretty high now on my backside. Oh, check this out.

This is my friend Derek he's. He has like lines on his wing so he can hold it way up high. It's like almost a cross between winging and cutting, so it's like most of you. What about you guys switching your stance? Are you guys staying in the sear stance? My good friends are staying in the surf stance, and I think, especially when you're using really small boards, it's, that makes it hard to, to switch. But I think one, once you if you didn't learn to do it in the beginning on a bigger board, yeah. It's really hard to figure it out on a small board. It's just most simple.

Yeah, I did it at the I did it the other day and it just felt like I was learning for the first time. So maybe that's something I'll work on actually switching my stance because I know for a fact it's going to be bitter. If you're doing the GAAP, when reaches and stuff, you just point high a hundred percent.

Yeah. Oh, I just realized did I wasn't sharing my screen. Huh? I thought I was screen-sharing this whole time. Sorry. I thought that I just going along with it. Oh geez. Okay. I got to show this. I got to show this footage of Derrick. Again, so that just realize it didn't have my screen sharing on wait I to go back here, but Schutz.

Yeah, I've been playing video footage and was talking about it's full time, but

Derek Yamasaki, his name says this footage is pretty cool. It's got lines on the wing. It's like way up high. It's kinda cool because when it, when the wing is higher off the water, you get more power to, yeah. Cause it's a little bit windier up higher. Let's talk a little bit about the whole pandemic and all that.

How has it affected you? And I know New Zealand is one of the few places where that's been relatively unaffected by the pandemic. Normal life is pretty much, you guys are pretty much back to normal. Yeah. Yeah, I feel I was pretty lucky. Honestly, it's yeah, it would be, we've had it pretty good.

We've had a couple of lockdowns that we, business, the business had to be shot, which is it's pretty tough shutting up is, but, I looked at other countries it's way worse. So I actually, yeah we kinda, when the pandemic happened, we would go to level three and we can all just say can we wing?

And we'd, we'll just meet up down at the local wing spot and we could at least wing in kinda hit the water and go for walks and stuff. But yeah I feel like we're in our little bubble here. Yeah. Especially with the older America's cup stuff going on. It's yeah. I just feel pretty lucky that you guys have you guys been in a similar kind of.

I know, we've had several shutdowns and and a lot of people out of work cause there's no tourism and stuff like that. So it's been a lot of people pretty seriously, yeah. That, that definitely a lot of tourism sort of companies down in, especially Queenstown down South, relying on.

I think, some of these America's cup sailors staying in hotels and then a lot of the only ones at the moment. And I spoke, talking to the hotel managers saying that, you'd have to book a year in advance this time of the year. So it's certainly affected tourism. And but I think we're just fortunate enough to be in this industry.

And a lot of people just, they need it, they need to take their minds off things. Wing, foiling, surfing, and these sort of sports have been pretty busy like busier. And I think we've seen that. With supply demand issues in factories, things like that. But yeah. Yeah. And you had a hard time getting enough inventory of your boards and stuff like that.

We were having issues with that. We can't, we don't have enough boards and stuff. A hundred percent. Yeah. We were, we run out of bullets of return mounts even. I always have boards in production. I get some of my boards made in Vietnam and it doesn't matter where, so yeah. And fright has tripled or nearly quadrupled in price since three years ago.

So it's difficult, but I'm making it work.

So for people that are I know a lot of people during the pandemic, like being stuck at home, they feel lonely or, depressed or anxious and stuff like that. Like how, do you have any friends that go through that? And what would you tell people? Or do you have any advice on staying positive and living a good life?

Cause I, I listened to Rob your podcast the other day and I agree with him. Don't listen to the news too much, and just get out there because yeah I think the city didn't use a lot and just get in, I dunno, just, it can really create a lot of anxiety. I think if you just, the sky is still blue, it's, if you can get out there and just enjoy it and safety yeah, I I've just been watching a lot of Netflix.

That's the only thing, a lot of good Dockers on Netflix lately. Yeah. Yeah. I dunno. There's a lot of good stuff then you don't know the formula one stuff was crazy seeing those guys, the new season three and how they handled the pandemic and they still made it work, and there's a lot on the line, I think. Yeah. The first one was canceled in Melbourne, but the, they still had a season of formula one and it's just a line in that sport. So it was cool to see like things are still continuing, but I'm traveling. That's pretty cool. Oh yeah, just having the America's cup here was, ah, it was just amazing, meeting up, having good chats with Jimmy and paid and Dean and stuff.

Dean Barker. He's the helmsmen for. American magic. He's a Kiwi and he's he's learning to wing at the moment. So like he, yeah, he must be like, I don't know. I shouldn't say maybe 50, 50, 55, but there's, to me, there's like much of an age limit on whinging, which like, I love about it. It's huge.

Like I had an 88 year old come in the shop the other day wanting to win and I'm going to teach him. That's awesome. So I'll teach him on that big board and I'll do it safely, Chuck a helmet on him, but I think also, so that'd be cool. Yeah. Yeah. I was just thinking about what you're saying about the the news and stuff like that.

And I think on social media too, it's I guess they call it doom scrolling. It's once you start looking at those kind of Yeah, negative news and stuff. It just feeds you more, as like the more you look at it, the more it feeds you. And it just puts people in that state of it's like almost it's like poor design, I was like people that are already anxious, you get they just get more and more of that.

And it's it's terrible. Yeah. There are a lot. I like to ditch my phone every now and then. I, w when I'm fishing the other day, I thought about checking it on the water, but no, I just, I, yeah, like when I know, cause I lived in California for a good year and a half and I I know how it is over there.

There's a lot of stuff going on. It's kinda, it's not like New Zealand, so it's kinda, there's just a lot more noise. I feel like we're away from it a little bit here, but I can see in other countries how you can get pretty wound up in it. Even, yeah that's what you focused on too though, yeah.

It's like you said, it's you know what you know what you don't have to look at it. You don't have to look at your phone all the time. No, I, honestly, I think a wing has kept me pretty sane the last year. It's been like, I'm just stoked. It's kind long. Who would have thought we'd be holding onto this wind thing and having such a blast.

But it, I feel like it has actually say, be quite a bit like mentally, like to have this, to look forward to every single day. So it's been, yeah. It's yeah. It's going to be around for a long time. I think I don't think it's going anywhere. Yeah. A hundred percent agree. It's kept me saying to, for sure.

Yeah, no, don't okay. Your videos and look at your more motor and tropical, consistent winds and stuff and get pretty jealous. So as soon as we can travel on, yeah, we're fortunate. But it's not always like this either, this week, we're not gonna have any wind, probably no wing floating for about a week.

Sometimes people come here for a week and they think they're going to be winging every day, but it's not like that. Maybe 50% of the time. It's good, might come here for two weeks and not get any when you know, I'm, mommy is always windier. If you're coming, you want guaranteed wind.

Definitely Molly's by the place to go more than a wahoo. Yeah, I love Maui because she goes, islands is like a funnel. It funnels the wind between the Westmont mountains and Holly, I believe it when we were playing from a wahoo to Maui and there was no window Oahu when we took off.

And when we arrived in Valley, it was, did Palm trees were just like, it was like 30 knots. It was crazy capping everywhere. Yeah. It's pretty crazy like that for sure. I just, yeah the wing didn't exist then. So it was just downwinders. So you just pretty much started your business by yourself and grew it and did you have any help or partners or anything like that?

No. So I feel kinda, it's funny cause like a lot of these companies around me and I've got quite a few people involved, I look at pretty much every company around me, like Armstrong, they et cetera. I feel like a bit of a small fry cause it's just me, but yeah it's almost it's not too bad being small because then you can do shorter runs and make sure that, your product's still at the top of the game.

You can do it in a way where you don't have to have such a big sort of volume kind of machine. I dunno, it's hard to explain, but yeah, a lot of the other companies I'm looking at have 10, 20, 30 people we've just got a few it's just me and the factories and a couple of stuff in the shop.

Yeah. Yeah. Is there anyone you want to thank for their support or that's there for you and. Just my panic, probably just for putting out with me and family and stuff and, everyone that supports me in New Zealand at the shop. And yeah, I'm just going to keep developing keep the product improving.

That's my goal for the next few years, anyway, just to keep improving things. And right now you're doing mostly, most of your sales are just consumer directed. You're just dealing directly with the customers more than, yeah. It's directly with customers. And I think, yeah it's pretty unique to be able to just taste here in New Zealand.

I think we've got a pretty cool place for testing. Like at the time where I was testing the wing, there was no one around, so that was pretty cool. Just being able to do that with no one, like coming up to me on the beach and but a guy like that is cool. And when I'm an Oakland, like you come out from the car pocket where we wing it tech burner, you're going about like 10 to 20 people around you sometimes like asking you what is this new sport?

So it's pretty crazy. Yeah. Yeah. And I, for people here in Hawaii, like going traveling to New Zealand is really nice because it's only one hour time difference, really. So you don't really even get jet lag, you instantly adjust to the different time zone. And then, that's a different day, but the hours, it's only one hour difference the daylight.

And then you're in the opposite side of the planet. So it's your winters are summer and the other way around. So I guess it's nice for you guys to come to Hawaii in your winter when it's summer over here. The cuvees come here for that. Yeah. Definitely breaks up the winter. I feel like up North though, it's not too bad. I used to live down South freezing, you'll be winging with gloves on. And that's why I keep thinking about handles with gloves. Just making sure the gap's big enough, but for the colder parts of the world, it was the thing to keep it.

I didn't think of that in the United see, went to Russia and the guy's ah, I'm using my three millimeter gloves. That's feeling a little tight. So I thought, Oh, dammit, maybe I'm going to have to make a bigger bet for the handles. But yeah, I dunno, just seeing these wings around like different parts of the world, especially like Russia and stuff.

And it's crazy seeing, your own brand around the world w in Australia are I've got a guy over there, Jason, a wing man. He's doing pretty well. So people are loving the wings and ALS, so that's cool. Yeah, I think it's for me I kinda just love my life like right now. And I love my lifestyle and I think I don't want to grow super fast or get an investor on board.

I'm happy just doing what I'm doing right now. Yeah. Self-funded, that's all, I think always the best way and just better to grow slower, but keep the ownership and be able to do. That's my philosophy and I guess we're actually similar in a lot of ways that, I volunteer shop.

So a lot of direct. Yeah. Yeah. And you ship all around the us, right? Drop. Yeah. Yeah. We do a lot of air cargo shipping. It's actually pretty affordable. We actually have free shipping on our website because we can, just included in the price when we sell so boards online.

That's so cool. Yeah. So how about you? Do you ship to Australia too? Do you ship boards or mostly just your wings or everything, or, like it's a little bit harder, I think, for it to ship from New Zealand and yeah, it is, it's pretty expensive. So mostly the wing and that, that's a good thing about the wing it's been pretty affordable to to seeing around the world.

Boards are another thing. I think if someone wants to sell bulls of stuff, go to Phillip and China. It's I think it's crazy if writing boards. I, yeah, I used to if like prototypes, which yeah, I think it used to be like 1200 New Zealand or something just for one little board. So it's quite cool being able to prototype and just prototype in a New Zealand now with the boards that but yeah, I think, yeah, the wing is great.

It's so small. It just doesn't take up any storage as well. So I think. Yeah. Do you find that easy to totally it's easier than the board. You don't have to package it. It's already comes in a little box. Yeah. Unloading a container of SOPs is a big job or a few containers for you. I would say. Yeah, it is. I'm just looking at your background.

It looks kinda like one of those fake zoom backdrops, but you earlier, you showed me your backyard. Can you show us your little pool and stuff yet? It's a real background. It's not a fake background. Oh, is that right? Yeah.

Yeah. I heard Baltz molar. Talk about practicing backflips on the trampoline with the wing in the sense. Have you tried that? I should probably try that actually. I, cause I it'd be hard with that.

There's actually a big like trampoline place down the road. I might have to bring the wing there. It's like a big open one I take is either. Yeah, I should do that. But I'm like, cause I can front flip and back flip on skis. I I know the feeling. And I think it's going to be the same. I'm just too scared to try it to be honest, but I'm going to try it, the helmet on, but it's the same feeling because once you get over with skis on any way, the skis and boots, the weight just pulls you back around.

It actually feels pretty natural. Like when you get you just naturally just keep going around, you can spot it. So the wing between you and the lining and then the foil above you, it just seems stretchy. I haven't gotten around to trying yet. I think I'll leave it to the pros. Yeah. Yeah, I, that was interesting too, that Encore is, was saying he, he doesn't jump at all.

He just like focused. He's such a good winger. But all he does is stay, he stays on the water, which, I makes sense. When you get older, you don't want to get hurt and stuff like that. And yeah. And just I to enjoy jumping too much. But it's probably not the best thing to do for my body.

Same. And I'm actually surprised how it's actually not that jarring on your body. Like you can, it's quite cushiony, especially when, it would be probably more Jari, but it seems we can go pretty high without too much, jolt on the body, which, yeah, it's crazy, especially. Yeah, I wanna, I want to be able to jump on waves and jump back into the wave.

I think that's the next goal. Yeah. I Definitely having that wing and being able to hold it above you. Like a parachute just really helps with land softer landings, even more so exactly on a wind surfer. You can't really hold it in that position. When you come back down and you have to come down pretty hard usually, but on the wing, you can really come down pretty gently if you do it right.

But you can also come down pretty hard as she, if you don't have the wind in the right position or whatever, and that's all the best. All right off I find with when it is really windy, you're going to want to go for a small wing, but it's going to be tricky with is so late lately I've been taking bigger wings out, trying to take bigger wings out in stronger winds to seeing how big of a wing I can take, like in 29.

So I've been I've been using like I, it was 30, it was 30 knots the other day. And I was using a 3.8. And I should have been using the 2.8, but the 3.8 just, made is so much easier. And then it's so you can just spill a bit at you, yeah. Pretty easy to lose power just by spilling a bit out the back.

Yeah, that's true. That's the one nice thing too, that you can really de power pretty easily. And if you overpower, just put it over your head and let it Slutter you know, so yeah. All right. I think we went over everything I have on my list here. Do you have any last words, anything else you want to share or talk about?

No, I'm just really looking forward to coming over visiting and over your way. Look forward to having you visit Hawaii and I'll come back to New Zealand too. When they'll allow Americans back in, I just got my first shot of the vaccination and should get my second a week or so we haven't we bought it.

I think it's coming into a fixer in, but I think we've just got it rolling out. So hopefully that opens up the borders a little bit more. Yeah. Yeah. It's good to see how it's, how different it is distributed. And around the world, Israel is already like fully vaccinated. They're vaccinating kids now, and then other countries don't haven't even started the started yet. But a New Zealand, you pretty much got it under control there. You haven't had any cases for awhile, right? For awhile, we had one case the other day and like prime minute, it just goes full into lockdown straightaway.

We knew anything about it. That happens. I think it was, yeah, it was one we had a lockdown for one week and then it's, it's nothing now, so yeah. Do you think that's an overreaction or are you happy that your prime minister's on it like that? A lot of people think it's an overreaction now.

Honestly, but then you got to look at the other side, like what happens if there was a big outbreak, it would be a huge IVIG, what's one week of your life, just catch up on some other stuff and go for a walk or for your family. And, yeah, I dunno. So every time we've had a lockdown, it's just given me a time to actually catch up.

And work on designs. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah. I no, I'm with her on that one, so that's good. Yeah. It seems like new Zealanders are really supportive of the policies. It seems and it's nice that you can live your life normally the rest of the time, if there's no cases and you can just go about your normal business, right?

Yeah. Honestly, it seems pretty normal. And then you'd turn on the news and it's not, but it's like these I'm American magic guys, Nick diner and Paul Goodison and stuff. I know that traveling around the South Island right now, but they both told me like, they don't really want to go back home right now.

They don't, they're going back to Italy actually. So yeah, it's been, I didn't mention it's been crazy just having all the teams, Prada, American magic any OSS, all just coming into the shop and holding the wing and. Giving me a feedback on the wing and w talking about loft pockets and different materials.

That's been pretty unique. That's been pretty special. So I feel like, yeah. Going to be some interesting developments coming out soon. I think so. Yeah. No, that's super cool. Alrighty. Thanks so much. Oh, I was going to ask you earlier, you mentioned that you watched the the interview with Rob widow.

Did you watch did you watch it on YouTube or did he listen to the podcast or I just curious did you listen to any of the other shows and what are your takeaways or any tips and ideas for the show in the future? Oh yeah. And also who should I interview next? What is that like? It's funny.

Cause I I thought about doing what you're doing like a few months ago, but not going to do it, you're doing a great job. Like I've been watching him on YouTube, on TV, I've been watching them with me and Kate and like Annie and stuff. I really love the athlete. Interviews, but then again, like having guys like Robin, stuff's pretty cool.

And I actually watched that because I was hoping to learn a little bit about the new Armstrong system that we're selling in the shop. And for a lot of customers asking me a lot of questions at the moment on that, but it's pretty damn, it's pretty simple, it's just a, it's a product progression.

It's just couple of extras. Good. You own the old and yeah, so I've put the anxiety out for people who think they need to buy a whole new set up. Yeah. Maybe interviewing army Armstrong about that would be an interesting topic, huh? Yeah. I was thinking, yeah. Yeah. Have you reached down to AMI?

No ask one he's he's cool. He's he's a character for sure. Yeah. He's erupt, like it's always fun working with those guys because yeah. He's just one of those guys, he's the test pilot. Don't put them in front of a computer, but I dunno. I want to see, I want to see guys like John, maybe pick up this thing.

Cause I like watching the Villa on YouTube and I like way guys like John, and some other pro surfers that picked up foiling and they love it and they say, Oh, so I'm thinking John, if you're sailing and foiling, why aren't you whinging? Maybe he doesn't see almost something. I dunno, it'd be.

I want to see some of those guys pick it up. Yeah, it might be tricky to get them on the show, but I can try and then I, but I try to do it about wing foiling. So maybe, yeah, maybe I need to get them to start wing filings first and then I can interview them. Yeah, exactly. No Kelly, Slater's got a house actually near here, so he's just, he's building one or he helped me quite a lot up near megawatt when we're testing the wing.

So it'd be pretty fun to see him on a foil. Yeah, mostly. Yeah. But no, I dunno. It would maybe you've actually had pretty the athletes that I was gonna suggest and everybody's probably suggest any, but yeah, I'm trying, I'm re I reached out to his dad, so that's the only email I have, but I'll try to get him on the show for sure.

Working on it. One of the, one of the recent, maybe Paul Goodison or Dean Barker, one of what are the American magic guys, does it mean that you do it and I've got a different perspective so that I think that'd be quite cool to talk to you. Yeah, for sure. If you have his contact information, I'd love to maybe you can introduce me or something.

Yeah. I Interesting to learn about the foiling sailboats, yeah. And that's cool. It sounds like he's pretty hooked on winning right now, too. Yeah. Yeah. And it was crazy. Cause at the time enough to come out with them, they took me out on the chase boats and stuff. So I got, I looked at the, it was pretty close up and it's just crazy what they're doing.

And the limits that pushing. But I think at any single every speed, right? The foil has a maximum. No matter what it is for sure. Yeah. I That's one of those things too, about the speed of the foil. I was like, you were talking about the 30, what is it? 30 miles per hour.

That's super fast, but really the limit is set by the foil more than anything. I think the wing and the rider can go faster. It's just like at the, you start to overflow. But then if you have a thinner, smaller foil, you can go faster, but then can you still get it going?

And I know that's a question. Yeah. It was 30 knots that I was pulled snowy Hanson. He's an Olympic sailor here. So he understands how to hook up to the wind. And I'm like guys like that, they pick it up so fast. And yet the F he was actually using a kite foil. It was about 500 and it was quite a long fuse and it was a cut tail wing.

The racing caught car with a, and he got their top speed on the 4.8. And we would test him between the 5.8 and the 4.8. But he got the, you got the highest speed on the smaller wing, hooking up to it. So you could really hook into it. Yeah. So that was hooking into, was he using a harness or no?

No, he wasn't. He wasn't, he was just those guys. I dunno, just bring it right into the route of the board. It like creates this hit. I heard someone talking about that the other day, actually. And I tried it the other day, like bringing the wing into the rail of your board and you just create this like vacuum and you just keep it real fast.

It just goes so fast. Yeah. More power than the link. And it's like closing the gap. It makes, and we're just going to be seeing like so many cha progression with foil spin sooner, faster. Yeah, I'm thinking too, like the, the leading edge is pretty thick and that the thick bladders, you have to have it, like you were saying that you have to have that for the rigidity of the leading edge when it's inflated.

But it seems like there's if you've made it rigid and then you could have a much thinner leading edge and there would be less drag. If you're really trying to do top speed and racing, it makes sense to maybe work on something like that. Yeah. Having a thinner, leading edge, maybe.

Yeah, a hundred percent. It's no secret when you look at the America's cup boat or any yacht the leading edge of a master's is oval. It's not around. It's going to be aerodynamic. I think a circle is probably the most inefficient shape to go through the year or something so that, but when I, when we use these wings to me, like they're pretty efficient.

So at the moment, so it'd be crazy to see where they're going to go when they do start, the leading edge is thinner and a different shot. I think it's going to be pretty interesting. Yeah. In a way I'm almost wishing that it wouldn't get, go that direction. It's all everything's extreme.

Cause it's, to me it's just so much fun and like, why, do we really need and wind surfing, you have the speed boards, you have slalom racing boards, you have like foil boards, you have freestyle boards, you have wave boards and beginner boys. It's do we really need all that stuff and different sales for every sport and stuff like that just seems like too much.

Yeah. I agree. I agree. It's really fun right now. Their gear feels great. Yeah. Keep it simple. Keep it simple issue for the people picking it up. Yeah. A hundred percent agree with that. Yep. I think that's a good way to end the interview. Got the. Sirens going by, but yeah, I think thanks so much for joining me today.

And maybe we'll touch base again in a year or so when you have some new stuff coming on, more stuff to talk about, or when you here in Hawaii, maybe we can have a live interview

or maybe I'll. Yeah. Thanks for having me on. It's always good to keep in touch. Thanks Sam. Take care.

All right. Congratulations. You made it to the very end and don't leave yet. Cause I have a message just for you. So from YouTube analytics, I know that over half the people that click on the video link on YouTube leave within the first 30 seconds. And by the very end of the video, only about 5% of the people that clicked on the video are still watching.

So that means you are a part of the top 5%. So you're at the very tip of the pyramid. It's like you're at the top of the sport and influencer and you're the ones I'm making these videos for the 5% that's still watching now. So I'm not rushing these interviews. Obviously. I want to get as much information as I can, and I hope you feel the same way that these are super interesting to me.

I really enjoy these conversations and I hope you like them as much as I do. So we're the ones who set the directions of the sport of wing foiling. And I think we can all agree that we want to keep it safe and fun and inclusive for everybody. So that's my commitment to you, and I hope you agree that's what we want for the sport.

I really appreciate all the great comments on YouTube. I read them all. I try to respond to every comment. Feel free to leave your comments down below. Any questions are welcome to, it's always good to have. Some questions and ideas for new videos to come out with. And please give it a thumbs up if you enjoyed it.

That really helps our rankings on YouTube. If we get a lot of thumbs up, then more people will get to see the videos. I also want to give a shout out to all the super fans that always watch and comment. One of them is Joe skill. Who's a paraplegic and he's super into all these winged feeling videos, and he wants to learn how to win for land a sport wheelchair with a small wing.

So I think that's super cool, Joe. I hope you get to try that and let me know if there's anything I can do to support you people like you are awesome and inspire me to keep making these videos. I'm stoked at people like you, who comment all the time and you know who you are. There's a lot of other guys, David last quiz, and a lot of other people that always comment and give us the thumbs up.

So I appreciate that. I'm really excited about the next interview as well. I'm going to talk to candy wild from Molly, Katie, Molly on Instagram. He's a young athlete from Maui, super talented Waterman, and also a really a deep thinkers and listened to some of his interviews on the progression project, which is another really good podcast.

And just, he has so much in depth information about how the foils work and so on. So I'm really looking forward to learning from him and sharing that knowledge with you as well. So stay tuned for that show coming soon within the next two weeks. All right. Thanks for watching. I'll see you on the water Aloha.