Original subtitles

GARRETT MCNAMARA: My childhood was very unstable.

REPORTER: They say they are the followers of Jesus Christ, Lightning Amen.

MCNAMARA: We walked the earth the same way Jesus walked.

SPEAKER: They had no shoes. They ate out of trash cans.

MCNAMARA: That was the part that messes with me a lot.

♪ (DRAMATIC MUSIC PLAYS) ♪

SPEAKER 2: Our idea for the third year project

was to open the door to everybody.

SURFER: You're never on a safety zone in Nazare.

We just wanted to do it.

SURFER 2: You can't afford to be on every swell, see?

You just need to be on the right swells.

SPEAKER 3: We created the Red Chargers.

SPEAKER 4: The surfers that look for the red blobs on the map.

The whole goal is to put a face to these people on the waves.

MCNAMARA: And then everything just kind of went wrong.

SPEAKER 5: Oh, my god!

Oh...!

[TV static drones]

[bright tone]

[tense music]

♪ ♪

- [speaking Portuguese]

[soft music]

- Check out these monster 100-foot waves

off of Portugal.

- The biggest wave ever surfed,

as high as 100 feet.

- To put that in perspective,

that is taller than an eight-story building.

- Surfers are always looking for the next great thing.

- It often breaks those brave or crazy board riders.

- Severe wipeouts and waves of mind-boggling heights.

- What happens here happens nowhere else in the world.

- Biggest wave ever surfed. - The biggest wave ever--

- The 100-foot wave.

♪ ♪

[radio chatter]

[indistinct chatter]

♪ ♪

- A gnarly wipeout in Half Moon Bay.

McNamara falls off his surfboard

and hits the water three times.

- Yeah, I saw Garrett's wipeout.

Skip, skip, crunch.

- I went over the handlebars and hit the water super hard

and then I just started skipping like a stone.

[mimics hitting water]

- [mimics hitting water]

- And then the lip landed on me,

and then I was underwater forever

and it was, like, a normal pounding.

But underwater, I felt this crazy excruciating pain,

and I couldn't move my arm.

- Some are now calling this wipeout

one of the worst ever recorded.

- All right. - All right.

- He got to the hospital, and they were like,

"You shattered your shoulder."

And the humerus head was shattered like an eggshell.

- I found out he got hurt. I was kind of scared.

Yeah, I mean, I did whatever I could.

I started making calls.

I started calling people and seeing who could help.

- Garrett's brother Liam was a godsend.

He found a surgeon who would work on him.

The next morning, he came out of surgery.

He said, "Put my shoes on. We're out of here."

We flew back home.

A week after the first surgery, we go to see Dr. Weldon.

- And they both simultaneously said,

"The surgery went perfect,

and we're gonna--we're expected to have a full recovery."

I glance at the X-ray,

and I saw some disturbing images.

When the head is down

underneath the acromion,

it's a sign that

your axillary nerve

is not firing.

- And he says that Garrett needs another surgery

because the first one failed.

Garrett comes out of the surgery, and I'm there,

and he wakes up, but he can't feel anything

'cause they have a nerve blocker,

so they tell us the nerve blocker

should last 24 hours.

With one hour of him being out of the surgery,

all of a sudden, it was like that movie "Hostile,"

just like this bloody murder

like from the depths of his soul,

like, just screaming in pain.

He was like, "I don't feel anything.

"It's not working.

"I just want another nerve blocker,

I just want another nerve blocker."

He's asking me to get him a plastic bag

so that he can kill himself,

and if I don't get him the plastic bag,

he's gonna rip everything out, and go to the top

of the building, and jump off.

♪ ♪

This depression and pain

went on for months.

- [breathes deeply]

The doctor said that I should never surf again.

- You know, I just told him--I was like,

"We just can't even let that be a possibility,

"so don't even think about that,

not a reality, so don't even give it any energy."

- [whispering] Practice acceptance.

Defenselessness.

Conscious choices.

♪ ♪

I started doing all my physical therapy

and my stretches.

- It took a long while for him to get back in the water,

but we were back in Portugal pretty soon after.

♪ ♪

There was events he had to be at.

We still report to sponsors to feed our family.

- Um, reports from a reporter...

- We had various other meetings too.

- I was invited in here to get to know you guys

and your company and to kind of...

- Looking for new opportunities

and new projects

to keep the sponsors happy.

He was just miserable with this arm

and not being able to surf.

- Not 100%.

Doctors felt I need a third surgery,

but they don't know me too well.

- [laughs]

♪ ♪

[birds calling]

- I went back to Hawaii to Sunset.

I could ride waves, but I wasn't comfortable.

I wasn't ready for big ones.

I knew I was gonna be able to, but I was, back of my mind,

wondering if I was going to want

to go back out in big waves.

♪ ♪

- There he is right here. My hero.

Weldon.

[machine beeping]

Whoa, holy moly, look at that thing.

- Your bone has definitely healed.

You have healing--evidence of healing through here,

so very good, very good.

Congratulations on doing so well with your shoulder,

and it's remarkable,

and it's even possible given where--how far you've come

that you could get enough

so you can be similar to this side.

So when you--when I first saw you,

I mentioned that I had taken care of somebody

who had fallen off a cliff, and I treated his elbow,

no problem, but his brain was messed up.

He was in tears all the time,

and I had missed it, that he had PTSD.

- Definitely, I had PTSD,

definitely working through it right now.

I don't know until I get a really heavy pounding,

and I'll see if I enjoy it or not.

Thank you. - Yeah.

- Thank you, really appreciate everything.

- Congratulations. - Thank you.

- I look forward to seeing you back at Maverick.

♪ ♪

- He stayed in a little storage shed

that we turned into a bedroom for him.

We surfed a lot together.

We had a really good time together.

[cheers and applause]

- He decided to kick out through the lip,

but the next wave is right there.

[tense music]

[soft music]

That wave landed right on Koxa's head.

♪ ♪

- He was really struggling.

He didn't know if he'd ever surf big waves again.

- Ready?

♪ ♪

- 2017, there was a big swell.

You get those perfect moments when the second wave

of the set is smooth.

Look at that. Look at how clean that is.

It's perfectly smooth, it's groomed,

and there's a lot of room in between sets.

Let's do it. Cotty's frothing.

- Nazaré was huge. I didn't want to wait.

I just wanted to get out there,

and I was prepared to go all day.

You know, I knew that someone was gonna get, like,

one of the biggest waves of the year, you know, for sure.

I saw some sick fucking waves. - Really?

- Yeah, like, sick A-frames, like...

[exhales]

- You're not to paddle about?

- I don't know.

A lot of people turned up for that swell.

[indistinct chatter]

- Big and pretty.

It's weird because it's super pretty.

So it looks smaller, but it's not small at all.

- How big is it out there, do you think?

- I don't know but huge. I think it's huge.

- I'm gonna try.

Hopefully, this wind doesn't get too strong.

- This is my baby, 10 kilos.

I like this wind 'cause it make the wave bigger.

- You know, I came down this morning.

It's just perfect offshore,

so the forecasts are wrong again, you know?

You don't get days like this often here.

You get the birds, and you get the sound, come on.

Come on!

- You know, it's gonna be interesting

to see what shows up.

It's gonna be exciting to watch everybody.

Probably, I think at a minimum, I'll drive Cotty and Hugo

into a few waves, and then I'll assess

the situation out there,

see if there's any waves that I would like to ride.

I have a feeling I'm not gonna even want to ride any.

- On look, a bit funky at first light,

and then about quarter to 7:00,

the sickest set I've seen in a long time.

Way more groomed than I thought it was gonna be.

Been visualizing the day before

the wave that I wanted.

I was super confident.

I was in a good place, you know, like,

like it was an all-or-nothing day, you know,

like I was prepared to put it all on the line, you know?

- What's the worst crash you've seen?

[dramatic music]

[speaking Portuguese]

- I put him on the wave. I put him in the perfect spot.

It was nice and smooth and beautiful,

and he came down, and he did a little fade,

and then he turned

so that he could get into the barrel.

And when he turned, he was too late,

and the lip was coming straight for him.

♪ ♪

[radio chatter]

I stayed out the back. Hugo got him.

Hugo ran him up the beach.

♪ ♪

[indistinct chatter]

- One, two, three.

Pull him over.

- His back is really sore, and he can't move that well,

and he thinks it's his spine.

♪ ♪

[indistinct chatter]

- Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on.

- Just get it off.

- Okay, it's okay.

- Easy, easy, easy.

- Hold on, hold on. Don't move your head.

- Same pain? - Same pain, lower back.

[unintelligible] [radio chatter]

- Have we got the blanket for him?

- Katie.

- Hi.

- Um, we got bad news,

but Cotty's alive,

but he got hurt.

- Oh, is he okay? Where?

What, in the water?

- Yeah, we just got out.

Really, really painful and doesn't feel right at all.

[dog barking]

- Take it off, take it off, take it off.

Brace.

- On three--one, two, three. - Brace yourself. Brace.

- Go onto the stretcher now.

- [speaking Portuguese]

- He'll be fine. He'll come through.

Cotty's strong. He bounces back quick.

Bummer.

- Garrett, in all his positivity,

he's like, "Oh, he's gonna be okay."

He got taken away in an ambulance.

Like, it was really bad,

and I think, like, maybe it scared Garrett,

so he was not giving it the energy it deserved

as far as how severe it was.

With injuries and, like, tragic situations,

he almost can't handle it.

Yeah, he doesn't do well with, like, people almost dying.

- Perfect. I didn't even have to surf.

[chuckles softly]

- With a wave measured at 80 feet

and setting a new Guinness World Record,

the winner of the 2018 Biggest Wave Awards

is Rodrigo Koxa.

[cheers and applause]

- There was nobody that I would like

to have broken the record more than him.

Oh, you know, it would have been cool if it was Cotty.

[soft music]

- Look at that.

♪ ♪

Mm.

Until that point, I never questioned

not being able to walk.

Just fearing that I physically couldn't do it

was pretty scary.

- Ah, Cotty's --

- And then within like two weeks,

I was walking around.

- See this guy walking already?

You'll be surfing in a blink.

- Ahh! - [laughs]

- It's been horrific going through the rehab,

the uncertainty and the stress.

- How's that feel? - It feels good.

- All right? - Yeah.

- You feel difference. There's a difference.

- Negatives, all that worry, all that, am I good enough?

Then once that happens,

sometimes it's hard to get it back, you know?

♪ ♪

[indistinct chatter]

- So how's life? - Good. Congratulations.

- Congratulations.

[overlapping chatter]

- [speaking Portuguese]

- Tourism of Portugal gets this great idea.

We're gonna put Nazaré in Times Square.

- Here it is, Koxa's world record wave,

80-foot wave right behind us in Time Square.

- The guy's a visionary. He's a visionary.

- All right, Rodrigo, let's get one more right here.

- Hey, right here, world record holder, Koxa!

Hey, and Garrett McNamara right here,

record holder, world record.

- No, he's the record holder.

- Now it's Koxa's the world record.

Yeah, Koxa! - Ha-ha!

- Whoo! - Yee!

[soft music]

[dramatic music]

♪ ♪

- I'm preparing my body

so that when I go back to Nazaré,

I will be physically, mentally ready.

I've surfed a 100-foot wave a million times in my mind.

I've trained for hours, focusing, manifesting.

This winter, it's gonna be the big wave,

so I'll be ready.

- Big, huge breath in.

Let it out. both: Ohh.

- Garrett was physically trying to get back in shape.

- All right, grab some water if you got it.

- My brother CJ had moved to Hawaii.

- Stay focused.

Feet on track, knees on track. Butt down.

- From 2011, it definitely seemed

like Nazaré was something super special for me.

It was gonna be a huge part of my life

'cause it changed me.

It really did.

- In 2011, CJ excelled above

and beyond any expectations I may have had.

He was excited to become a professional surfer,

big wave surfer.

And he got injured.

- It wasn't a huge day. It was kind of big.

I'm kind of zipping around inside back and forth

in the white wash and looking around,

and this kind of weird little Nazaré tidal wave

sucked up kind of out of nowhere,

and I gassed it to get past it,

and I went up on the lip,

and it sent me off over the side of the lip,

and the ski rolled over.

I got a good hit from a jet ski in my rib.

And then returning to beach volleyball season,

the way I played was just hard,

just jumping as I can, hitting every ball

as hard as I can. [whistle blows]

So I ended up blowing out the disc

in my low back on the left side,

and that's when the sciatic pain came.

I couldn't stand up for more than ten seconds.

I would hit the floor and go into fetal position.

It was brutal. I couldn't move.

I was absolutely crippled, floored.

- My brother being my brother, he spent an entire year

trying to heal it on his own.

- We didn't realize how bad it was

until his mother went to visit him,

found him laying on the ground.

He was broken.

- All of his muscles were atrophied.

He was withering away.

Finally, he did the back surgery

after a year of this already.

When he came out of surgery and he came to,

he just started crying.

CJ suffered a severe mental, emotional,

and physical back injury,

and then healing and then recovery.

It was a journey.

- They say 10 to 15 minutes

of laughter will give you

the benefits that you need.

So we're gonna start off

with just really simple little breathing exercise.

I'm so different now because of the injury

that it's so hard to say what would have happened

had the path continued

and not been--had I not taken this detour.

All the way in the belly, in the belly, in the ribs.

all: Aloha!

[laughing]

- I like to think, you know, would've been amazing.

I'd be this famous big wave surfer and, you know,

sponsors just throwing money and stuff at me.

But it's all this stuff that now I'm like,

what is that even worth?

What does it mean, you know?

Probably still have this guilt and self-worth issues,

and I'd have all this external attention

from big waves and all this, and I'd still be like,

oh, whatever, I'm shit, you know?

[laughter]

So I definitely wouldn't trade it in for anything.

You know, it's the biggest blessing in my life.

But now I have really kind of taken a step back,

then I'm planning on going back to Nazaré with Garrett.

- The traditional big wave season

of Nazaré is October through end of February.

Garrett was in recovery mode from his shoulder,

and so it was like, okay, let's do this comeback.

Let's get you guys both out there.

- Curl with the curl.

We both experienced injuries

but haven't really broken through on them

in order to be able to go out and surf these waves.

[light dynamic music]

When it's time to go to Nazaré

and go ride this giant wave,

we'll be ready.

♪ ♪

- We were in Bali for a month.

The plan was yoga, training,

and to really get ready, and feel mentally

and physically prepared to go back out to Nazaré.

It's not just your regular yoga

that you think of with postures, and that's it.

It's about how we hold trauma in our bodies,

and that's what creates pain.

It's also about healing injuries.

- We were doing like six months

of quite intense physio and rehab,

but all of it's been gym based.

The idea was to come up here and just a bit

of yoga, a bit of moving.

- The first movement you need to learn is to

massage the Earth.

Come down.

And you've got to put a little bit of dancer in it.

- At first, it's like, we're meant to get up

and dance and stuff.

I was like, oh, no. [laughs]

[chanting] [instrument clacking]

And then I kind of got into it.

It was kind of just quite good to sort of break the ice

and let your inhibitions go

and then, like, just fully throw yourself

into the experience, you know?

[chanting]

- People come to us for a lot of different reasons,

including reasons that they didn't know.

They come for healing,

sometimes it's the back injury,

and sometimes it's a deeper yearning

and a deeper hidden impulse.

- [breathing deeply]

[bones crack softly]

Oh, hear all that?

All the ligaments and tendons popping over the middle.

[inhales] Oh.

Ahh.

My body will be as ready as it can be.

The challenge is getting confidence underwater.

I want to surf in it,

but I don't know if I want to surf in it.

I don't even know how I'm gonna feel when I go back there.

I was trying to paddle in some little waves yesterday,

but it was really terrible.

- Sometimes those little days are harder, though.

- Yeah, and I don't know if I'm gonna even be interested

in riding some big waves.

- You will. - Yeah.

- As soon as you get two under your belt.

- As soon as I get my lungs.

- You'll get a few waves. It'll be clean.

- It'll be all back to normal. - It'll be nice.

- Freaking out. - Yeah.

- [laughs]

- Directly into the heart.

Then turn on the inner legs.

- He's starting to turn on the muscles

that were just flaccid.

He's not such a stress ball around his injury.

It's like, it's changing beautifully.

- Physically, they will be able to do it,

but confidence is a big thing,

the mental preparation.

- We have been working on how to disobey the dictates

of fear because when you're doing anything,

and your fear takes over, you're screwed.

You can't be in the throes of fear

and responding at that profound athletic level

that he needs to be.

If you know you can trust yourself,

then you can trust yourself to do great things.

- I do not worry for them at all.

I think that they are ready.

- Get in your body.

- I suggested the yoga trip to Bali.

[children chatter]

But to get Garrett to go to Bali

for a month with his kids...

Yeah, there had to have been some carrot

at the end of the trip.

The carrot was G-Land.

- It had been about at least 15 years

since I've been to G-Land,

and we were just there to have fun.

- The goal was to get barrels in Indonesia,

and we got to go to G-Land, which has been this wave that,

since I was a little kid, I was like, oh, G-Land.

I first heard about it when I saw "The Endless Summer II."

It's just this remote location that has this wave

that's just, you know, perfect,

and you can get the best wave of your life, you know,

if it's right.

- As I got ready to paddle out,

I looked at my helmet in my bag,

and I decided not to wear it.

I should've put it on.

[soft music]

♪ ♪

- He hits the reef,

and he gets a gash in his head

and amnesia.

He doesn't know where his camp is,

nor where his wife is.

- I know--I remember the wave,

and I remember being in the barrel.

I was coming out, and then I--something went wrong,

and then all of a sudden, I hit,

and I was almost knocking out-- almost knocked out.

I was like, fading, fading.

I feel definitely out of it.

I'm having a hard time remembering still.

I shouldn't still be not remembering things, right?

Just-- - No, no, no, it's normal.

- It takes a while? - Yeah, like 24 hours.

- Okay.

- You will ask the same, same, same again,

but it will get better.

- If I hit any harder, I would've knocked out.

I probably wouldn't be here because--I mean,

I have this, so I was floating,

but good luck somebody finding...

My children, my wife, my life flashed before my eyes,

and I thought to myself, is this even worth it?

These little waves, and I could've just died.

I was thinking about my family and stuff,

so I said, oh...

[laughs]

- All right, Garrett, this is gonna sting for a sec.

Okay, just one second. - Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho.

- You all right? - Oh, yeah.

- It's gonna burn just a little bit.

- Ooh, hee-hee-hee-hee, I like it.

- Looking good.

- How about glue, you got any glue?

- No, dude, glue won't cut it for this one.

Yeah, I got worried.

I finally caught another wave and asked someone,

like, "What happened?"

They said, "Oh, he had blood on his head,

didn't know where he was going."

- [laughs] I didn't.

I didn't know where I was staying.

Up until about a couple minutes ago,

I couldn't remember where Nicole went.

- Wow. - Yeah.

- Your brain's really vulnerable at the moment,

and if you hit it again,

you can get permanent brain damage,

and you don't want that.

- You good? - I am good.

Tomorrow's gonna be really good, huh?

- Yeah.

- When Garrett is talking about going out surfing again

when he's still got a bandage around his head,

and he's had a concussion, I'm like,

"Well, the doctor said you shouldn't surf

for at least two weeks."

♪ ♪

He just wanted to go out.

There was no convincing him otherwise.

He's like, "Yeah, but it's fine.

I'll put the helmet on. It'll be fine."

And I'm like, "Okay."

♪ ♪

- Oh!

- The universe said, "You didn't listen

"to my first sign of your amnesia,

so now I'm gonna have to do something different."

♪ ♪

Four days later, we landed in Portugal,

and we went straight to the hospital.

- How did this happen? - Surfing.

The board went-- [clicks]

- Okay, let's have a look at the day of the exams.

Here we see the base of the third metatarsal.

So it's dislocated. - Dislocated.

- Yes, there's no bone here as it's dislocated.

We have to put it back in its place.

What I plan to do is to put a plate over the second

and the third tarsometatarsal joints.

If they're not stable enough, the foot in time will start

to collapse, will start to deform.

You will not be able to walk.

This is the kind of lesion that we have to do surgery.

- Okay.

If we did nothing, he will not be able to walk

as he used to, and I doubt he would be able

to go on a board and surf again as he's used to.

This is the kind of injury you have to fix.

- How long does it take, the whole process

if everything went really smooth?

- For you to be on a board,

not before four months.

- The doctor so gently explained to us

that it was pretty much fractured in, like,

eight places, needed a plate and all these screws, and...

Kay.

It was, like, playing back to me, like,

the shoulder and the months of depression,

and I was like, I can't--I cannot do it again.

♪ ♪

- Thank you for coming in. - You're welcome.

- When I got the wipeout,

my family flashed between my eyes

and them losing me.

There's always the potential of getting injured lurking

in the back of my mind since the shoulder surgery

that makes me think twice about everything.

♪ ♪

[grunts]

- Feel good, in good hands.

To be honest, when I got hurt, I was almost relieved.

I feel like I need a little more time.

When my body feels 100%,

the big wave will come.

And if I feel like riding it, I will.

♪ ♪

[monitor beeping]

Today, my flight leaves at 1:00 from Bristol.

I'm flying to Nazaré.

I've got sort of physical training to begin with

and hopefully some waves,

and then sort of big wave season kicks off.

- What's a quart graph? Okay.

- A what? - A quart graph.

- No idea. I can't do any of that.

- It's mental, isn't it? - Yeah.

- It's like, why would you even need to know that, though?

Ace, he likes it when I'm injured

'cause, you know, I'm home more,

and yeah, you miss him, you know.

You do sort of think, you know, like,

"What's it all about?

Is it really worth putting everything on the line?"

- All right? - Yeah.

- But you don't fear death, you know?

Like, I don't fear dying.

But I get more fearful of, like,

not being able to surf again, you know?

Like, I fear that.

♪ ♪

- Technically shouldn't even have been able

to surf that season, but Garrett had his mind set

on getting back as soon as possible

I think because he knew I was so mad he broke his foot

that he was like, "I better, like, get it better fast."

- How are you?

- Good.

- That's the least excited I've ever heard you say it.

- Well, I'm good, but I'm just--you know,

I got six weeks of off the foot and six weeks of rehab,

and that's the best case scenario.

[exhales]

- I think Garrett definitely feels pressure

to get out there.

I'm sure some people really look forward

to seeing him surf, and the Portuguese people

definitely love seeing him getting out there and surf.

- Ah. - Yeah.

- When we first came here, nobody knew who Garrett was

because this was not a surfing town.

It wasn't a surfing country.

[upbeat music]

But now he's like the George Clooney

of Portugal.

- [speaking Portuguese]

- It's amazing how much just seeing him

lights the Portuguese people up.

[horn honks]

- He showed that we are a surfing country.

We can attract the best athletes in the world

to do things that for common mortals

are completely impossible.

- Looking good.

- The old ladies love him.

- How you doing? - Fine.

- Been a while, huh? - Yes.

- We have a bunch of friends coming over,

so I would love to get some fish,

whatever you guys recommend.

- Okay. - [laughs]

- The king of Nazaré!

- Let's have a look at your X-ray.

So everything seems to be okay.

He's moving already his foot a lot,

no need to move more.

We have to go slowly but surely.

Seems to be healed.

- Well, I'm glad I got the surgery

'cause it feels great.

- Last one.

You did it. - Oh, my goodness!

[laughs] Good job.

After the surgery, there was no pain.

It was a miracle.

I told Nicole, "I am not gonna do anything.

I'm just gonna stay here, focus on healing my foot."

And then I said to myself, "Man, I got all this time.

I might as well utilize it."

And I've never been to Africa.

[drums thrumming]

- So Garrett and CJ went to Angola

for a beach cleanup.

♪ ♪

And then they went to South Africa

to work with Waves for Change who provide surf therapy

and mentorship to underprivileged youth there.

- So is everybody ready to get in the water?

all: Yes!

- Let's go surfing!

[all cheer]

♪ ♪

- And then we went to New York because Garrett had a meeting

to build a survival suit.

- We're in New York, and my buddy Kyle

is helping me put together a suit

that I've been dreaming about making

for the last 15 years.

There's no real solid suit for waves over 80 feet.

- See if there's things we need to add in.

- The survival suits in 2011 that we used,

most of them were, like, Garrett's kind of creation,

and it's just taking, like, flotation from life vests

and just stuffing into the wetsuit

in the spots that you need it.

Now the evolution is having a bladder that inflates

when we pull a cord.

- Crazy, isn't it?

- So Garrett's trying to design a suit

that's as comfortable as possible,

so you can be fully free and mobile

but also really solid and safe.

- Once in a while in Nazaré, you come up,

and then there's this monster,

and you gotta try and swim through it.

You deflate real quick while you're waiting and then, ahh!

Get through, and then you can have another one breaking,

and...

- I think building this ultimate survival suit

is gonna give Garrett the confidence he needs

to do this for as long as he wants into his old age,

and it's just gonna, like, keep him together like armor.

- Whoa, holy shit. - [laughs]

[soft music]

- When I got on the plane to Nazaré,

my foot was feeling great.

By the time we got off, it was swollen and sore,

and I thought maybe I reinjured it somehow

from sitting with my foot down for too long.

- Traveling's, like, the last thing you want to do

with a broken foot.

- Do you see it?

- He was feeling frustration from what I could see of,

you know, having to do all these things

and wanting to really take care of his foot.

And then there was waves of being grumpy.

You know, you're pinned on the couch.

You can't go anywhere. You start snapping at people.

[child cries]

- I've never been so unprepared to ride a big wave

ever in my life.

I got to Africa and ran around.

Then I went to New York and ran around.

And it's only my own self-sabotage

that I did by choice.

And I could've said, "Sorry, no, I'm staying home.

I need to focus on my foot."

And I thought it was a good idea

because I couldn't surf,

so I might as well do other things,

but to get back in the water, you gotta focus

on getting back in the water, not doing other things.

Check out the storm, CJ.

It's as big as we've seen.

60 to 80 feet on Wednesday, magic.

Straight down the pipe. - Huge, huh?

- Huge. - Look at the center of it.

- The wave that I've been dreaming about for years is

actually on the maps and potentially coming in,

and I'm 100% not ready physically.

I could ride it, and if I make it,

I'll be fine, but if I don't,

there's a potential of not coming home.

[soft music]

- Garrett don't have to stay 20 hours on the water now.

He have kids. He have family.

He have to make all the stuff there,

and he have to calm down a little bit.

- [grunts]

- No.

And he's the best of the world.

I think Garrett have to stay around, and have fun,

and take control of the life, and growing up with the kids,

and that's it.

I think it's the most difficult decision

to look at the mirror and say, it's time to stop.

I think a surf guy never feel that.

- I do not know when big wave surfers finally say

they've had enough.

Haven't seen it yet. [chuckles]

- There's a point in surfing when it might end up

becoming selfish when you're not putting your family first.

And I think Garrett's been fighting the demons,

and I think there's gonna be a time when Garrett

has to hang it up, call it a day, call it a career,

and be there for his family, and kids, and things,

and not risk his life for the 100-foot wave

'cause it may never happen.

- I think it's personal when you decide when the end is.

When you lose the emotional capacity

to be able to go do it,

then I think the physical leaves.

And I think some people, that never ends.

Maybe some people, they just don't ever

not want that feeling.

- I don't think you call it a day on surfing.

I think maybe you'd call it a day on, like,

chasing it and risking it all.

But you don't call it a day on surfing, do you?

[dramatic string music]

- Portuguese authorities have now

issued a red weather warning.

They say coastal areas are likely to get a battering

from the incoming weather front.

♪ ♪

- Strengthening storm is expected

to bring downpours and strong winds.

♪ ♪

- Of course, apart from wind and rain,

this storm could also generate significant surf conditions.

- Luigi texts back,

"Guy who really want to see his X-rays."

He said, "Good." Yes!

Time to rock and roll.

Now it's time to get serious, time to train hard.

Time to get CJ in the water.

Time to get in the water real soon.

I'll be driving the jet ski, maybe surfing.

♪ ♪

[upbeat music]

♪ ♪

[bright tone]

SPEAKER: I want to thank you for coming to the inaugural,

Nazare, pro-surfing challenge.

This is gonna be the greatest show in surfing.

♪ (TENSE MUSIC PLAYS) ♪

SPEAKER 2: Every important big-wave surfer,

everyone's there.

SPEAKER 3: Justine is one of the standout surfers.

Everyone wants that wave that's gonna make your career.

SPEAKER 4: But they've got some serious competition.

Garrett's the ultimate example of the old guard.

The new guard is represented by Kai Lenny.

Just like you're going to the Super Bowl of surfing.

I can't wait to see these guys out there

giving it their best, and it's gonna be a great show.

SPEAKER 5: Go, go, go, go.

(WAVE CRASHING)

♪ (SOLEMN OUTRO MUSIC PLAYS) ♪