Titouan Galea Wing Foil Interview- Blue Planet Show Episode #12

Aloha friends, it's Robert Stehlik, welcome to another episode of the Blue Planet show.  On this show, I interview wing foil athletes, designers, and thought leaders and ask them in-depth questions about Wingfoil equipment and technique. I'm also trying to get to know my guests a little bit better, their background, how they got into water sports, what inspires them, and how they live their best life.

I'm a visual learner, so I'm adding visual content that you can watch on YouTube, but you can also listen to it as a podcast on your favorite podcast app

Today's interview is with the very first wing foil world champion, Titouan Galea from new Caledonia. If you're into wing foiling as much as I am, you've probably already seen the videos of him doing crazy moves on jumps, back flips on the face of the wave, big airs, riding big waves in New Caledonia and other places. Really impressive stuff. And of course also being able to pull these moves off under pressure during competition and winning the last couple of world championship events.  Titouan breaks down some of the most advanced moves for us, Step by step. We also talk about his background, how he grew up in new Caledonia and now lives in France and about his board, foils, wings and what the future holds for him.

So without further ado, please welcome the talented Titouan Galea.

All right. Titouan, thanks so much for making some time to be on the Blue Planet show. How are you doing today?

Great, thank you for inviting me.

Yeah. Awesome. So here in Hawaii, it's it's 10 o'clock in the morning and for you it's evening, right? Eight o'clock or something like that?  And you're in Montpellier France. Is that right?

Yes

Okay. But originally you grew up in new Caledonia. So can you tell us a little bit about, your background, how you grew up and how you got into water sports?

Yeah. Born in new Caledonia and my father was doing windsurfing and kiting, yeah. Maybe around 2000. So yeah, he teach me when, so thinking like surfing when I was about like eight or nine and yeah, I've been projects learning where mainly and some other places yeah, since.

Maybe I was 12. I started doing it quite often.  Studying wave kite surfing mostly. And then what else I've done? Yeah. Foiling came like maybe six years before. Maybe seven. I started with kite foiling on my own when I was about 18 years old and yeah, just one year after I moved to France and I joined the French team of kite foiling.

So I've been doing lots of wind sports and yeah. Then the wing for the game. So two years ago, and now I'm doing a few other sports most of the time. Pretty much. Yeah.

Awesome. Congratulations on being number one in the world right now in the rankings. That's pretty impressive.

How old are you now? 24

actually, I actually had to look up new Caledonia. I've never been there, but just for people to know where it is. So this is New Calidonia and Australia and Hawaii is here. And then this is new Caledonia, right?

There's a place nearby, which is very famous. Is Fiji.  exactly the same swell, like Cloudbreak receives So yeah, we have same waves as other spots, so yeah, it's really nice space. And actually it's much more like it's windier in New Calidonia then. Yeah. Most of the time it's yeah. When you're in New Cal. So what's the prevailing wind direction.

So what is the prevailing wind?

So yeah, Southeast is like this way, right along the coast. For the surf, is it better on the south shore? On the north shore? Both?

Yeah, cause it's windy almost everyday. It's tricky. Sometimes a winter and a bit north is so we have good surf on the west coast.

Now we surf manly on the west coast. All disposed comes from south is south. Yeah. From depression, south hemisphere. So all this welcomes between a New Zealand and Australia and they, most of them come from south Southwest. So it's all all the stuff sports on the west coast. And so I guess the best ways are probably in the, in, in the winter there, which is summer in the Northern hemisphere.

Is that right? Yeah. That's where we get you as big as well, like June, July, but actually there's way happening. Pretty much all the alarm really it's like entireties is have good swell too in. Pretty much all year long. They receive also no swell. We're not receiving the really, we can have like very good session and increased in may.

Not really, but yes, there's a main season. Yeah. June, July, August. That's where exit peak of swell is where we get the biggest swells. All right. And then, so you've been out on the water windsurfing and kiting and so on since you're you said nine years old or something like that long time before I was pretty much sailing on small boats, like I don't know, optimist and stuff where I started  when I was nine.

And do you have a early childhood memory that where you just realized, oh, I love this. This is what I want to do with my life or. There's always been a passion, but when I moved to France from Nicole, for sure, I said, okay, I really like this. I'm going to try to do it like professionally and try to make it as my job.

And yeah, it's nice. And so did you move to France so you can be easily compete more easily? Or what, why did you move to France? Okay. Y yeah, two levels from Nucala is such a nightmare. There's not much light. It's super expensive. I didn't have big budgets in the beginning, cause yeah, it was just starting.

So I will not live in Newcastle and travel all the time from new Caledonia. It's too much money for me. So yeah. I decided to move France, much more things happening, you guys are now. Yeah. You had to show to people, where is it? There's not much people knowing where it is. It's not a not places like Hawaii is like, everyone is looking how I there's a lot of things happening in Hawaii.

Lots of people are there just a few people that are like writing professionally. So you stay there all the time. To be well known by people. There's not much you can do, like it's better to move to France or Europe where there's more evidence, there's more writers. So it's better for me even to progress and have a bit of emulation.

I can say this in English. Yeah. That's a Friday around you. And also, yeah, now it's a fun. And they are also based in more per year where I'm living. So that makes things easy too. Yeah. So in new Caledonia, are you a French citizen or what is yeah. Yeah. It's like a department of science.

It's easy to stay here for me also. I didn't start in the beginning, but now I'm doing a source today has a pilot license. And so I'm about to finish it in a couple of months. Yeah, looking forward we'll have like much more time to do many other things. Yeah. I guess new Caledonia is pretty far away from France.

It's like pretty much on the other side of the world, right? Yeah. It's 35 hours flying almost because of the connection. Terrible. And also, if you want to know, I dunno, in a state, in the USA, it's so complicated. Really. So is it traveled from where it's super expensive? Like flying from new Kalamazoo to Europe is always more than yet 2000, sometimes 3000 super expensive.

Talk a little bit about flying. I know it looks like you do paragliding and glider, plane flying and so on and you're. I guess you, you said your goal is to become a pilot do you have a pilot's license this now? Or? Yeah, of course this is gliding. So I have the license. I'm also piloting small airplanes.

So yeah, my goal when I will be older is to do it like as a commercial pilot, but it has always been a passion for me to start by writing when I was pretty young. And when I moved to France, I had this thing also guiding super nice. It's much better to do glider here because when it's all the time strong, so it's better to fly a lighter than a paraglider.

Yeah. And then you you also like doing like the kiting on snow around, it looks like.

Thing new gal never will discover this thing. So it was nice to do this was things in trends to realize the mountains, the landscape are amazing. And yeah, it's a nice way to, to visit the mountains. Yeah, that's awesome. Cool. And then now basically you're able to just be a professional wing foiler now, or Kaiden wing further through F1 through the sponsorship, that's enough for you to make a living or do you have any other jobs?

No, for now I have nothing else. So moving from this

before it was a different thing. We, the Federation was helping a lot too. Like it was more, more structured thing. Now we was a wing, so cause it's like everyone, one of the wing is pretty good in the wing too. So it's working great too. Okay. So let's talk a little bit about the wing foil world tour.

So recently you just won both the freestyle and the racing, right? So you're number one in the world right now. How does that feel? Hey, it's nice. We had two, two Evans last year also and both had finished and spouse, a one over one he wants. So I think it's going to be a great battle against this guy again, this year.

Yeah, it seems like he's your biggest competitor right now. Huh? It's

like he's right behind you.

Yeah. Tell us about the last contest you went to, where was it? And and how was it while were the conditions and how has traveling to, how is it to travel during the pendant? It was not a big travel. It's one hour and a half from my house now. So

yeah. I know four people from outside, it was a to travel cause fem a lot. Definitely was okay. And what about the convention? It was nice. Super well, have a nice the place it's like the wind was fully off shore, so maybe it was not waves at all was like the sea. So yeah, it was very difficult to have like big gems and setbacks was really tricky and freestyle.

So on that flat water and we had to racing to we're going to have a wave and I'm really looking forward to it. Cause I think that's a windfall it's much more funnier in ways that war. Yeah. The waves make it more interesting. I guess the, that event in Brazil last year. There was there was some like a small shore break, but not much in terms of like breaking away.

Yeah. It was not breaking ways, but still has, like proper waves to really enjoy it. So yeah. Presumably can do something. So we're calling actually 50% of the score on the ways and 50% on a freestyle. So that was okay. But as you can see, we can there was no way at all. So it was 100% of freestyle.

The wind was just blowing off shore. Yeah. How strong was the wind? Like how many knots do you think about was the wind hit during the contest with w we have five days of competition and we only had two days off and the first day was probably around 30 knots, something like this. And the second day we had 20 to 15 knots no more, but he has, the first day was quite strong, quite cold raining all day.

It was quite a tricky condition. Yeah. It looks perfect in the video, of course. Yeah. Yeah. That was the second day. Was that? Yeah, 15, 25 minutes, depending on the sign.

So what size wing were you using? During the freestyle and what size during the racing? And just curious, like different con equipment Thursday, I told you it was, the wind was pretty strong. So I was on my three five, and that was the last day as you can see, I was on my phone too. Cause it was like, yeah.

Less wind on the first day was the racing Thursday in 30 nights. I was, I think I was in a five and a five. And and the second day we did a race after the freestyle and it was less and less. That's when I went on my, I think on my five and my six or seven after really big wins. So talk about this, on that one back flip, I guess your foil landed on the wing and left a couple of holes in it. And it was okay to just keep going. That was okay. Cause I had the pressure and the motivation was it. I was doing the final against spouse. Yeah. I was building my studying by the like small small streaks.

And I came to do my backlit. Normally I do it all the time, but this time I crashed and I crashed like really bad. So I ended up into the doing with the foil. So it's got a bit like two parts of my wing and it had me a lot of pressure. I saw I pulled still a fly, so I went again, fall back asleep, and then I did my Qualtrics again.

I knew I was in. Good. Yeah. Awesome. And then you, the racing, what we're using different equipment for the racing and like how was that? What kind of course was it and so on? Actually, no, really. I bring, I dunno. Yeah. I bring many boards to test and see actually, yeah, I use exactly the same for freestyling and racing was the racing.

You had a bot. Off downwind where you will not use the wing at all. So you had to pen, so we could not use super small 500, 600. So yeah, so I had my hate Android coming quite soon with a fund that I use this country's guide and I'm racing to, there was really I was supposed to

this done with, but I will have used maybe a 500 or 600 because it was much faster, but because we had this down with, but it's really nice that way. It's not, everyone has such small force, so it was better for everyone, I think. So how did that work? So the downwind part you had to you basically had to pump without the wing or how does that work?

Yeah, it just basically grabs the wing from the front handle, which is in the leading edge and you just keep going. That's it. And then downwind leg, you're not allowed to use the wings. You have to, you just use the waves to end the foil to go down. Yeah. Yeah. It was very short, like longer, but it was like, I don't know, 200 meters maybe normal.

I see. So like a super small, super fast than racing wing, like you would use for kite racing or something like that would be wouldn't work for that. Yeah. Maybe I could do it, but I don't know, take safety and don't take such a small cause it's not working like sailing a normal racing regatta.

It's elimination like freestyle. So if you lose like one race, when you're over, you have no discards, nothing really. You have to perform on each race. Who's one time if you're over so better takes safety. Okay. Interesting. So basically that, that's pretty interesting. So you basically use the same equipment more or less, same foil, same board, same wing too, for the racing industry.

So yeah, the last day, cause it was like very light when a, I use a bigger board. Yeah. For the freestyle. I was using a 30, 80 there's sports and yeah, for the racing, because it was super light when we were on those six or seven meters. How was he seeing a 44, 50

with 50 liters and and a big wing, like how light or how much, when do you need to get up on the foil? Like how many knots would you say? You need to get it?

Maybe seven, something like this? I think around seven. Yeah. If I was still using a small book, 50 liters, it's not so small. If you go like on the sup for example, like for down winner, Like on a sup a thing you can go even lower. I want lower for sure. Maybe we have a 50 liters. That's good.

Wow. That's impressive. So if the DWA came to you and said, Tetouan, you can have a contest anywhere in the world any kind of format. So what would you say this is? This is the perfect contest. What would you choose? I don't know. It's a tricky question for sure. Love to have one in proper way, like I have at home, like big waves or like Cloudbreak or even Whereas like these more, maybe more shoes one I wear or maybe someone might, I guess something like this really visa one day, for sure.

I'm not sure it's going to happen anytime soon. So yeah, it would be nice maybe not such big ways, but I know not super hollow, maybe also retreats in a way, because it cannot bear from trees. But I think now, I'm trying it by now, like to perform tricks into the way, and this is very interesting. I think we've not big waves, like even less than,

but I dunno where honesty.

I don't mind I can go on,

but this space there's many places for sure. We can do this. There's many places we can do maybe in a couple of Brazil. I don't know many places in Maui, too, in front of the beach or even lanes. I don't know many places. Yeah. So wave contest. Obviously you probably the waves are more interesting than the racing, right?

Yeah. Really racing. I don't know,

competing this year for the two, but there's no sense doing racing. We've already tied, fallings out, performing very good already. I think it's better to keep this sport. Yeah, like this really? This is better really. Yeah, you're doing some amazing stuff in the waves and I'm just like pulling off big jumps on the face of the wave and stuff like that.

It's pretty impressive for sure. So maybe walk us through a little bit what you're doing here and what I find really interesting here, when you're doing a bottom turn, how you sh she didn't the way almost like wind surfing and yeah. Can you talk a little bit about that? Your technique?

You're going to have the full story. It's fun. Yeah. It gives a video. You can see on the learning edge. I have a Sikh, which is my comment on it because I had this thing. I could not grab the phone from handle. So that's why I was keeping the wing in my hand. But I've journey. Yeah. Afterwards I saw it looks great.

And it's helped me to do maybe better bottom sometimes, but also you don't see much when you go to this thing because I don't have window in mind. So I don't know. I like both, most of the time I just grabbed it from handle. I used to do this, but yet since this time I was using to see I'm doing more and more like winter.

Yeah. It's really interesting. And then when you land with the foil in the whitewater, Does that actually make the landing a little bit softer? Is it actually easier to land on whitewater? Is it hard because of the turbulence? Yeah. Yeah. True. So you can jump on a, fall on the shoulder and you're going to land on flat or even on the steep part is going to be tricky, but it's going to be hard yet for your knees and everything, but yeah.

Landing in the white water, it's much more softer, but afterwards also move a little bit. So like in this side of waves, it's okay. But more than this can be tricky to learn. Really. I don't know. Of course we're going to perform more and more, but more than this, for sure. It's going to be tricky to learn in a whitewater.

I don't think there will be lending like big areas, like 10 feet away is for sure not going to happen. I don't know. We'll see. It goes so fast. I'm really looking forward to see what's going to happen. Five years in the sport. Really. I'm really stoked to be part of it now. It's crazy. Yeah. Is this the same way that from the, with the GoPro max?

Yeah, it's exactly the same way, but just so from outside, this way you can have a, yeah.

That's super cool move in. And I think there was another one that I wanted to show where you're doing like a back flip on the wave as well. Whereas that one that's funny. I think. Yeah. It's fun. Yeah.

So doing all those freestyle moves on the wave and I guess that's like the whole, the next the next step right. Doing days ago. Yeah, you can go from back there and 360, but now I'm doing good this time. I was training now I learned my last post and then a good one. So for sure you can lend some front flips into the waves to probably double to build also seven 20.

Yeah. Awesome. I think you've already been attempting those right? The 17, seven 20. No, really. If I attempt was not made on purpose really. I have to really, I have to try seven 20, but as a thing, if you do a pre 62 high, most of the time you go turn over rotate and they never land seven 20, but I have to try it for sure.

Yeah. Th the. Let's talk a little bit about the backflip. I think the tricky part of the backflip is like when the wing, when you're kinda got the wing between you and the water, and this just looks like a really tricky spot to be in. But actually at this moment, if you have a good, Hey you okay?

Yeah, really? It's all about the Pope. Really? If you both, while you get the good hate and you just like, yeah, totally good. I got to Trumbull line. If you, at the end, when you see yourself pointing towards the sea and the wing in front of you, normally you're good. Really? There's nothing can happen. It's all about the beginning.

For me, I think so as long as you have enough height in this position, then you can pull out of it. But if, I guess if the water's underneath you at this point, then you basically fall onto the wing. Yeah. But it's happened to me many times for the first time.

So maybe walk us through it step by step. What do you like, I guess for the pop, like you're trying to get the anchor, the full angles up as steep as you can. And the takeoff. Yay. You have to get a good spirit. Not to agree, not to cross man having a good speed. Yeah. It's

like hard when you back. So you try to go hi, and you have to put your head in the back. I'm not doing really putting the, your eyes, like going back in the back. It's I think it helped for sure. And after, yeah, on this one I grew up myself, to make my myself like

maybe faster. Yeah. That's pretty much it after it was a tricky part also is to position the the wind. Like it's a bit hard, like to explain to everyone the main thing you to think, as a wing, like not. Into the wind, again, the wind, as you can see on the highest spot I am is a wing is just like in the middle.

Not taking much like the wind, the that's not against the wind. It's just in the middle. Yeah. And that was just the one above. Yeah. When I'm upside down exit wing. Yeah. I want to get back winded, but you also don't want the wing to pull you down towards the water, right? Yeah. And one other thing is give advisers it's much easier to learn, move some ways, for sure.

Like a good key here, like coming, just cross I don't know. You didn't, you don't need nothing. Just one fit normal coming against you. It's gonna help you so much. Really? Yeah. Just have a steep ramp to launch off of. It will for sure. Okay. So yeah, no, that's awesome. And then what about, is this the one for that?

I think so this is not the one, sorry. Yeah, so maybe walk us through that move. Like the Ford sort of, it looks a lot like windsurfing actually like doing a forward on windsurfing, but not the same though. I don't know. Maybe I'd done a long time ago, but I think it's totally different,

but I'm doing maybe winds of sight. The decision I had paid, cause it was a waste, but I don't think, and from it this way, I saw some old guys now doing it, like more like Trump line again, like throwing themselves in a, from and me I'm more using the wing to do it. So I think I have to learn how to do it, but this one looks great.

It's nice. It's just a bit tiring for your knee. So basically you, this one, you getting up, you try to go high first and then you spin sideways almost around the wing. It looks very great. Or w how do you think of, what do you think about when you're doing it? I really, I don't know.

I just learned like a week ago, this thing. Yeah, you have to turn the wing, like upside down, like towards the water, like super fast and keep pushing, pulling you back normally itself. I don't know. Really. I don't have much advice really. I didn't learn a lot yet, so I don't all the time, but I have to.

Yeah. It's super cool that you're pushing the limits. I think without, it's always easier to do something once you see somebody else doing it and then can figure out how they did it. But doing it for the first time is the hardest, the first point to learn it is always the hardest part, right?

Yeah. Especially for the, like the guys in Maui. And they were doing back flips since mom already, but because we didn't have any advice from anyone, it was really hard to learn it, same way, but now, yeah, I get it. Many guys go now in France. So I think going to go faster and faster, I don't know

for sure. Are kids now doing it too? The forage flips.

Yeah. Yeah. Not so much here on the wahoo, but I know on Maui, a lot of the guys who are doing the backflips now, the younger guys, so this is pretty good too. So using a kiteboard with the wind wing. Yeah. This is not something I'll for sure. And yeah, in France sometimes when that's in, look at where we had the competition to the wind is blowing like super strong sometime.

So yeah, this time I can use my cause he was like, I don't know, 40, not something. Yeah. I think I saw somewhere where your dog, like there was a longer version of it in your dog. Is that your dog chasing you on the beach? No. That's not even mine. A friend, maybe. I don't know,

but yeah, that was pretty cool. So in terms of, I know the F1 wings don't have windows. Like how do you feel about windows? Do you think it's that's always a question people have, do you need a window? Or like, how do you feel about having windows in the wings? Really depends if you go in a crowd or no, I don't use to go to play so much crowded, so I'm okay.

Without window. Yeah. It's the only time I told you before was when I'm using it in a way maybe. And I do like bottom turns and stuff like Windsor style. I cannot see inside the wings. So that can be a problem sometimes, but maybe it will come with some windows. I don't know.

Cool. Some amazing stuff you do and the waves are really impressive. So what do you see hap like for the future? What do you think will happen? What are your goals? What do you think is possible? What do you think the future holds for wing filings?

Maybe now I have a better ID, but in the beginning, like a few months after it came, I was thinking it was just a little thing, but not thing to grow at all. So I was totally wrong. Really. Now it's becoming such a big thing that companies are doing, like lots of work on it and focusing on a lot now.

And also it's really nice, but how I see it, I don't know for me. Yeah, for sure. I really like going in a ways. I think it's a really good time to go in a ways and have fun in a ways. For sure. Yeah. People want to also put the freestyle now that they're doing competition. So we have, it's much easier to do freestyle and racing event weather event.

So it's gonna push a freestyle again. Good thing. We, what we're going to learn in a freestyle and we can add it in a ways too. So it's going to be even more interesting. I think the wind serves are doing tricks in a way, so we'll come with this too. What else? Yeah, it was me. I want to know is just, yeah, I prefer going away.

I really want to do like videos in good places bringing in good ways. Around the world. I'm really looking forward to this. Yeah. So one of the tricky parts of winging in the ways is if you get caught inside of a big set and then a big whitewater is coming at you just cause the wing has, the wing just gets torn.

So pulled so hard by the waves. Have you ever like broken leashes and lost wings or blew up the wing and so on? Like how do you deal with that? Like when I went in bigger ways, I don't know why really. I had many sessions, but I never felt once in UK then. Yeah. So I was lucky. I was not like pushing too much at this time.

Maybe now if I'm going back, I will do maybe go deeper for sure. But yeah, I've been in such big west, but still I've been culturally smaller ones in other places, even here in France. And yeah, I broke a few leashes for sure. He broke some time. It's a nice things though. It doesn't like to touch your arms, which is nice, but yeah it's tricky if you're on your own and there's not much people around you, you can be in trouble when I'm in a new car going in big ways.

There's always boats taking care. If never something happened is always. I know friends with boats or is always going to be a solution, but yeah, if you're on your own, I know people like more shoes they go in and sometimes it publishes. And so when just go away in Madagascar or I don't know, so they have yet to swim back to the shore.

So yeah, sometimes it can be tricky. It's the same way when surf and as they broke a lot of gears, the waves, it's almost the same thing. Yeah. Yeah. It is. We were just talking about what the best solution is, because it's just, yeah, it's hard when you lose your wing. Sometimes I think it's maybe even better just to let the wing go when the big set comes.

And then try to turn the channel later, yeah. Depending on what size of where you were talking about the one, it was really big in your cow. I didn't put even a Wenglish. I was without really all the time. Cause it's not going to break anyway. So you'd better, like it better, doesn't have a leash that way the wing might not be broken by waiver.

There's a good chance of doing won't be broken if you don't have the leash. So it's nice. Yeah, sometime first you're not going to have a bullish. There's no sense. It's super dangerous. Yeah, but then yeah, you just have to be pretty pretty sure of yourself that you're not going to lose your gear. We're also talking about that maybe you could put, they have those apple air tags or whatever like a satellite locator thing that you could maybe put on your wing.

So if you lose it and it's like out in the ocean somewhere, you could find it, with, find your iPhone and look for your wing and then locate it like that. So later on you could go back with a boat and find it or something like that, I think that's I never heard about a thing where not so advanced,

I think you need cell phone service to make it work probably. Yeah.

Yeah, it's a second another idea, but I was wondering like you have some of your boards behind you, so if you could only have one board for all conditions, like including light, wind and so on, what would be the board you would have, maybe, can you show us your w the board you would choose if you only had one board?

Our hands, really? If suddenly I have to go in that maybe I'm gonna take this one, so four, eight, four, eight. Yeah. That's the one I use in super-light with 50 liters visiting. I can go, yeah, that's super light, maybe 12, 12 knots with a normal wing, like five. So yeah, that's the one I would take.

So how much do you weigh? I weighed 70. Okay. So a good volume for you and I'm sorry, what did you say about 50 liters or? Yeah, that's 50, but really that's only if I have to go like below 50 knots, I always using yeah. Around 35 liters. Normal, really? And then when you start, you put your, you put both your feet on the board already underwater and then get, let it pull you out.

Yeah. Yeah. I just sit standing up on the surf board with my knee bands and the water and I have my wings up and I just go out to water. Yeah. And you just need a good Gus to get you going. And then once, once you're out, it's fine. Yeah. Yeah. No, I think, I had a lot of questions like this.

A year ago, six months ago. But I think now, I see here many people using small boats and I think the same on how I were quite strong too. Now, pretty much everyone is using small boats. Yeah. It's pretty common to use smaller boards, but I still like using a board that almost floats me. I use I'm like 88 kilograms or something and I use a boy that's maybe 75.

That's yeah.

Okay. Around yet.

Yeah. Let's look at some of the ways. And is this in new Caledonia that this video, can you see it. Yeah. That was a long time ago. Yeah, that wasn't NewCo was one of the first time I was going to the reef. That was almost two years ago. Yeah. These two years ago. More than two years ago. Yeah. It's been a while.

Huh. Let me see, like there's some more recent ones. Yeah. I guess not much.

So pretty soon after they moved to France, basically. Yeah. I call often in UK. Not now, this was two years ago or a bit less now. And after this year after this, as you continue, but after this, I went back, just went when it started Yeah, that was the first time I was trying to Germany a year ago.

Nice. But it's really, you're the level of your whinging and the level of everybody's winging has progressed a lot in just one year. It's pretty amazing how much everybody's getting better at a really high rate. Can you give some pointers on landing big jumps?

Like how do you keep the landing soft when you do a big air?

If you're going like. Most of the time. Yeah. A few moments ago, I realized like it's much better to land on a tape all the time. So that's what I'm doing now. I just end up on a tailoring all the time first. And that's the only advice I can give out. Honestly, there's not much I can say about it before I was trying to learn, but it was like giving lots of pressure on me and everything, but I realized that tail was a bit easier.

Yeah. And I've seen some people trying to land with the nose slightly down. So the front wing goes in down at a downward angle a little bit. So it doesn't hit as hard, but then it's hard to pull off. It's hard to pull it off because just the board gets sucked down on onto the water.

Yeah. You can do this with small gems, but really once you start doing high, really, you can not do this again, really. So you on YouTube to watch videos on YouTube

and YouTube. Yeah.

That's the only station I filmed, but now that I'm listening, I'm more involved in this now. Next time. I have been much more of this administration and I only see him that one, but I want to go again. I'm just wanting movies now.

What's your, I think like foiling in steep waves is a whole different ball game. So do you have some, maybe some tips or pointers on, like controlling the foil on, on the steep fast wave? Again, can you repeat the question? Oh, just with the foil on a steep, fast moving wave it's just tricky to keep the, to control the foil.

So do you have any tips on how to, how you do that or any points? For me, it doesn't feel so tricky. Just depend on if you use the right size of a wing. I think it's okay. This is, this was writing a 500 centimeters square was pretty small, pretty good, small, thin fast wing, basically that you can use in the bigger waves.

It makes sense. Yeah. And yeah, it would be cool to see you write those ways this summer. So do you have any plans to go back to new Caledonia? Anytime soon. Not yet. Sadly some now with 15 days of quarantine where there's not much light, so yeah. Maybe I'm going to travel more. Some other places it looks like on this one you are wearing a leash or you said you weren't using any least a leash.

This time I was not. I was wearing. Yeah, because there was only one boat and not much people around. So the waves were not so big. So it was okay. But really when I had bigger condition, when this, and I was not using the wind and not using the leash,

big base, many people, and it's all my friends. So again, I know if I release my wing somehow, because of course, if I Excel because you're going to help me another thing, if I don't have a solution, I do a mistake. I don't know. I'm jive on attack and I release the wing. And third, like far away in a, in the channel can be a problem.

So when there's, when it's big and with lots of people is can help me, but there was no one out. So it was on my own. That's why I was using zoom. I'm just curious when you're coming out of the water after a good session. Are you having dinner too?

So when you come out of the water with your gear what is and people come up to you on the beach what is the most common question that people ask you. Like everywhere you mean? And every spot. Yeah, just like when you think that's like the most, most common questions that you get.

I had quite a few questions. Maybe the most, the question people ask me the most probably it's how do you get up on small boats? But there was like, I had many, and now less and less because people start to use these small boats too. Especially in the beginning two years ago, when I was using already at 25 ditches boats.

So many people were asking me, how do you get up on such small wars? And now I'm using what gear should be grateful. These of this condition. Yeah, they're still looking at the size and Maluma my boss, but not much question about like technique and stuff, because there's not much people sending even trying to do back flips and stuff like this, just stop jumping.

So yeah, yesterday I had someone else. Give me, take out, how can I jump a higher. What can I do? Yeah, of course, I'm going to give him tricks. It seems like the question I get a lot, like from people that don't know how to wing for help, they always ask like, how much is it? And they think that they can just buy the equipment and then do it.

But once they have the equipment yeah. That's from people that are not already writing, but I thought you asked me what people writing me, like question, but yeah, of course, random people or even, yeah, kite surfers when Sufism will know the prices, but yeah, random people walking in the beach there. They're all asking first.

What is the sport? How is it called? And yeah. How much does it cost? Is it hard to write? That's a pretty common question. I think. So this was another different event. That was just a teaser of the,

okay.

So I went there just to do a teaser for was crazy. The event was crazy strong again.

So what what is your favorite move? Do you have a favorite or just depends on the conditions and is there like one, a favorite move that you do now? I like back flips because it seems very easy. So it's nice to do two fro like a good one when there is a good waves in front of me. It's nice when it's like couple waves too.

It's to do what we saw a few times. They like to Jen facing the wave and landing again in the waves on whitewater is really great. Cause you can do it sometimes really high and give you like good sensation is same as when surfing. Like you have very good possession. People are doing tricks in the waves, but the tricks, I think the most is like big aerials.

So it's the same in wind falling. Okay, cool. Yeah. It's awesome stuff. You're doing. If you let's say you're stuck inside or, like during the pandemic, a lot of people were like quarantined or they couldn't get outside. And and a lot of people get feeling lonely or anxious and depressed and so on.

So when you're having a rough day and you can't get on the water, let's say what would you do to stay positive or keep a good outlook? If I have to say, if you're having a hard day, it's always easy to go in the water and have fun. And then that makes everything better.

But let's say you can't go in the water. So make it a little bit harder to answer the question. What do you do? I will try to work on something. Now I have to study, I can video or do some stuff like this. So I don't know to make my days better. Probably I'm going to watch some video of not athletes from the past like a few days ago I rewatch, I don't know the name.

Red bull TV on a one on one chapter. I don't remember the name, but he has, he made a good video with Jesse Richman CAHE and Robbie nation in Fiji. Yeah. I love to see those videos. It really inspired me. Yeah. Yeah. It's called chapter one. I think. Oh, cool. I have to watch that. Is that kite, a kite surfing video or skate, surfing video all around the world.

And there's is a big part in Fiji, some of hers in Indonesia. So yeah. Very nice film to watch.

Let's talk a little bit about your wings. Like your, the F1 wings, like how would you compare the original F1 swing to the new F1 strike? What are the differences and what do you like about it and so on. Okay. It's totally different. It's much more steeper. It goes much faster. It keeps his shape.

Even if you like pull out your back hand, even strong wind. So that's totally a different way. Like it's yeah, just more rigid. And the profile remains the same with even a lot of pressure on it. And it's still like very light, very easy to use. It's really a wing and much higher too, but that's also the GDT name.

And then I, like I saw during the, they have a new wing for racing too with an extra like an extra baffle in it or extra kind of almost like inflatable battens. Is that right? Yeah, I know how to pronounce it in English breeds trust. I think it's the same as the one in the middle of it's a smaller one, but it's not another wing.

It's also the try, but be a size from the six meters, three strips. Okay. Let me see if I can pull that up. So yeah, you had it before it's on video,

straight wing, but on the bigger sizes they have this extra extra thing here. So what is what does that do? What's the advantage of having that?

Cause. So when chip is always touching the water, if you put, if you make the wind bigger,

like maids may doing like super wide wingspan, so they had to put so fast on the court, and if you put a lot of code and not was trust was stretched and not going to keep a good shape. So we was three stretch is going to take, keep a good shape. I think this is a profile. The profile is much more like that better.

So you get less and less flutter and stuff probably too in the trailing edge. Yeah. Also sometimes in strong winds, turning edge can flap on those ones are not at all. So yeah. Who knows maybe is he gonna use it on the smallest size later? So let's talk a little bit about the foils. Are these the foils that you're using?

Yeah. Downright. Yeah. I'm using a nine 40 or is it

okay? Yeah, same chamber, much smaller. I know if they're online yet.

And and wood, what do you like about it? W why is it? Why does it work? You think it's a medium aspect ratio, so pretty a few brands are coming with this. Now

we still have a good glide ratio. You still have a good speed, which of course the smaller,

the weight, and also improving, not gonna have the same book because the aspect was a wing makes a good book too. If you have a high aspect, me, you're gonna have a better book in the lower aspect. So this is like a medium aspect wing. It looks like, right. Yeah, that's what I said. So I think

And then the, as like a nice curve to it, but then the tips are slightly turned up again. Do you find that helps when you, when the wing tip breaches and helps you help? When the Winship goes

to it doesn't catch much bubbles there in the main curve. It's too to have the full stable and maneuverable. Nice. And then the, is it the mass and the fuselage or one piece. Yeah, you can see it with the three screws. The connection between the mask also is two bucks. And then the tail wing. Do you ever do any shaming on the tailoring or do you just use it the way it is or whatever, but this one's already, not

that not so small too. And welcome. We have already like smaller sizes tailoring. Yeah. I'm using mesh smaller than these ones, right? She is the curve tailings or is yours more flat or what kind of shape is your, the one that actually the one I'm using now it's more curl will come with stone, like this much smaller.

And I think it's going to be better because you have better maneuverability and probably. Better speed too. Is there anyone that you would like to thank for supporting you over the years and in your career? Like anyone that's helped you or supported you? Probably my parents teach me how to, he teach me catcher, so he brings me into his sports and my mother taught me a lot in the beginning.

Buy me some gears now. Probably a fun. Cause they took me since beginning withdrew both together. So they helped me a lot in the beginning. And your, are your parents still in yukata? Caledonia? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. My parents are living Danza, gonna stay there forever for sure. And you're gonna keep going back there.

When do you think you'll ever end up living there again? Or do you like living in Europe better? I really like Europe yeah. Going on a night thing. I really like Ireland too. And was specifically for the condition. The thing is now there is a lot of people don't talk about it. Cause it's, as we talked about in the beginning, it's not a well-known place where there's a lot of sharks attack.

Now there's many people eaten by sharks every year, like more than in Australia, many places. So it's going to be a problem for specifically, for people that are going a lot in the world like me. So I will see. And for sure there is good play, good places. Be some nerves. Somewhere else. I haven't been to French refugees, so I have to visit more places to see if there's somewhere else again, I can say,

but now I'm not going to stay in France, for sure. Even if I really like space for all the things, but I don't have in islands. Have you been to the Canary islands or any other?

I haven't been to canneries. I've been to, I was in the Caribbean this winter too, really? I think I prefer still. I think we've had, I think we have better condition where it's not not also. I have all my friends were, their thing is much easier. Yeah. I think we have very good condition too.

Yeah, it looks pretty amazing. For this show about wing fighting, who else do you think I should interview? Are there any other good people or friends you have or people, that would be interesting to talk to for insights about when quilling you've been interviewing Zane bowels and who else

Yeah. Yeah, penny Riker for the athletes. Yeah, and a few other people, but yeah. W who else do you think would be good to talk to men and women? You already did, honey, any record I talked to then who, I don't know. I really want to heard about advice and tips from the Spencer boys, or it would be nice if you interview them.

Who else. I don't have much. Hi girls. Huh. Who is pushing in France? There's a girl who won here in in the cat. It's Olivia Kenna. Yeah, she's doing good. Who else? I don't know. Who is pushing along, talking to you there? Is there someone in their room with you?

You want to say hi she wouldn't be at and say hi on the video now. Okay. Heidi. Just telling me. Okay. So Olivia piano, Jeff Jeffrey. And

For sure. I would love to, to hear what Ty thinks about his fame, but I don't know. Yeah. He has time. He's pretty busy. Yeah, it's hard to get him be nasty if you can reach him. For sure. Yeah. Cool. Anything else you want to talk about? Usually like at the end of these videos, most people already left, but there's a few hardcore people that are full, crazy that they're still watching.

So do you have a special message for those people that are still watching after an hour and a half

to say, thank you to you. It's nice. But various people like you doing this thing for sure is going to interest. Many people are on a roll. And for me, it's nice. You're giving me a person who I'm going to hear because yeah, for sure. I really want to hear what a yeah. So I'm going to look at them for sure.

Next month. All right. Thank you very much to rich and to me for this. I'm really happy. Yeah. Thank you so much for your time. It's always fun to talk about wing foiling and I just find thinking about it and hearing other people give pointers. It's so helpful, when you get on the water and try something new, if you already have to do it again Jeff real  I really wish I had advice for backflips and many for the backups for mum.

I didn't try and match, but if I had only a few advice, like I did this video, you should go a lot faster and faster circles. Yeah. Loads of people are doing it and yeah, it's gonna spray many people are gonna do it soon for sure. Yeah, thanks for sharing your secrets. Now you're going to have more competition sometime.

Yeah. So you have some tricks up your sleeve that you that you're working on right now. Like new tricks that nobody's seen yet. No, I have to work on it. I haven't, no, I'm not pushing much, honestly. I've been almost always following. Yeah. I didn't learn by flick even the front flips. A few perfectly, but.

I came after his one who land one during the competition, the 360, it was probably bus or someone else doing it the first. So now I'm not pushing my freestyle anyway, that's I start liking more and more now, but in the beginning it was not really something I like really, for me, the wing goes in a way and that's it.

But now, yeah, cause I said, cause you can do tricks in a way. It make sense for me to also learn tricks and I don't see any yet doing, she'll be only this. So I helped competition going to be more and more in a way. Okay. So one more question. So when you think about like your skills, is it how much of it is just natural talent that you have, naturally talented for the sport and how much is it practice and thinking about it, visualizing, and then just time on the water.

We're practicing it.

You're asking me about me. Like how much of it is your talent and how much of it is practiced on the water. Okay. That's yeah, I don't want to be like, I don't want to say I'm good. I think I'm not working much like for trick. So I think it comes from talent. Interesting. Really? I just, now sometimes people see me and can look and try to understand.

Most of the time now, just on myself, I don't push much money, save myself doing many times and just do a few drinks in my session. So maybe it came from Thailand sometime

the video from 11, just in one day is a backlit for me to maybe a bit more for sure. Yeah. It's also all the experience he hasn't before that. And other sports and other things. And also he was the guy who were lending his brother and defray that keeps so for sure he had good advice from them.

So what Baltz Miller was saying, like a lot of times he like dreams about wing foiling, or he can't sleep at night and he's like thinking about it in his head a lot and stuff like that. Do you spend a lot of time thinking about weighing foiling or visualizing it in your head or? No,

but really I'm not thinking. I'm thinking of a lot of things. It was the thing, but really I'm not really, it depends if I had a really big condition, like a superstition, of course, I'm going to dream about it, but accommodation, even doing tricks and stuff. It's nice, but it doesn't give me like such

big waves, man. Yeah. All right. Thank you so much. This is really good interview. I appreciate your time. I have to get going too, but good luck with everything. I help you. Stay number one in the world. That's awesome. Just keep doing what you're doing and you're in spirit inspirational. So thank you for that.

All right. Okay. Have a good night. Aloha. Bye bye. All right, friends. Thank you for watching another full episode of the blue planet show. You made it all the way to the end. You're one of those elite few people that are crazy enough to watch the whole thing and just can't get enough of it just like me. So congratulations.

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