S1E01 – Invite People In, And Talk A Little Story – F1RST Episode!  

🎙️ IS THIS THING ON?!

The first ever episode of the podcast that started as an idea for a radio show about surfing. Watch Brad and Chris figure this thing out over the course of 30 minutes of an Instagram Live recording from F1RST Shop on Miami Beach, FL

Originally recorded: Jan 24, 2018

This episode includes:

  • Hurricane Irma
  • Surfing Podcasts
  • Shane Dorian on the Joe Rogan Experience
  • How-to Get Clued-in at a New Surf Spot
  • Surf Recap for the Week
  • How to Be a Surfer in Florida
  • Surf Pools
  • Division Wynwood
  • Miami Beach Surf History
  • Support the Caribbean

 

[00:00:00] Brad: So, uh, Chris and I have been talking about maybe doing this on the regular, a little talk story show where we could go through all the different stuff that’s happening in the surf community locally here. Forecasts, reports. boards, equipment, local guys, travel,

[00:00:21] Chris: stories, uh, I mean, even start to go off topic.

[00:00:24] Chris: I mean, you never know where one thing leads you into another. Other people doing it? I mean, they do it. People come in here all the time to kind of talk a little story, recap and whatever. This is true. So we figured this would be a great way for a couple of surf nerds. Kind of talk about weather surf coming up.

[00:00:40] Brad: There is surf

[00:00:40] Chris: trends industry stuff, whatever, you know I’m just kind of keeping it real and local and you know, who’s by

[00:00:46] Brad: I know you guys out there actually listen to podcasts Let us know in the comments.

[00:00:54] Brad: Ah the giant log on the beach. That’s a great topic that showed up during Hurricane Irma

[00:00:59] Chris: That’s right And the the city had tried a couple different times and the county to actually move it off the beach Cause he had people complaining about it. I don’t know why, but they, uh, they had a bunch of front loaders and big tractors that were trying to move it and they couldn’t.

[00:01:13] Chris: Uh, so they kind of gave up. Uh, they had also a lot of feedback from locals that really, uh, wanted it to stay there for picture purposes and whatnot. And actually became a cool little tourist spot. So they’re leaving it there. The worst that I could imagine it moving off the beach would be into the park at South Point, but that’s about it.

[00:01:29] Chris: I’ve gotten word that Um, that thing is not going anywhere.

[00:01:32] Brad: Yeah. So it looks like some of you guys listen to podcasts a lot and some of you guys not at all. That’s kind of similar to Chris and I, I listened to podcasts a pretty good deal, I guess.

[00:01:41] Chris: And I’ve never listened to one at

[00:01:42] Chris: all. I’m so, you know,

[00:01:47] Brad: so you know, you should start one then.

[00:01:49] Chris: Sounds about right. You know, um, figure, you know, there’s what, you know, how hard can it be to talk?

[00:01:57] Brad: We talk a lot

[00:01:58] Chris: and we do talk a lot. And those of you have cruised by the surf shop, you know that we talk a lot. So. Hopefully, um, there are things that we can kind of pick up again, like Brad had mentioned, anywhere from boards, uh, new boards that have come in, uh, material that’s out there, um, understanding what volume counts are like and how, how to find that perfect board.

[00:02:17] Brad: Oh, actually, I listened to the Joe Rogan when I saw, uh, Carlos was asking about that. I listened to Joe Rogan’s episode with Shane Dorian the other day, and that was kind of, uh, a little bit of inspiration for us thinking about how to work on this.

[00:02:31] Chris: Where do they start the, where do they start their conversations at?

[00:02:33] Chris: Like, does it go straight into like, Hey, you’re a big wave surfer and you shred.

[00:02:37] Brad: That was basically what Joe Rogan said. Yeah, that was it. He was like, See, I can do podcasts. Oh, so you got a family, you got all this other stuff, that’s cool. I saw you surf really, like, crazy big waves. Tell me about that. But Shane does.

[00:02:52] Brad: Shane Doherty definitely does.

[00:02:54] Chris: That’s killer. Uh, did they go off topic?

[00:02:57] Brad: Yeah, I mean they followed that. Cause Shane’s a

[00:02:59] Chris: big hunter.

[00:03:00] Brad: Yeah, and Joe Rogan, I didn’t know this about him at all, is also a huge hunter. And so they like talked about going bow hunting for two hours. Bow hunting, that’s tough. And they also talked about, I think I told you the other day, going out into the woods for seven days straight by yourself, no friends, no technology.

[00:03:23] Brad: Well, you’re on your own.

[00:03:24] Chris: He’s not with anybody else. He’s just, he’s just camping. No human voices

[00:03:29] Brad: for seven days. That’s pretty intense. And this is all in Hawaii, does it? Or is it just He did that one in Yeah, it was in Hawaii. Right behind, uh, actually back on the ranch by his place.

[00:03:41] Chris: Uh, I wonder how they can hear us.

[00:03:42] Chris: Can you guys hear us pretty decently? I mean, is there, I mean, we don’t have anything professionally set up whatsoever. But, you know, if you guys can put it out there and let us know if you can hear us decently. At least, you got a pretty loud voice. I can project. I can project louder. You don’t know, do you?

[00:03:59] Chris: Um, but past that. Uh, we got some surf coming up, maybe.

[00:04:04] Brad: Yeah, there’s been surf all week. That’s been upcoast. Been really good. Uh, alright. I’m just reading here. Any advice for a long time surfer coming from South Latina out to California with two younger arms on a tight budget?

[00:04:22] Chris: Uh, you’re going out to Cali.

[00:04:25] Chris: I mean, there’s, there’s a surf shop on every block, you know? So from wetsuit rentals to surfboards, uh, you’re going to have a large selection of them. So definitely don’t travel with any, uh, cause there’s no need to waste that kind of money. You have. Plenty of shops that’ll just rent them for dirt cheap again because there’s so many surf shops on every other block You’ll have a pretty good deal so from there It’s just a matter of checking out the surf reports whether it’s through thank you surfing or any of the other means from surf Surf line to kind of see what’s going on But I’ll tell you what even when it’s flat out there and it’s one to two and you got some small little grounds You can push them into just about anything.

[00:04:59] Brad: Yeah, I think the most important part is just to go to the shop That’s local to wherever you’re staying like go just google the local shop You And they’ll clue you in. I mean, anywhere you go, they know what’s up.

[00:05:10] Chris: So we have some surf on tap there. I’ve noticed through a lot of the weather pattern for this next pattern for surf kind of looked a little similar a couple of days ago to what we were getting last week.

[00:05:21] Chris: Um, and last week was a little bit of a conundrum. Like we really like, everyone thought this was it. Hurricane Sandy type of surf. I, uh, I, I didn’t fly out to California cause I was ready for, you know, for what we were going to get going on here. And it was fun and it was good. We had a small like little two hour window and you and I kind of broke down as to what happened, like how it was going, because there was a combination of wind swell, right?

[00:05:44] Chris: When we had the refraction swell, bounce swell when the winds kind of blow out of the Northwest direction for a little while. And, um, and then we had an actual ground swell that was attached to it. Neither of which really completely held up to the size that we had anticipated originally.

[00:05:59] Brad: But then you can look back at some of the pictures.

[00:06:01] Brad: Right. And like the sets of the day were clearly overhead. Right. And if you just cherry picked from those images, the forecast met at least that. Right. You’re right. You’re right. But it was only for a couple hours. Right.

[00:06:15] Chris: And that was the whole thing is we anticipated like literally all day surf for a couple days at least and then residuals after that.

[00:06:21] Chris: Um, and you know. But we did have some fun surf.

[00:06:24] Brad: Nonetheless. We had four days in a row of ground swell. Right. Right. And

[00:06:29] Chris: if nothing massive, it was what fairways a little bit further up. Um, that was pretty sick. Thanks dude. Thanks Fred. Xernator. Um, so what do we think? Not going to happen the same size, same magnitude.

[00:06:47] Chris: Uh, not even remotely close. It looks like we got mostly wind attached to this

[00:06:51] Brad: for, well, I’m actually looking forward to this little groundswell that’s in the water already for upcoast. Like today’s, overhead at the right spots for sure tomorrow should be in the head high range for good spot and then as you come further down into, you know, southern central florida, maybe like, uh, Just above martin county But above bahama bank should be chest high shoulder high tomorrow the wind’s supposed to be good So, I think tomorrow is a good day to go upcoast.

[00:07:22] Brad: We’re gonna be surfing anywhere in central Florida. Should be really good. And we have a front coming through. Yeah, that front’s gonna be what’s turning the winds. And then that front should maybe give us some waves Monday time period or next week.

[00:07:37] Chris: Uh, give us waves as in us down here in South Florida or us as in like, you know, north of here.

[00:07:43] Chris: Probably Norfolk.

[00:07:44] Brad: I mean, that’s generally the case, but, um, we might have a shot at it. I mean, like we only get so many cold fronts a year. So every time there’s a cold front, you have some chance of waves. Some cold fronts are better situated, uh, for us than others, but you gotta, you gotta pay attention a little bit.

[00:08:00] Brad: I mean, it’s not going to be a, the swell of the year or you can just tap into thank you, sir. Yeah. You could also just follow. Thank you, sir.

[00:08:09] Chris: Um, killer. All right. Well, um, it’s Friday.

[00:08:15] Brad: It’s Aloha Friday. Aloha Friday. Every day is Aloha.

[00:08:18] Chris: That’s true.

[00:08:20] Brad: In

[00:08:21] Chris: this chapel. Oh, Kenny Lane. Look at you, buddy. You’re dreamy.

[00:08:27] Chris: Um, but anywho, I mean, it’s a good little rough draft. Yeah. A little starter to kind of just see how things are going. Yeah. There’s going to be so much more to kind of talk about. Uh, to kind of hit, we got surf again in a couple of days. I’m sure if we tapped into that, we have a surf expo coming up as well.

[00:08:47] Chris: We’ve

[00:08:47] Brad: got some stuff going on up there and yeah, we definitely got a whole bunch of live stuff from surf expo.

[00:08:52] Chris: Absolutely. We’re looking to go ahead and grab some of the old school guys. Uh, when we get offshore waves at a cold front or a hurricane swell? Yeah,

[00:09:00] Brad: actually this is a really good example of a time we get waves, uh, that’s not from a cold front and not from a hurricane swell.

[00:09:08] Brad: And I mean we, I’m talking like the state of Florida here. Right now the, uh, swell we’re getting is an east swell or even an east southeast swell that’s coming from really just a big high pressure interacting with a low that’s closer to us. And it just created a huge fetch over pretty much the whole tropical Atlantic Ocean that’s pointed in our direction.

[00:09:31] Brad: So that’s why there’s waves up coast now. Um, the wind is going offshore and the wind is going to blow out of the west due to the cold front coming through. But it didn’t actually make these waves. So yeah, we do get waves that aren’t cold front related and aren’t hurricane related. It’s kind of rare, and I’d say most of our best swells are due to those sort of factors, but yeah, we get those.

[00:09:52] Brad: Alright. Trade swell kind of stuff. Well, we’re in January.

[00:09:56] Chris: It is cold front season. And our season is unfortunately not that long. And, uh, you know, eventually comes to a wrap. And January and February are our go to months. Yeah. For trying to see some swell. And we got some leftovers in March, and some wind

[00:10:10] Brad: swells pick up a little bit more.

[00:10:12] Brad: For surfability, I would say that March is probably like one of our most surfable months. Right. Just due to the fact that we get so much wind swell. Right. And then that’s punctuated by maybe one or two last good cold fronts. Right, right. We’ve had some really good waves last few March.

[00:10:27] Chris: And because I’m sure a lot of people might be, um, who’s doing dinner pairs in South Beach.

[00:10:32] Chris: Uh, well we have one Mitch Crute, uh, old school local from the Haulover Harbor House days. Uh, did nitro surfboards actually started, uh, South Beach underground surfboards with one Jack Gavilan. So he does our dinger pairs, picks them up every Sunday and drops them off every Sunday. Boards, bikes, and beers, Florida surf is the best because it’s a lot warmer than most.

[00:10:56] Brad: Yeah,

[00:10:57] Chris: but

[00:10:59] Brad: you just have to be consistent. You just gotta have a bit of a big smile on your face. And what up Cocoa Beach?

[00:11:07] Chris: Talk some story.

[00:11:09] Brad: Yeah, I mean, that’s actually another that’s a good point. You know, Florida doesn’t get waves all the time and South Beach for sure Like barely gets waves. So what the hell is a surfer to do?

[00:11:20] Chris: You know, yeah, you kind of have to travel or stay on top of that for the most part. Um, have a flexible job As most surfers I feel like growing up down here they were either in the restaurant industry or hospitality of some sorts because It was either you were working at night or a lot, it was relatively flexible.

[00:11:38] Chris: So they’d be like, what’s going on for the waves, which is kind of one of the hardest parts about being a Florida surfer is that you kind of gauge a lot of your life around that surf. If you’re really committed to it. Whereas you guys in California and Hawaii, when you’re surfing, you just got to be like, Hey, I’m going to surf on Thursday.

[00:11:52] Chris: Hey, I’m going to surf up there. I’m going to take care of all this stuff. I got to take care of it. I’m going to go surf on Thursday. What do we got going on here? Oh, it’s going to be waves Friday. Uh, babe, can you pick up the kids? Rearrange your whole life. Mark, I’m not calling in sick, I promise. You call whatever store you’re at and you’re calling in sick.

[00:12:10] Chris: Because you never know. But, it’s kind of part of the hardships. But you gotta stay on top of weather patterns. Uh, you kinda, you know, you kinda become junior meteorologist. Uh, hopefully. That’s

[00:12:19] Brad: true, for sure.

[00:12:20] Chris: Learn as much as you can, cause it’s actually pretty interesting and fun. But we’re the hungriest circus.

[00:12:26] Chris: We really are. We kind of just, you know, we, we, we’re going after whatever. Like a lot of times back behind here, it’s like cross currents. That means winds. That means an outgoing tide, you know, some stars. Barely knee high. Right. Right. And smile on your face and a little beer afterwards, you know, kind of makes it all right.

[00:12:43] Chris: And you kind of sit back and talk a little story and kind of invite people in to kind of talk a little story with you.

[00:12:49] Brad: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. There’s a lot more to surfing than actually riding waves. Yeah, yeah. I mean, if you think about the actual amount of time that you actually are standing up surfing.

[00:13:04] Brad: Right. It’s like, it’s like probably like the worst return on investment you can do in any sport. Considering how

[00:13:12] Chris: much it costs.

[00:13:14] Brad: I mean, everything that you put into it, you have to buy a board, you have to know when to go, you have to be in somewhat decent shape to be even like athletic enough to, to do it.

[00:13:23] Chris: And then travel to be able to go ahead and get on some of the practice that you need to kind of make it happen consistently, which is always what kills us. But you know what? Surf pools, surf pools, those things are going to change a lot of things nonetheless. And I’m thinking with the next couple of years, we’re going to have a couple down here and it’s going to at least Lift the ability to be able to go ahead and have like a surf workout.

[00:13:44] Chris: Um, and even do all the training. I mean, these guys are taking it to the next level in WSL. Gone are the days that guys are flicking cigarettes out into the water before they go into the heat. No, these guys are like machines. Machines. It’s crazy. Eventually there’s going to be Home Depot sponsoring this sport.

[00:14:01] Chris: Which, you know, I mean, if you’re a surfer and you get in the loop, who cares? Oh, that’s a whole other question. I mean, this is a whole other topic we can get into, like, you know, versus the purists. The purists that are, you know, those people that are like, you know, screw sponsorships and all that and what you’re doing.

[00:14:15] Chris: And then there’s the business side of things. We’ve seen the business side of the industry kind of take a hit in the last 10 years or so. I

[00:14:21] Brad: think it will be changing.

[00:14:22] Chris: Oh, I think it will be changing. It’s transitioning right now. We’re seeing a lot of differences. But, you know, it makes it tough for, for a lot of people to do stuff and even surfers.

[00:14:29] Chris: We’ve seen surfers get asked. I mean, Dayton Reynolds got let go of my Quicksilver. That’s pretty big. Dave Reynolds doesn’t suck. They had no money. No money. No money. No, I mean, look, if you’re nixing Kelly’s line because he got no money, then you know, you got no money. Because Kelly can kind of sell anything.

[00:14:47] Chris: Kelly, you’re a

[00:14:48] Brad: seller. What are your cool thoughts? Uh, we’ve done a couple of trips, uh, with Thank You Seraphine to Typhoon Lagoon in Orlando. It’s fun. It’s not surfing in the ocean. That’s for sure. And I’ve surfed the wave pool

[00:15:02] Chris: out

[00:15:02] Brad: in Austin. That’s right. You

[00:15:03] Chris: did. And, uh, you know, it’s a little different.

[00:15:05] Chris: It’s a, it’s counterintuitive a little bit because the ocean and its energy and the way the wave breaks kind of comes from the same direction and the way that the line is drawn. Whereas this place, the source of that energy. Is coming from a complete different way from where the wave is breaking. So you have maybe the source of energy coming to your left, but the way it starts to break on your right.

[00:15:23] Chris: So you’re, you’re breaking, you’re filing into it and then you’re curving back around and you’re just trying to trimming line and stuff like that. But you know, seeing stuff that’s coming out with like the cove and all these other generations, weber’s new pool as well, like. And Kelly’s pool. I mean, it’s just ridiculous.

[00:15:37] Chris: Like you see,

[00:15:39] Brad: they’ve said that, like, they have something crazy, but they’re not saying what, right? I know. It’s like, I like that idea. I was like, it’s

[00:15:48] Chris: going to be a race. It’s going to be a race. You’re going to have all these guys. Well, you have, like, you have the summer Olympics in Japan. I was at 2020 around the corner.

[00:15:55] Chris: Is that, yeah, I don’t think they’re

[00:15:57] Brad: doing anything. No, no, no. I heard it was not a wave pool because they would, they’d have to build it already. Yeah. It’d have to be like in progress. Is it happening?

[00:16:08] Chris: Is it not? Stay tuned. Olympic Committee, International Olympic Committee. Do any of these pools have salt?

[00:16:15] Chris: Uh, no. A lot of it, the mechanical factors in it is, um, I mean, unless they went and used, like, some serious, serious material. I’ve never heard of that. Unless they used some serious material that wouldn’t get corroded because of salt or maybe brackish, at the moment it’s just all, all fresh water. Fresh water.

[00:16:30] Chris: Which is a whole other How do you approach that? You know, at the end of the day, we know that fresh water has got a lack of buoyancy compared to ocean water. Right? We’ve seen it. If you guys have surfed Typhoon Lagoon, you’ve kind of seen it as well up there. Um, is that what, what do you have to end up doing?

[00:16:43] Chris: You have to get a thicker board. You know, you have to get a little bit more volume because it gets you into the wave. And change your

[00:16:47] Brad: approach to surfing. Absolutely.

[00:16:48] Chris: Change. You can’t come as high as you used to be. You’re doing mid face turns, you know, but this is again, Typhoon Lagoon and the limitedness in regards to performance.

[00:16:56] Chris: I’m C. C. Kelly. It doesn’t seem like those guys are getting held back a little bit. Those guys are Yeah,

[00:17:01] Brad: you’re right.

[00:17:01] Chris: They’re kind of, we’re pushing it pretty decently. So, um, the technology is going to come around. It’s going to be pretty insane. It’ll be a race. And I think Florida is primed to, to have at least three different spots.

[00:17:11] Chris: It’s

[00:17:12] Brad: definitely one of the biggest

[00:17:13] Chris: surfing markets in the, in the world. And it’s like sunny here all year round. Weather is epic.

[00:17:18] Brad: I mean, there’s a reason Disney World is in Orlando.

[00:17:20] Chris: It’s true. And Miami is kind of epic all year round. For those that want to create a wave pool, listen to us. Miami.

[00:17:27] Brad: Yeah. Good

[00:17:28] Chris: spot.

[00:17:29] Brad: Yeah. Great.

[00:17:29] Chris: Great

[00:17:29] Brad: spot. Actually, like, right in my backyard is probably the best spot. That wouldn’t be out of selfish reasons, would it? No.

[00:17:36] Chris: Yeah, no. You know, because we share. Friends. I don’t like to leave the neighborhood. There is that, too. Something about living south of here in South Beach that doesn’t let you ever want to leave.

[00:17:46] Brad: 45 minutes. And it was scary, wasn’t it? Yeah. I had to have like some oil on a rash to work out.

[00:17:53] Chris: Get me back over

[00:17:54] Brad: here.

[00:17:57] Brad: I actually held my breath the entire time I was on the main man side. Oh,

[00:18:04] Chris: it’s good stuff. Well, we’re rounding up close to the 15 minute marker if not gone over 15 minutes Which is half pretty good of what we thought we’d be able to kind of make happen I feel like we still have so much more I could actually talk about and almost kind of bring in like some sort of ad sponsorships that kind of comes in You got to pay for the spot you got to pay for the spot, yeah, I’m kidding Or is it

[00:18:27] Brad: there could be they don’t even know that’s why we’re doing this.

[00:18:29] Brad: Maybe you Could be you she done before

[00:18:36] Brad: Maybe not. So, uh, local events. Yeah. I mean, I think that’s another, like I was saying before, there’s waves here so infrequently that you need something to do. Absolutely. You have to occupy your time. You can’t travel to surf all the time. No. But you still want to stay somewhat connected to surfing kind of stuff.

[00:18:58] Chris: Sure. Carry the spirit with you whenever. Which is typically what a surf shop kind of holds, right? I mean, the surf shop becomes that local spot that kind of you go to talk story, you hang out, have a brewski, or kind of

[00:19:09] Brad: just talk about

[00:19:10] Chris: the next surf show. Right, get info about what it is. The

[00:19:12] Brad: guy that came on before that was asking like where to bring his kids in California, it’s like bring them to the local surf shop.

[00:19:17] Brad: I don’t even care where you are, just bring them to the local shop. Right, talk to those guys,

[00:19:21] Chris: they’ll get you dialed in. Most surf shops are all about helping people out.

[00:19:25] Brad: I mean, they wouldn’t be in business if they weren’t doing that for a little while. Surf training. Yeah, actually surf training is something that I’ve been thinking a lot about.

[00:19:35] Brad: What up Mario? But it’s I hate exercise. And really the only exercise I get is surfing. Except for when I’m going on a trip and then I’ll like force myself to do something. Like extra stretching, maybe some running and swimming.

[00:19:53] Chris: Can we all agree that one of the worst things about surfing? Yeah. Going on surf trips is being how out of shape you are.

[00:19:59] Chris: Oh yeah. That’s like a waste of money. Don’t even go. Right. And then it takes like by day three before you can kind of like, okay. And then by day four, you’re completely so sore that by day five, you jump into the water and the first paddle you do, you’re like,

[00:20:10] Brad: Oh, that was painful. Yeah. Why am I doing this?

[00:20:13] Brad: Well, I don’t know about the, why am I doing this? It’s like, why did I do this to myself? Oh, right. Yeah. In regards to like,

[00:20:18] Chris: because you’re there for me, um, but yeah, I mean, there’s, there’s It’s funny to see guys that are fit, right? That come in and want to do surf lessons. They kind of laugh and quaff at the fact that they’re like, Oh, blah, blah, blah.

[00:20:30] Chris: I can handle it. But they’re using muscles that they never used before. And within 10, 15 minutes, done, done and saying, this is the hardest thing I’ve ever tried.

[00:20:37] Brad: Yeah.

[00:20:38] Chris: And, and it’s true. You’re just using different muscles, um, that kind of work through it. So everything from pushups, even burpees, you know, you can

[00:20:46] Brad: do like the most simple, I think at least I’m not like a fitness expert clearly, but I think it’s good if you can do like a little bit of cardio, a lot of stretching and that’s pretty much, and then spend as much time as you can in the ocean.

[00:21:02] Chris: Right. And then of course, within that, and any good nutritionist or anybody else to tell you that 80 percent is your diet, you know what you’re putting in you. And that for a lot of us, it’s a hard thing. It’s so hard, but you know, uh, usually non impactful things like swimming, get a good coach at many beaches, Alex Montero, Um, you know, that guy will help you out.

[00:21:24] Chris: Normandy Pool helps me out.

[00:21:26] Brad: Mario, you want to do a push up contest? I don’t think so, buddy. Alright, you start first. Let’s see how many you get to.

[00:21:33] Chris: One

[00:21:36] Brad: Sorry, I’m on pull ups. Two

[00:21:38] Chris: Um As

[00:21:40] Brad: far as local

[00:21:43] Chris: events, things going on, surf training, we’re actually going to have an event. Uh, for division Wynwood, which is our surf skate tattoo shot that we opened up in Wynwood.

[00:21:53] Chris: If the, for those that don’t know, follow at division Wynwood and you’ll get to kind of stay up. And we’ve teamed up with Ami James, Chris Nunez, a bunch of tattoo, other guys, artists. Um, Walter, that’s not nice, but it’s true. I do look creepy, don’t I? It’s the glasses, it’s not the

[00:22:08] Brad: mustache. No, it’s not his look, it’s just his look.

[00:22:11] Brad: Uh, but not

[00:22:11] Chris: this weekend, the following weekend we’re going to do a relaunching party out of our Wynwood spot because we had it closed for about the last couple of days. Another party? Another party. So, we’ll let you know through Thank You Surfing, through First Surf Shop, as well, Oop, Hurley Pro, jumped in there, I probably don’t think that’s the actual Hurley Pro.

[00:22:26] Chris: It could be. Or is it? Bob Hurley. Call me, call Mark, you know Mark. Anyway, it’s past that. Please come join us. It’s going to be fun. We’ll, we’ll post it again. It’s not this weekend, but the following weekend, we’ll have plenty available. Maybe a live podcast. We could do something like that. Maybe live get while you’re out there and stuff like that.

[00:22:48] Chris: Um, some of the things I hope to accomplish with this aside, sir, forecasting, talking story, broing down all the other stuff is really highlighting.

[00:22:59] Brad: Uh huh.

[00:23:01] Chris: Some of the local legends that we have there. And not only that, but some of the history that we have going on here. That’s the

[00:23:06] Brad: thing that’s crazy to me about Miami.

[00:23:09] Brad: I’m not from here. I just live here. Where are you from? New York, New York, New York, Long Island, New York. And realizing how big of a surf scene there is here was kind of surprising. One. And then realizing how far back, I mean, it goes back to the beginning of surfing on the East coast. Wow. Wow. That’s how far back Miami beach goes.

[00:23:32] Chris: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we, we’ve had, we’ve had a Mr. Witten. Yes. The Witten’s in themselves, the ones that started Bell Harbor shops. Uh, they were pretty much the godfathers of the forefathers of surfing down here in South Florida. Uh, and one of the first ones in the East coast as well. Um, and you’re talking about late thirties, early forties.

[00:23:52] Brad: Yeah. I saw a picture of him crossing Collins Avenue with a surfboard. With the saltwater croc in the middle of right. And that was,

[00:23:59] Chris: that was Bay Harbor. That was Val Harbor, Val Harbor, Val Harbor streets and stuff with a croc walker across. So these guys were attacking surf here for such a long time. And we’ve got such a rich history, rich history, um, that most people don’t understand.

[00:24:10] Chris: Cause I always tell people, uh, whether it’s in the industry or outside of the industry, like Miami, for whatever reason, doesn’t have. That DNA of surf that you guys, right. That people understand like our, our community and whatnot, understand that they get it, but there’s so much that brought us to this point, um, down even to like the grits of surfing in the eighties here, uh, when, how tough it was, and we’ve got so many great locals, uh, that are of our same age and a little bit older, that got such great stories about that, about how, and it reminds me of like Venice on the dog town days, you know, it was kind of just real rough and gritty.

[00:24:40] Chris: And you talk to guys from Miami for, you know, way back then that surfed in the sixties, seventies into the eighties. And it was, it was rough like that. And it’s funny to hear these stories and I’m hoping to capture a lot more of them because we’ve got a lot of older dogs that are, you know, older. Yeah. So, you know, kind of need to get them going,

[00:24:58] Brad: put it into archive.

[00:25:01] Chris: Absolutely. So I’m kind of hoping we do a little something like that while we go up to Surf Expo. Oh, that’d be great. That’s actually where,

[00:25:07] Brad: uh, what’s his name, uh, Bill and Dudley? Whitman, Whitman. Yeah, the Whitmans.

[00:25:12] Chris: We did, we did a little article with him on Ocean Drive Magazine. That was pretty cool.

[00:25:15] Chris: Really? A couple years back. Yeah, we did that. It was like the spread in the middle and whatnot. So it’s pretty cool.

[00:25:21] Brad: Um, so yeah, I mean, it’s incredible that there is so rich a history of surfing here that I mean, outside of the very few that know about it, would never ever think that it exists.

[00:25:35] Chris: Absolutely.

[00:25:36] Chris: And I think it’s our responsibility to go ahead and, it’s our responsibility to go ahead and capture these moments and be able to go ahead and preserve them in some way to go ahead and push it forward. I’ve, I’ve worked with a couple of great guys that were part of the Miami Surf Archive project that, uh.

[00:25:50] Chris: That we’re just doing exactly that. So, um, we didn’t really have as big of a platform to do things, but I think we might have a better one now. I mean, it’s an

[00:25:57] Brad: important thing to do.

[00:25:58] Chris: Absolutely. And I’m hoping that we can kind of showcase that, um, showcase some sort of, you know, everything that we got. I mean, travel, what do you, what do you got going on?

[00:26:07] Chris: Are you going anywhere new soon? New

[00:26:10] Brad: or not? I ain’t going anywhere soon. No, I got really nothing on the maps right now. I mean, I want to go back to Puerto Rico. They could use the money. Yeah. I think everyone should probably try to like go take advantage

[00:26:24] Chris: of the fact that it’s probably cheaper to go there than, and it’s not that it’s ever been that expensive.

[00:26:29] Chris: Um, you know, just like go down there and spend some money. Right.

[00:26:32] Brad: The adventure continues and awaits you. I mean, I haven’t been back to the Caribbean in a while. Yeah. It can be really hard to get a good, but It gets good and perfectly blue and beautiful. And they can use the money. They can

[00:26:52] Chris: definitely use the money.

[00:26:53] Chris: So,

[00:26:53] Brad: you know, coming from a place that’s a tourist town, I understand what that’s like. When this place ended out after Irma, it was sad. You could see, like, literally, like, livelihoods diminished.

[00:27:06] Chris: Our livelihood was a little bit off.

[00:27:08] Brad: Yeah, everybody, everybody that was here, I mean, it’s a huge disruption to your life.

[00:27:13] Brad: And so, those people got decimated, and they could use a little bit of help, so what the hell, go surfing. Do it often.

[00:27:21] Chris: Do it here. Stop by First Surf Shop. Pick up a bar of wax. Come talk story with us. Well, I mean, is there any much more you want to go ahead and hit on our maiden voyage? I mean, this has been fun.

[00:27:31] Chris: It was actually kind of fun, thanks. I mean, I had a little beer, too. Um, so should we sign off? I mean, kind of off to the next one? Yeah, so, yeah. Bye. Sounds like we got

[00:27:41] Brad: something going here. Thanks for joining us. Thanks for all your advice and for your feedback and your questions. Even you’re making fun of us.

[00:27:48] Brad: Walter, I see that. Thanks for joining Carlos. Um, Oh, I dropped off a whole bunch of stickers and pins over here at first shop, so come pick those up. And then over the next couple of days, I’ll probably go by division and drop off some stuff there so you guys can pick up stuff when they’re up and running.

[00:28:08] Brad: And, uh, Yeah, man, pass that. Thanks

[00:28:12] Chris: for swinging by. Thanks for stopping in.