PUERTO ESCONDIDO BIGGEST SWELL IN 10 YEARS!

Day 5 Swellbender, Porto. Me and Ivan gearing up. Looks super closed out but I think We could change with the tide That's it. We'll see you in the water. Hopefully we can catch a wave. Oh, and round two on the 360 cam. But that's a mega close out. That's a... Almost there. Almost there. Almost there. The storm is arriving. The second swell has come and passed. It was west and super closed out. There was a few really good waves through the day and I think Cristobal got a really good right. Me and Ivan gave it like four hours that swell day. We put in maybe four and a half hours and neither of us really rode anything special. The wind came up. Everyone went in. We're like, okay, here's our moment. Usually we wait until the wind comes up and then a good one will come. There's a crazy dragonfly. So we waited for the wind. The wind came up. There was a couple sick ones in the wind. Finally, after forever, I went on this right and it was like real doubled up. It was real pretty out. The water was real blue. I drove off the bottom. Two big pumps. Super deep. Driving through the barrel. Everything was going great. Everything just spit super hard. The spit was propelling me forward. There were two parts to the spit. The first part started to propel me forward. I was sick. Usually the spit can blow a path. If you're on the foam ball, the spit will blow a path through the foam ball. You can get a clear exit even if you're super deep. That's what's going on here. It started to do that and the spit doubled down and went twice as hard and literally just blew me off my feet. I went flying in the air and was like, oh man, I'm eating it. Hopefully I'll fly out of the barrel, but I went flying so quick. I somehow spun in the air, landed on my face or head or something and wrenched my neck and then my back just absolutely scorpioned. My head and upper body caught and my back scorpioned and something just snapped feeling in my low back. I couldn't really tell if it was the scorpion itself or something actually popped. I can't really remember now, but it was super sore. A few years ago I fractured my T12 or did a compression fracture of my T12 at Jaws which was a much more dramatic version of this, but it felt pretty similar. I had extreme pain right in the one vertebrae. I was like, no, I think I just ******* broke my back again. It faded as sometimes these things do. It got all hot and I actually paddled back out. I was like, oh, I tweaked my back. He was like, oh, how bad is it? I was like, I don't really know. I can't really tell. I'll have to sleep on it and see. That was a few days ago. I slept on it and I woke up. I'm not anywhere near as sore as I was when I had done the Jaws one, but one of the vertebrae is super, super sensitive to any hinging. I tried to go get a scan because tomorrow is a massive swell. This trip has been about chasing three swells and the third one is approaching with this big storm system. That's why it's all rainy and stormy. It's either just going to be three days of storm or a window or portals potentially 20 to 25 feet real south and crazy. Part of the reason why we're here, but now I'm hesitant. I don't want to have a compression fracture or something like that and go out and take another big slam and do something worse. That's just not worth it. Ivan's for sure going to surf if there's a window, but ideally tomorrow I'll get a scan when it opens up. Today's Sunday. I can just be like, hey, look, you got a bone bruise. You're all good. Structurally everything's fine or just give me a definitive answer if something is more injured than I think it is. You fall that many times moving that quick at a wave like Porto and your odds of injury just get higher and higher. I'm honestly not super surprised. I don't just go on waves thinking I'm going to fall, but most of them I thought I was going to make. Kind of a bummer. A bit injured. But either way, Ivan will be out there and the boys will be out there, so we'll see what happens. The swell. Storm's arrived. Look at the size of that wave. Oh my gosh. The swell is massive. So I've gotten two CT scans now. Trying to get an idea of my back, but the storm is hitting. The conditions are pretty clean, but the waves are huge already. You can almost see them over the trees over there. It's easily 20 foot already. Look out the back. You can see these massive walls out there. And this is just the start of the swell. You see all that sand moving. Pretty insane that we're ending up here and the biggest swell in like 10 years is arriving. Oh my gosh. It's huge. Look at the speed of the current ripping by. This is how people get swept away and they end up out in that. So heavy. Biggest swell of the year approaching. I think the lifeguards are going to have their hands full. What the hell? Right with the offshore pluming it up. It's like a big board like catching it. You just like be in the plume like flying up. Oh, it's explosion. That was insane. Like lifeguards whistles. Yeah, it's pretty sketchy. Coming out all close. Oh my gosh, this set is so big. Dude, the sand is going to be so far out. Whoa. What is going on there? There's a full left bar. Can you hear all the lifeguards whistling? There's some bombs going off. This set is huge. This next wave is ginormous. Yeah, the one behind it is crazy. Whoa. To the right. Tomalingas. The thing was a smusher, bro. Oh, it's a big chunk-a-longer. Whoa. He's paddling. Two days of huge storm and swell. The team spent walking around, watching waves, massive waves. Yesterday was a slow road. I'd say it was about 60 feet maybe. Like properly massive. As big as I've seen Jaws on certain days. In real time it was looking like serious slow motion. Like it was taking so long for the lips to land. It took like an hour. Every once in a while wave would break and the explosion would just go like 100 feet in the air. That long period of filling, it filled in so powerfully. It was super heavy. There was hope that today would be a surf day. Second day of the swell, but it's just massive still and super wonked out. A lot of current. Tom Lowe actually paddled out with a few guys. They're probably going to rest it up and hopefully tomorrow. The medium ones today are the sets and when I say medium ones, it's still like 20 feet. Just crazy. It's so cool to be here, really special to be here and see waves that size doing their thing. If we get a surf day tomorrow, which is also my birthday, it would be the cherry on top. That wave size was more than 10 years ago, I think. Not very often you see 60 foot walls at Bordeaux. Exciting stuff. Oh my god. Was that guy up and riding? That was crazy. Still super big in the sand. You can see he's carved away and it's breaking. I haven't seen the sand where it's that flat and that far out in a long time. It's been like years. He's going. He's in there. That was insane. Someone looked at the next one. There we go. Just needs to be big enough. Thawing one out. Huge fire ants on the beach. That would be a nasty bite. Today's saddle out is going to be is going to need to be very well timed because the bar is pushed out so you don't want to get caught on the in between land. Whoa, crazy looking right. Chunky. Some big heavy rides out there. That thing was so gnarly. Not what I'm looking for today. Looking for a clean, chill ride. My back is feeling a lot better but still a little strange and stiff. That was a close one. I was getting sucked back. Aw, nobody. The best wave in the last hour, huh? It'll pull you straight down. It pulls, man. It'll pull you straight under. We've been paddling on a lot of rip currents. Neither me or Ivan have ridden a wave. It's been about two hours. Whoa, we've got a big set here. Post session, boys are doing some cards. Me and Ivan didn't get a wave. We sat for about three hours. It's okay, though, because we were just hanging out. It's my birthday. Sitting around, talking in the lineup. And now you're losing the cards. Birthday to you. So, we're session's done. We're going to have some dinner and have a good rest of the day and we'll surf tomorrow morning. Happy birthday, Nathan. You smell like a monkey. The World Cup is on. It's our... Well, tomorrow will be our final day, but it's been an epic trip here in Puerto Escondido. Good time. Love coming back here. And tomorrow, we're going to check in some tubes and we'll be off the plane. How's the video? Okay, here we go. Kalani. Big debut at Porto. Going to get one of these. What do you think? What's going to happen? I don't know. Oh, look at this lift. Oh, my God. There's not too many there, but yeah, there's not too many guys. Let's go. Did you wax up? Not a ton. Oh, look at that right, Kalani. No, that was so good. That's a lot. I might go hunt down there. Go get close to the shore so you're ready for the timing. Broken board. Charging too hard. Wow, Kalani's going to get so lucky right now. Not even going to get to experience the Porto paddle out. Now he's ready. Okay, here he goes. Go, go, go. Ivan thought that was funny. Oh, my gosh. He's trying. Who's that? That's Kalani. He got one. That was Kalani. What? That was crazy. Final review. Porto. Kalani's big first Porto mission. Unreal. Guy doesn't catch a wave for like an hour. We're like, where is he? What is he doing? There's all these waves. All of a sudden, a bomb comes. One of the boys is like, go. I have to go. That thing just came right to me. That was mental.