Nate Florence Tried To Paddle ‘The Right’

At the beginning of this year, we published an article titled, “How Long Until Someone Paddles Cyclops Or The Right?“

Turns out it took exactly 244 days for someone to try.

Nathan Florence just posted his latest YouTube dispatch, from a three hour session at The Right.

“On this channel we post every session, from the days where we can’t paddle out to the days we get the waves of our lives, but honestly, I almost didn’t post this one,” Nathan admitted. “I felt embarrassed by it as first. I just couldn’t get into the right position for a real set wave. I caught a tiny insider that barely capped on the reef but that doesn’t count. It only counts on a proper set wave at The Right and that’s my goal.”

We’d be fools to shame Nathan for it. In fact, one of the most impressive and daunting things about the attempt is the sheer fact that Nate is respectful and respected enough to be allowed by locals to not only film The Right but also to call out waves that he wants to go on.

“To get a set you’re gonna have to position yourself so far in that if you don’t go on the wave you’re gonna go over the falls. You need to sit where you’ll get caught inside and due to the strong draw of the wave be placed in the right spot to possibly make the drop,” Nathan told us today. “You need to put yourself in a spot where the only option to not get worked is to make the drop and make the wave, which is a terrifying position to be in. You’ll need to be in the right headspace, with the right board, with no jet lag and on top of that you need it to be the right swell and all the conditions to come together and be perfect if you want to get a real one. It has to be one of those “everything right” conditions. It’s not called “The Right” for no reason [laughs]. It’s gonna take a lot from me but I think I can make it happen and I’m stoked to try again.”

A week ago, we actually published another article titled, “What’s The Hardest Wave To Paddle?” where we talked to Kipp Caddy, Soli Bailey, Russell Bierke, and Nathan himself to try and grade the world’s slabs by difficulty. Long story short — two waves earned top honors and they’re both still heretofore un-paddled: Cyclops and The Right.

“I also think though that the biggest, baddest waves out there just simply aren’t paddle waves. Maybe a future generation will be able to, never say never, but I don’t think the biggest, baddest ones are possible,” Nathan continued. “But I do think that some really solid set waves are possible. It’s just gotta be the best day ever and you’ve gotta be perfectly drifted into the tiny take-off zone. But, I’m stoked to have just tried. And someone’s gotta go out and there and learn and try and push that limit. At the beginning of this year I told myself that I wanted to paddle waves that have never been paddled or draw new lines on waves that have been paddled. I tried it recently at The Shock in Brazil and it didn’t work out and now I’ve tried it at The Right and, for me, those are some of the coolest sessions where you’re not in your comfort zone and you just have to see and look and try and find those new limits and that’s where my priorities are right now, for myself and for big-wave surfing as a whole.”

As surf viewers, far from faulting Nathan, it seems we should praise him for investing the time and resources to fly 26 hours, diplomatically organize things with locals, and recruit his own wife, Mahina Florence, to film B-roll just for a chance at three hours (the wave is super tide/wind-dependent) at The Right. Of all the world’s best heavy-water surfers, Nate has one of the best chances of actually doing the “impossible”, and he said he’ll be going back to try again.

As Soli Bailey told us, “Cyclops and The Right are waves that are on the next level of things and will push the boundaries in terms of finding out if it’s even humanly possible to paddle into them.”