Billy Kemper is a titan of big wave surfing. In and out of contests, the Maui-born surfer has made an uncompromising march up the ranks of a world where your life and your reputation is on the line every time you paddle out. To be at the top of his game, Billy has curbed his adolescent ego, made sacrifices and dealt with horrific injuries.
When we caught up with Billy, he was mid-way through a stellar 2022. He’d already won The Paddle-In Ride Of The Year at Jaws, been towed into possibly the scariest wave ever at Teahupo’o and fulfilled his childhood dream of getting a giant tube at Maui’s capricious, freight-train right, Ma’alaea. This winning run would have been hard to imagine back in 2020. Billy’s career was nearly cut short after he suffered a brutal wipeout on a surf trip to Morocco. The wicked combination of a crushed right lung, broken pelvis, torn ACL and ripped MCL nearly ended his life.
As Billy well understands choosing the path of the big-wave-surfer is no easy grind. Here are seven things we learned chatting with Billy.
1. “I just have this image in my head that I’ll never forget that wave did something that I’ve never seen another wave do.”
Billy blew our minds on July 13th with his insane ride in arguably one of the biggest tow sessions ever out at Teahupo’o. In the lead up to the historic day, Billy was the most unprepared he has ever been, heading to Tahiti with only one tow board after doing some media work for his WSL series ‘Billy’ in California. Billy landed in Tahiti at 11 pm and was home in Hawaii 24 hours later. It was long enough for Billy to have another close encounter with death.
The waves were so wild that authorities called the conditions ‘Code Purple’, a level beyond the legendary Code Red session we saw in 2011. It wasn’t pretty Teahupo’o, it was ugly with howling winds, but Billy still found himself hustling alongside a stoic crew of big wave surfing’s elite. According to Billy, ‘Even Koa Rothman called it a day, early.’
There were only two surfers remaining in the line-up going into the late arvo, Billy and the prince of Teahupo’o, Matahi Drollet. The heavily-committed duo were still steaming with dissatisfaction and desperately wanted a bomb. After eight hours of surfing, their patience was rewarded when the biggest set of the day rolled through.
“We were actually kind of out of position,” remembers Billy. “Both our drivers kind of drifted over, and we were on the shoulder. And I think if we had taken the lines that we normally take on a tow wave out there – the wave that I went on for sure – you would have died, like there’s no physical way you could have ridden through the shock waves in the barrel of that wave, like whipping from behind. And same with the wave Matahi got.”
Billy somehow found a way to successfully ride the colossal wall of water, navigating a sketchy bump before brazenly looking back into the eye of the Tahitian monster like a gangster that just pulled off an impossible heist.
“I just have this image in my head that I’ll never forget, that wave did something that I’ve never seen from another wave. You know I’ve seen Jaws as big as it’s ever been. I’ve seen Nazare massive. I’ve seen the biggest waves ever towed in it at Chopes, but just the vibe and feeling in the darkness of that swell and storm. And that wave in particular, was just something that I don’t even believe should have been ridden. I’m so grateful to be alive and to have ridden that wave.”
2. Last time Billy surfed Ma’alaea on Maui, he was a freshmen in high school.
Despite suffering a minor injury in the Code Purple session at Teahupo’o, on the same hip that nearly ended his career, nothing was going to stop Billy from surfing the mythical wave, Ma’alaea. The swell forecast had all the Hawaiians hyped. Ma’alaea, sometimes called the fastest wave in the world, was expected to be firing for the first time in over a decade. Billy would have a few days in Kauai, to recover from the fall at Chopes, before flying to his childhood home in Maui.
Scoring Ma’alaea was so important to Billy that he was ready to miss an Indo boat trip with some of his best friends, Matt Meola and Torrey Meister.
“I was like, ‘I can’t miss Ma’alaea’ like if that wave breaks I have to be there. I’m not going to the Ment’s in you know four days with this swell hitting Ma’alaea’. It had been almost 20 years since I surfed that wave. When I was a freshman in high school. And since that day, I’ve been licking my chops to have a proper dig into it you know.”
Fortunately, he managed to fit in a two-hour session, and hitch a ride on a couple freight trains before jumping on a flight to the Mentawais the following day for another full week of surfing.
3. Jaws makes Billy a better person.
Billy was this year’s men’s ‘WSL Biggest Paddle In’ winner with a successful barrel on a 40-foot bomb at Peahi. Kemper is a four-time champion at Jaws and is considered one of the best out there. However, Jaws has a deeper meaning to him than just adrenalin pumps, and ego boosts from the wins and prize money. There is a spiritual dynamic, which Billy is drawn to.
“It does something internal that, for myself no other wave in the world can do. The second I get out there, it’s like, somebody lifts a weight off my shoulders, I feel like I’m free when I get out there. Makes me feel like a better person. And not only as a surfer, but just a better father. Jaws makes me a better person at the end of the day.”
Even though he has a deep love for Jaws he does not see himself surfing the wave for much longer.
“This lifestyle is not sustainable. This is not a forever thing. I’m not going to compete out at Jaws till I’m 45-years-old. You know, I’m not going to be Twiggy. I’m not going to be out there pushing into my 50s in a jersey. There’s no chance you’ll see me in a jersey out at Jaws past the age of 40-years-old. And that’s not only for myself, but that’s for my family.”
4. Ethan Ewing to Billy is “the perfect surfer in all conditions.”
When chatting about the current landscape of the WSL, it was clear Billy is a big admirer of Ethan’s surfing, and he placed particular emphasis on the world no. 3’s work ethic. This holds value, as Billy is known as one of the fittest surfers in the game and someone who takes his preparation very seriously.
“I’ve been paying a lot of attention to him (Ethan) in the last five years in Hawaii. I tell a lot of my friends there’s literally no one who’s putting in the time like Ethan at all three venues (Pipe, Sunset and Haleiwa). To see that in a young kid at that age is rare and I’m a big supporter and a big fan of his surfing.”
5. Once upon a time it was ‘F&*k Laird Hamilton!’ Now he’s ‘pretty much a father figure’.
Billy’s heroes growing up were not Superman or Michael Jordan. Growing up in Maui, Billy and his buddies would go watch their idol Laird Hamilton take on Jaws. However, as Billy’s balls started to drop and he started to pursue big-wave surfing, it went from adoration to a brash ‘Fuck Laird’.
“If you were to ask me that question as a teenager, I would have said ‘Fuck Laird Hamilton’. You know, when I was a teenager, and my ego was everything. Everyone was like, ‘Oh, Laird is going (to Jaws), don’t go’, I was like, ‘Fuck that if Laird’s going, I’m going, this is my wave’. And I learned really fast, that it’s his wave.”
Their relationship is a lot different these days. Billy seeks advice from Laird and his wife, Gabby Reece, on all life subjects.
“Whether it’s physical training, whether it’s surfing, whether it’s marriage counselling, like, nutrition, everything, you know, they’re the ultimate duo…There’s probably no human on Earth I respect more than Laird Hamilton.”
6. “Big waves are different man…you can talk it up, you can want it, but you can see it in someone’s eyes out in the water.”
Billy is 31-years-old, which may surprise some, due to the impact he’s already had on big wave surfing. He’s still in his physical prime. When asked if he’s been impressed with the new guys on the big wave scene, I got the impression that he still doesn’t see many of the up-and-coming big wave surfers as being on the level of himself and his peers such as Koa Rothman and Nathan Florence.
To gain Billy’s respect he wants to know if you can paddle out to the ledge at Jaws and Mavericks or at big Chopes. The younger crop who Billy does rate includes Brazil’s Lucas Chumbo, Matahi Drollet and Mavericks local, Luca Pudua. Meanwhile, he is underwhelmed by those chasing the biggest ride ever at Nazare.
“Anyone can show up to Nazare and throw on three tow vests and go 80 miles an hour on a tow board into 100-foot wall of water that breaks for five seconds and then disappears.”
7. Billy had a simple answer to why Kelly Slater’s the best ever.
“Sacrifices.”
“That’s what I’ve learned from him. And the same thing I’ve learned from guys like Kobe Bryant and Conor McGregor (Conor and Billy partied at Vegas), you know, it’s rare that you see people have to turn into this human that maybe they don’t want to be and they know it’s not a forever lifestyle. But if you want those results, you want to live those dreams that you were looking at when you’re a kid, you got to make sacrifices, man, you got to block people out, you got to zone in, you got to make sure your circle’s tight and you’re able to do everything you want to do to make the decisions based off solely yourself, not about anyone around you. And as shitty as that sounds, that’s the only way you’re going to be the greatest of all time. And he’s the proof in the pudding when it comes to that.”
Check out Billy Kemper’s classic run in with one of his biggest inspirations Conor McGregor.
