Join in this exceedingly rare conversation with Dr. Mark Renneker, a distinguished figure in the realm of big wave surfing hailing from San Francisco. With a surfing tenure spanning nearly six decades, Dr. Renneker has secured his legacy as both a surfing pioneer and a medical doctor at the University of California, San Francisco.
Renowned for his notable achievements, including being the first to surf the treacherous Potato Patch outside the Golden Gate Bridge, and amongst the first to lead expeditions to surf in remote locations such as the Arctic, Antarctic, Iceland, Norway, Greenland, and Alaska, 'Doc' Renneker joins us to share insights into his extraordinary life.
In this episode, we meticulously explore the facets that have contributed to Dr. Renneker's enduring success, addressing aspects such as life balance, dietary practices, training regimens, and the nuanced risk-taking inherent in tackling some of the world's most formidable waves.
Acknowledgments are extended to Josh Wiese and Kevin Starr for their role in facilitating Dr. Renneker's participation in this episode. To our esteemed audience, if you find enjoyed the show, share with a friend.
References:
References:
Playing Doc’s Games. The eponymous New Yorker article by William Finnegan that made me a lifelong fan of Mark Renneker
If you've enjoyed the show, please plesase drop a quick review or rating on Spotify or Apple. It helps reach more listeners. I thank you mucho! 💜
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Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Yeti Stereo Microphone- (00:05):
Friends welcome back to the issues
athlete podcast, where we tapinto secret and stories of each
to find high performingathletes.
Uh, rainy weekend here in SanFrancisco, and I enjoyed
spending the day putting thisepisode together.
Broken only by soggy walksoutside with my dog.
Roger.
(00:25):
Once in a while you getexceedingly lucky and you get to
meet your heroes.
And poke them with defensiblequestions.
Dr.
Mark Raenuka is a legendary bigwave surfer icon from San
Francisco.
I learned to surf in the breaksaround the city, myself.
And could barely contain myexcitement when mark greet to
(00:46):
meet with me.
Mark is 70 years young.
Started surfing at 11 and he hasbeen exploring waves up and down
the California coast for almost60.
Remarkable years.
As a surf pioneer, mark holdsmany records to his name.
But alongside he juggled acareer as a medical doctor and
(01:07):
advocate He was.
Forcing foremost.
Maybe the only person who haveserved.
Kush (02:13):
Hi, Mark.
Good to have you here in person.
Mark Renneker (02:16):
Glad to be with you, Kush.
Kush (02:18):
Excellent.
I see that it is nighttime, inSan Francisco, uh, with fall
approaching.
you feel ready
Mark Renneker (02:24):
I was ready for this fall season, all through
the summer, and just kept hopingto see the first glimpse of fall
weather and fall swells, andtruth be told, here we are,
October 20th, and we've only hada glimmer just in the past two
days.
And otherwise it's, um, chalk itup up to global warming or what,
(02:48):
but it's concerning.
and the worst of it was that thewater got so warm,
Kush (02:54):
Mm hmm.
Mark Renneker (02:55):
over 60 degrees here in San Francisco's
beginning back in August.
Um, and there's this planktonbloom we call the Red Tide and
me and a lot of other surfersare intensely.
Reactive to it, uh, allergic,and boy, you'll see any number
of folks out of water with, um,any number of sort of sinus and
(03:20):
nose and ear and eye problems.
I saw a guy out in the waterjust two days ago.
He had this goof, goofyapparatus.
It was like a clip on hisnostrils and he had some little
thread or something that wasgoing to keep this thing.
Clipped onto his nose.
And I said, is that because ofthe red tide?
He goes, that's right.
(03:40):
And I said, does that work?
That thing you have on?
And he said, I think it does.
And I said, well, did you evertry just every time you're going
to punch through or you're goingto have your head underwater,
just breathing out through yournostrils.
And so the water can't come in.
He said, Oh, uh, but at anyrate, uh, Yeah, it's, it's,
(04:06):
it's, uh, this is not beginning,um, in a really strongly
positive way.
Normally, by the end ofSeptember, we would have had a
couple of days at Mavericks, acouple of solid double overhead
days here at Ocean Beach, andinstead, you know, yesterday,
the day before, you know, maybethere was a handful of waves
(04:28):
that were maybe double overheadand, but for the most part, not.
It's still, you know, Wasclassically Ocean Beach.
Like yesterday, four of us, fourgood friends all started
paddling together up by Rivera.
It was a 40 minute paddle out.
And, you know, if one werecounting how many times you had
(04:50):
to throw your board away or diveunder or duck dive or whatever.
You know, it's in the hundreds.
Uh, and one of the four didn'teven make it.
He finally just said, I'm out ofhere.
And, uh, and you know what, ofthat whole session and the rides
I got included, the mostmemorable part was the paddle
(05:11):
out.
And if you, if there's somethingsort of the great equalizer here
at Ocean Beach, but also the barthat you have to keep yourself
healthy and strong enough for.
It's to paddle out.
And even in the summer, it canbe a rough paddle out, but, you
know, famously at Ocean Beach,the fall winter is what brings
(05:35):
so many surfers to their kneesand they think they're the
greatest surfer in the world.
And they may well be.
It doesn't mean that you'regoing to get out.
And so you have to use a fairbit of cunning.
One of the guys who I paddledout with, he is currently under
treatment for an advancedmelanoma
Kush (05:54):
Wow.
Mark Renneker (05:56):
and he made it out and, um, When we got out
there, I sort of sort ofjokingly sort of paddled up to
him as if I was like a making afilm from a drug company or
something and wanted to know,you know, do I think that his,
the drug that he's on, it'scalled Keytruda.
Do I think that that contributedto his being able to get out?
And he said, well, yes, I dothink so.
(06:18):
And we had sort of a joke aboutthat, but I said, seriously,
Tom, um, to get out on a daylike today, or even on bigger
days, it takes a certainwillfulness.
And do you feel that the will toget out on a day like today is
somewhat similar to the willyou've had to have?
(06:40):
To go through the cancertreatments and he said,
absolutely, absolutely.
So it is, there is aparallelism.
I think, um, he's somewhatunique really to Ocean Beach
because most of the surfingworld.
There's nothing like this, youknow, for, for me, always, it
was easy to go to the Northshore and you could, you could
(07:03):
paddle out without getting yourhair wet It's a whole different
deal
Kush (07:07):
you know what, this is such an interesting, uh, subject
that, uh, I've thought about alot, in the last 10 years or so
that I've been learning andsurfing at Ocean Beach.
Um, just so people understandwhere we are and what we do
here, I would love to get aquick bio of yourself.
Mark, how old are you?
(07:27):
Where do you live?
What do you do for work?
Mark Renneker (07:30):
yeah,
Kush (07:30):
And uh,
Mark Renneker (07:32):
Good enough.
Good enough.
So I'm 70 years old and I grewup in West Los Angeles and at
age 11 with some friends, we dida junior lifeguard program right
by Santa Monica pier.
And that was when I first begansurfing and I ended up, um,
(07:54):
going to UC Santa Cruz as anundergrad and, uh, where I did
my pre med and
Kush (07:59):
mhm,
Mark Renneker (08:00):
got into UC San Francisco here for medical
school and that was in 1975 andwas immediately astonished to
see how big the surf was up herecompared to Santa Cruz, which I
thought was pretty big surf and,Once I'd gotten to Santa Cruz, I
was never intending to ever goback to Southern California,
(08:21):
which has generally pretty smalland very crowded surf.
And, you know, for me, it waslike heaven to find San
Francisco and all throughmedical school, I was never
intending to even be aphysician, really.
I just wanted the education.
I was more interested inactually the field of education.
And through the passage of, uh,getting into medical school, I'd
(08:45):
already been to like eightdifferent colleges.
Uh, or places of institutes, ifyou will, and had a number of
important role models.
Um, a guy named Gregory Bateson,who was a legendary cultural
anthropologist, a guy named IvanIllich, who was sort of a
defrocked priest.
Um, and both of them havinggreat, I don't know, great
(09:07):
inspiration for me in terms ofeducation and the power of that.
And I was intending to actuallygo and work with a guy named
Paulo Freire, who
Kush (09:16):
mhm,
Mark Renneker (09:17):
This whole notion of critical consciousness and
ways to sort of educate people.
And so my dream always was touse medicine as a way to, um,
create change
Kush (09:29):
mhm,
Mark Renneker (09:30):
rather than as it were to sort of dole out
medicines or, or do operationsor that kind of thing.
And it just so happened thatwhen I was finishing medical
school, I had an experience onin family medicine with a guy
named, uh, Ron Goldschmidt andthrough him began to learn
about.
This sort of the actualapplication of something I
(09:50):
learned from Bateson in termsof, um, the work of Milton
Erickson, who was a amazingbased on, on change, a change
agent, but using hypnosis,really, and, um, and I just
loved what I was doing there.
And that was at SF General.
And I just, so I applied toresidency.
(10:11):
It's the only place I evenapplied in family medicine at SF
General and did all that.
And, uh, yeah.
And when I finished, I was, Idid inner city family medicine
again, just sort of this wholeidea of trying to work with
people who, where you can reallymake profound change and along
the way began realizing that itwas advocacy that I was most
(10:33):
interested in.
And I started my own advocacypractice based on a television
show of the time called themedical.
I call it the medical equalizer,but there was a show called the
equalizer.
And it was made into movies andthat kind of thing, but it was
this idea of, you know, um, I'mgoing to say rescuing people,
but pairing up with people towhen they're feel like, uh, sort
(10:56):
of everything is stacked againstthem.
So I began doing that withpatients who feel that the
medical system had failed themutterly, or had given up on
them, or were actuallyobstructionistic.
And I devised a way of workingwith people never by zoom, uh,
but by phone, this was way backbefore people even talked about
(11:20):
telephone medicine as somethingyou could do, but I began doing
it, you know, in 1989, 90.
And, um, part of the, the, thesort of benefits of that was
that mostly the people I wouldbe speaking with, they were from
all around the country aroundthe world.
They'd find their way to methrough an underground of people
(11:40):
I'd already helped.
Um, and.
But they generally, the time totalk would be in the evening
when they were done dealing withdoctor appointments and whatever
crazy stuff that they had to dowith their lives.
And also when more of theirfamily members could be on the
line and we would do like groupcalls.
So I always, um, was protectingmy time for surf and I never was
(12:05):
in the closet about being ahardcore surfer and a big wave
rider.
And the patients loved that andit was fine with them if, if for
whatever reason we did have acall set up and I needed to,
because there was a big swell orI needed to go to surf a swell
somewhere, they were fine withit.
Okay, yeah, that's great.
You go surf and, you know, let'sreschedule it.
(12:27):
It was never an issue.
And, um, so I've been doing thatwork as the quote medical
equalizer or what I call medicaladvocacy.
I've been doing that for about30 years and I have a house
right here on the beach and nextto the house is another house
that I have for just an officeto do this
Kush (12:47):
hmm.
Sure.
Mark Renneker (12:49):
And I do a lot of teaching of medical advocacy to
medical students and otherphysicians who want to study
with me.
Kush (12:56):
Got it.
Got it.
Yeah.
One of the things I wanted to,uh, explore a bit is how you've
managed to, uh, organize yourlife so you can, uh, give
surfing the time that surfingneeds.
As well as give your career thetime that, uh, your patients and
(13:17):
your profession needs.
And I think I'm getting one clueright there, which is, which is
the work you have done with, uh,patient advocacy and being able
to, able to work with yourpatients to move times around.
By, by sharing with, uh, your,uh, your clientele, your, uh,
your, your, uh, other life, yourpassion for surfing, it sounds
(13:40):
like, uh, sounds like there'sbeen, uh, adequate empathy on,
on that front.
Uh, I'm curious, um, you know,now we have enough media out
there and people see, uh, maybepeople see surfing of all types.
But generally when I have talkedabout surfing, even in the last
(14:02):
dozen years that I've beensurfing, people's impressions of
surf are still kind of lockedinto what they might have seen
from movies, the, image of thatsurfer and, Waikiki beach in
Hawaii, on a perfectly,beautiful day.
Have you been?
Able to communicate how, surfingin San Francisco might be a bit
(14:24):
different than, uh, the popularstereotype.
that's one.
The second how would youdescribe Mark to the average
person, how that is different?
What makes, uh, surfing in SanFrancisco, interesting and, and
different
Mark Renneker (14:38):
So to the first question, there really isn't,
when you're talking aboutstereotypes, it's usually maybe
the stereotype that you holdyourself as virtually a chip on
your own shoulder.
And I've seen far too manyprofessionals, lawyers,
physicians, physicists, who,because they were a surfer, they
(14:59):
were literally in the closet orslightly ashamed of it, even.
And.
So, um, In the same way thatpeople have stereotypes, perhaps
about what a physician shouldbe, you know, in a white coat
and like something that you saw,you see on television or in a
movie, but in truth, the samediversity that you'll see in
(15:20):
medicine, you'll see in surfing.
And yeah, there really are somestereotypes.
Typical characters who becomethat way.
Largely, they're the highvisibility ones who are
sponsored surfers who, you know,they're just, they've got a gig
and they got to perform and goto work and, um, present
(15:41):
whatever is the company's, uh,what they're trying to sell.
And I've, uh, developedliterally a.
Almost an anaphylaxis to thosecharacters.
I mean, I, you know, throughthese years of sort of combining
medicine and surfing, I'vegotten to know kind of most of
the, you know, the name peoplein the surfing world.
(16:05):
And some of them are fantastic.
And some of them, they're justdoing it for a paycheck.
And, and some of them hardlyseem to enjoy surfing.
Um, and then they love to bewhen, uh, they can be a free
surfer, they call it.
And I remember one famous guywho said, he said, Well, now my
sponsors are letting me be afree surfer.
(16:26):
And I said, Do you see thecontradiction of what you're
saying?
They're letting you be a freesurfer?
What's that about?
So, um, the unique thing in SanFrancisco is that if you love, I
don't mean to be pretentious,but if you love culture, that
usually means being close to acity.
And, you know, I have A greataffinity for jazz.
(16:49):
I love seeing live jazz and Imust go to two or three shows a
month and have for a long timeand I, and I thrive on, on
movies.
I see a lot of movies.
And in terms of keeping thebalance, I remember I used to
have an index of, I'd go down inthe San Francisco Chronicle,
(17:10):
they don't even have these listsanymore, but it'd be all the
theaters and what they'reshowing, and I would do a tally
of how many of the movies I'dseen.
And I decided that if I hadn'tseen at least 20 of the movies,
and the total number wouldaverage around, in town there
might be a total of about 70, 75movies, but if I hadn't seen at
(17:30):
least 20 of them, it meant thatI was working too hard.
Then the other me, the othermeasure I, I began to use was,
yeah, you know, you can makemoney in medicine for sure.
There's, you know, you can takeon more gigs and push for, you
know, charging more and all thatkind of thing.
But what I came to realize wasthe real power is you in terms
(17:51):
of buying free time.
In other words that I have,it's, I'm lucky to be a
physician and I can make a lotof money if I need to, but it
also means I can create.
A lot of free time and so I'veset it up so that I don't
generally ever have anappointment before about 5 PM
and because the summer surfaceso crappy here.
(18:15):
I will, you know, do more workduring the day and more
appointments during the day andI just work a lot more hours and
then I literally downshift in myschedule big time starting right
around now and I'll keep that upthrough the big wave season
which for us goes right throughFebruary.
Kush (18:34):
it sounds like you've been able to create that schedule and
hone it over the years to whereyou kind of have.
Some you have that, balance andthe flexibility.
yeah, curious, um, to thelayperson, how would you, uh,
how would you describe orcompare, CF and disco surf to
maybe other kinds of surf?
(18:56):
And I'm not, I'm not trying toput all other kinds of surf in
one bucket, but if you were to,to make that distinction, how
would you go about it?
Mark Renneker (19:05):
you know, some people approach surfing from a
quantitative perspective, howmany waves they can catch.
for instance, uh, surfing in SanFrancisco is more of a
qualitative experience.
And big wave surfing in generalis more of a qualitative
experience.
So that, you know, on a big dayout here in San Francisco, A,
you feel Like you'veaccomplished a lot just having
(19:28):
made it outside and be if youend up catching more than two or
three waves That's you caught alot of waves that day.
And so a lot of people who wouldstand and watch surfers for
instance You know, they're sortof puzzle how little time we
actually spend riding waves, buthow much time we have to spend
Sort of working out all theangles as it were to figure out
(19:49):
where to sit and where to takeoff and how not to wipe out and
And the higher you go up theladder of big wave surfing,
always the fewer the wavesyou'll be catching.
So on big days at Mavericks, uh,you know, Mavericks doesn't even
start breaking until it's atleast triple overhead.
So let's say 15, 18 foot faces,um, you know, very few people
(20:13):
catch many waves.
Even when, even when there'snobody out, I mean, you know, I
surf a lot by myself atMavericks included.
And, um, yeah, you, you're not.
You're not doing it for how manyyou catch and you might even be
out there for three or fourhours and catch one wave.
And from a sort of a spiritualtradition, um, it's just about
(20:35):
perfect.
Kush (20:37):
What makes it perfect?
Mark Renneker (20:39):
It's, it's the oneness of it.
It's the, um, the fact that youhave, you have, you, you imagine
that you have some measure ofcontrol over it all, but for the
most part, you don't, other thanby your own experience and
fitness and cunning.
And a lot of it is cunning.
But having to put aside, it'slike people who now will say,
(21:03):
well, I'm done with this COVIDpandemic.
I'm just going to live my liferegularly.
The foolishness of that, toimagine that you can proclaim
that and that there's anyreality to that.
And the same with somebody who'sgoing to like conquer the surf
or, you know, take surf lessons.
(21:23):
And then I got a coach and thenI got, and then they, you know,
this and that and blah, blah,blah, blah.
And we watch these people cometo Mavericks thinking they're
these conquering heroes becausethey've done that elsewhere and
maybe in other aspects of theirlife.
And they're just reduced torubble.
Kush (21:41):
Sure, Mark, how long have you been surfing Ocean Beach and
Mavericks?
And maybe if you can just give aquick idea of how you've seen
the surf culture, uh, evolveover that time?
Mark Renneker (21:55):
So I started when I came up here to start medical
school, and I was looking aroundfor a place to live.
And it was, you know, offshoreit's this time of year and sunny
and they were good surf andthere was nobody else even in
the water and I was getting somegreat waves and there was one
guy who weighs up the beach andI paddled up to where he was and
(22:16):
said, you know, what do you callthis spot right here?
And he said, Oh, this is calledpillbox and that's called purple
cow.
And he's all these things hestarts saying, he goes, are you
new here?
And I said, yeah, I just movedup here to start medical school.
And he paddled over right upnext to me and he put out his
hand.
And he said, Dan suey third yearand so, uh, and I, so it was
(22:36):
like, yeah, that was moreimportant than any white coat
ceremony sort of for theinitiation of becoming sort of
in this, uh, this group andright away.
I all the surfboards I'd hadfrom.
You know, LA area and Santa Cruzwere useless up here.
And I gradually began to realizeI had to get bigger guns,
(23:00):
bigger, longer boards, which youcouldn't even get here.
I mean, there weren't.
Shapers for the most part, andeven in Santa Cruz, they didn't
have big boards.
So for whatever reason, I begangoing to the North Shore when
the surf here would get crappy,which is usually in February,
and there they'd still have bigwaves, and most of the pros had
left town, and they often wouldleave behind their big guns.
(23:21):
So I would just buy a pile ofthem and fly them back home,
five or six boards even.
And the problem here was, um, wewere just breaking boards all
the time because of how powerfulthe surf is.
And also is when leases werereally pretty primitive.
I mean, the leases would justbreak willy nilly.
my goal was really to surf aplace that breaks about three to
(23:46):
four miles out called the potatopatch.
Which I had seen the first timeI, in anatomy lab on the 14th
floor of the medical school, youcould see the potato patch
breaking.
It would just blow my mind.
And these were waves that were50 foot faces, something like
that.
I mean, really, and some of thewaves would, would go on for
like a minute.
(24:07):
And, um, so
Kush (24:09):
And, And, Mark.
This is just, if you don't minddescribing this place, it's,
it's a fascinating, uh, naturalphenomena, right?
Believe It's outside the GoldenGate Bridge.
Mark Renneker (24:18):
if you just think of like a river mouth, where the
sand is, comes out the river anddeposits sandbars, that's really
what San Francisco Bay is, it'sthis one big river mouth and all
the sand goes out and in ahorseshoe crown that stretches
from the north on the rune sideall the way down here, comes in
kind of closer here, down byTarabel Street, And, um, and on
(24:42):
the outer realm of it is wherethe shipping channel has to be
dredged to for the big ships tocome in.
it's about four fathoms deep.
So about 24 feet deep and theonly way to access it.
Originally, I tried with myfriend who had a power boat and
I ended up worrying more aboutthe guy in the boat and then I
just, I didn't like doing that.
(25:02):
And, so then I just began tryingto paddle out to it.
And after a number ofexperiments figured out that on
an outgoing tide, I could justjump in up by the cliff house.
And literally ride the currentall the way out without
paddling, even it was hilarious.
You could just sit on your boardand it just takes you two to
three knots an hour.
(25:23):
I mean, it was, it was easy.
You just had to time it for whenthe tide stopped outgoing
because otherwise you couldn'tstay in position out there.
But on some of those days whereI wouldn't even catch a wave,
you know, I might have literallypaddled or covered maybe 10 or
12 miles.
And I always liked paddling.
Paddling seemed to me a delightand sometimes, you know, the
(25:45):
current would help too, but, andthen finally, um, and I would do
this with friends in the, in thebeginning, and again, I hate to
say this, but they would kind ofchicken out or lose heart or,
you know, and I would say, no,no, we got to get about another
mile or two further out.
We're just on the inside here.
And they would go, no, I don'tknow.
And then the Coast Guard wouldsend out one of their rescue
(26:06):
boats because there was somereports and, I don't know.
They'd, they'd, those guys,you've seen them on the big days
where they bust through thewaves and make a quite a, quite
a show for people.
But, and then they would, theywould look over and they'd go,
Oh, it's you doc.
Oh, okay.
No problem.
And then they would justdisappear.
And finally, I ended up doing itby myself and caught a wave.
(26:28):
Uh, this was about 2005.
Um, that, you know, solid 25foot wave.
And it wrote it for about aminute.
And with no photographers, noother people there, and, and
that was just the way I like it.
That's beautiful.
the few times when I have beenfortunate to be out in the
water, uh, by myself and catch awave like that, uh, not a wave
(26:51):
like that, but a wave, uh, youknow, much more, humble in its,
uh, dimensions.
it's still been, uh, anoutstanding, moment for me.
So I think I can, I can onlyimagine what it must be like to,
uh, to be out there.
Um, and having not only caughtthat wave, but put in the effort
(27:11):
and time to earn that wave, uh,which I think is a big part of
what surfing is.
Well, for me, though, I must saya lot of it has been, again,
really interwoven with the sameprocess that I use in medicine
of seemingly something, uh,unsolvable.
Someone with an advanced, youknow, metastatic cancer or
(27:32):
something.
So what's the way out of it?
What's the way, what can you dodifferently?
And, um.
Or additionally, and so it's alot of research.
And so these places that I'll goand surf, it's incremental in
the study that I engage in oftena lot of cartography and, you
(27:54):
know, bathymetrics and, youknow, ocean, oceanic kind of
inquiries and talking to peoplewho know areas.
Whether they be fishermen orwhether they be researchers, um,
to get a better handle on it.
And so I've taken that level of,of exploration or inquiry
Kush (28:16):
uh,
Mark Renneker (28:16):
into not just the local area here, but I've been
systematically exploring theArctic and the Antarctic and the
sub Arctic, sub Antarctic areas.
And have organized and led firstexpeditions to surf Antarctica,
Iceland, Northern Norway,Svalbard, Greenland, um.
(28:43):
All of Alaska and what I'm mostexcited about now is I'm putting
together a trip to explore allthe way to the end of the
Aleutian Islands.
That'll, it'll be like a monthlong trip next August.
Yeti Stereo Microphone (28:56):
Holy smokes.
That sounds incredible.
Kush (28:59):
uh, amongst all those trips and, all the memorable,
uh, surf sessions over thedecades, uh, including the one
where you caught that eponymouswave at, uh, the Potato Patch,
any other, like, highlights ofproud moments, maybe a couple
that stand out that you wouldlike to share?
Mark Renneker (29:18):
I have a way that I surf some hours north from
here.
I have a little 10 by 12 footcabin, no electricity on a cliff
over a surf break.
And then it looks out over wayout in the ocean and the outer
reef spot that I first surfed in85, 86, and it remains my
(29:39):
favorite big wave spot in theworld.
And I've managed to keep it asecret for the most part and not
let what befell Mavericks happento it.
And so I've had experiences outthere that, uh, just would blow
anyone's mind.
And usually surfing alone abouta mile from shore.
(30:02):
And the one that most comes tomind actually is, again, the
lessons of hubris are criticalto me.
And so I had paddled out aloneon a 10.
9 brand new board that JeffClark made me.
And it was, you know, 20 to 25foot, something like that.
So that would be like four tosix times overhead.
(30:23):
And, um,
Kush (30:25):
Wow.
Mark Renneker (30:25):
when I do this on my own to these outer reef
spots, I promise myself I'llonly take three waves.
And the first wave will, I'lljust, it'll be an easy one.
Uh, you know, I'm not gonna sayshoulder hop, but sort of.
And the goal is to try and do itwithout getting my hair wet.
Kush (30:41):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (30:41):
it's not like Ocean Beach, where you got to
dive through the whitewater.
These are places you can accessthrough relatively calm water.
It's just, it can take 45minutes or an hour to paddle
out.
But, and then the third wavewould be the only one that I
would really Take a chance andsort of sit deeper, uh, maybe a
bigger wave, whatever.
(31:02):
And so I'd already caught myfirst two waves
Kush (31:05):
Mm
Mark Renneker (31:06):
and then this fog bank appeared and it would
happen like so fast.
It was like a bad special effectin a movie or something, but
literally.
No visibility.
And, um, I don't know, 50 feet,something like that.
And, and so I have my lineupsout there based on way on shore
(31:27):
sort of areas that I triangulateand figure out where I am and to
where the wave would break.
But I also know the kelp bedpretty well and the boils pretty
well.
And I said, okay, I know whereI'm sitting.
I'm just gonna, I'll just waitfor the fog to lift because I
really want to get that thirdwave.
I really want to get that thirdwave.
And, you know, it was kind of.
(31:48):
Amazing, because as soon as Isort of had convinced myself
that I would get a third wave,this giant wave broke outside of
me.
Just, I didn't even see itcoming.
We're talking huge, huge wave.
Throw your board away, dive asdeep as you can, the leash
breaks,
Kush (32:06):
Oh, goodness.
Mark Renneker (32:07):
It's one of those things where it's, it's so
violent that it sort of launchesyou back up from the depths like
a torpedo shooting out of thewater or something.
And I go, Oh man, this is, thiswill be a challenge.
And I just looked at my watch.
It was 347.
I remember exactly and I thoughtthere's time it was dead of
(32:30):
winter, so it was going to turndark at five
Kush (32:33):
Mm
Mark Renneker (32:34):
and I wasn't really worried about swimming
in.
I've practiced swimming and outthere before.
It's really tricky to swim in.
You have to swim in throughthese rocks and we call it the
keyhole and it's it.
It's formidable.
But really what I was worriedwas to find my new board.
Um, and I have a pretty goodidea where the boards go from
(32:55):
having this having happenedbefore, but never in the dense
fog.
And part of it was that you hadto stay with where the waves
were breaking, because that'swhere the board would go, which
meant that you had to let thesestill giant waves just I want
you and I did all of the above,and was swimming around out in
the ocean again, about a mileoffshore, looking for my board
(33:17):
in the fog and never found it.
Kush (33:20):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (33:21):
And then finally swam in and my car was parked
pretty far away.
And so I'm running along theroad with, with my broken leash
and now the sun's come out.
Now I can see everything and allI want to do is get binoculars
so I can look for it.
And some guy driving by whorecognizes me, he says, doc,
what are you doing?
And I said, I just lost my portand he goes, you were fucking
(33:44):
out there and I said, yeah, Isaid, could you help me find my
board and he said, yeah, yeah,great.
So he's got binoculars too.
And so we stood on the cliff andjust watched and watched and
watched never found the boardturned dark.
And that was the end of the day.
Yeti Stereo Microphone-4 (33:59):
Godly.
That's quite a story.
That was not what I expected.
Quite the adventure you had outthere and did not expect the
ending.
And, uh, it brings together somany elements of surfing.
That many of us experienced, youjust have experienced that on a
(34:21):
much.
More intense and grander scale.
But it brings together the highsand the lows and the cheeses and
the losses.
And the elements.
Out in nature.
Yeti Stereo Microphone-5 (34:37):
Oh, and sorry about that board.
A brand new board from JeffClark.
Indeed.
Sounds quite special.
Mark Renneker (34:45):
I had a board, one of my favorite boards.
It's still one of my favoritewords.
I still write it.
The day parmenter made me, itwas an eight foot fish that he
made me for Mavericks workedfantastically well at Mavericks.
one day, The leash broke and Iswam and swam and swam and
looked for it and never found itlet the, harbor master know if,
that if anybody with a fishingboat or whatever found a board,
(35:09):
you know, sort of purple, redone, you know, to call me a
month goes by, he calls, Ithink, I think we've got your
board.
And I said, what?
And he goes, yeah, wonderful.
The captains, you know, he foundthis board floating out in the
ocean He just wants to, youknow, make sure that, it's yours
and I said, well, and Idescribed some as it were sort
(35:30):
of like in, you know, policeprocedural, identifying, tattoos
or scars.
I said, yeah, there's a dinghere and there's a blah, blah,
blah, and this and that.
He goes, yeah, it sounds likeyou're bored.
And I said, well, what do I haveto do to get it back?
He goes, well, you know, therules about recovery at sea.
And I said, Oh, that's fine.
If he wants some money, I'mhappy to pay him.
(35:52):
I really love that board.
And he, I said, how much does hewant?
He goes, a C note.
I said, a C note.
Did he say a C note?
And he said, yep.
And I don't know if Kush wouldeven know what a C note is.
Well, it's gangster slang for ahundred dollar bill.
Kush (36:10):
Oh, century note.
Got it.
Mark Renneker (36:12):
yeah.
And, but, but I said to him, Isaid, God, this guy is no
authentic captain.
And he, he said, yeah, justbring me a C note.
So I had to go, like, go to thebank, get a C note, went down
there and got my board back.
Kush (36:27):
That's hilarious.
That's, uh, I mean, it couldhave been a C note wrapped
around a bottle of rum orsomething to make it even more,
Mark Renneker (36:35):
could have, yeah, yeah.
Kush (36:37):
that's, that's, that's crazy.
Um, Marek, you've been, youknow, you've been surfing at,
at, uh, you've been surfing forsuch a long time at, at such a
high level.
Um, how do you keep your body,your, you know, how do you stay
in shape?
Do you have, uh, do you crosstrain?
Do you have any other rituals?
(36:57):
any dietary habits that you haverefined over the years?
Mm-Hmm.
Mark Renneker (37:02):
Yeah, and it's been just like everything else
in surfing and medicine.
It's been incremental.
So I've been surfing for, what,60 years, started when I was,
you know, 10 or 11, thereabouts.
And, um, what I didn't want wasto do anything that would
interfere with surfing.
(37:22):
So I was a hardcoreskateboarder, you know, pretty
radical skateboarder.
But I kept getting injured, andthen I couldn't surf, and I
hated that.
So I gave up that.
I gave up skiing.
Kush (37:34):
mm
Mark Renneker (37:35):
Um, I used to do rock climbing and surfers
generally make good rockclimbers.
The problem is that if you fallsurfing, it's no big deal.
The water is soft, but I hadsome, I had some good falls and
I thought this is stupid.
I'm not going to do that.
I won't be able to surf.
And so that was like one rule ofthumb.
The second was, um, I hadlearned yoga early on and always
(38:00):
kept up some practice of yoga orcertain poses that I knew would
help me not have sort ofstiffness or loss of
flexibility.
Um, and also I began, um,working with different people
like a cranial osteopath.
(38:21):
In other words, a, a treatingmanual medicine specialist And
with my stated goal being, Iwant you to keep me able to surf
as I get older.
And so just a standingappointment once a month, and
it's just proactive.
It's just looking forrestrictions or issues that if
(38:42):
left unattended or un, uh,worked on could really add up to
a problem.
And, and then amidst that, theninvariably there are injuries
that happen.
And I have about four differentpeople of different specialties.
One is an Atlas orthogonalchiropractor who only adjusts
(39:04):
just the Atlas.
Another is a brilliant,brilliant, um, you would call it
a sort of a muscle.
Specialist, but he, um, did alot of dance medicine and took
care of Baryshnikov and, haddeveloped a lot of his own style
of working with people to, know,look for restrictions, you know,
(39:24):
at different segments of thespine and the hip and ankles and
all of that.
Um, and I've worked with him alot to help sort of.
Reverse or improves like ascoliosis that I've had, um, and
work with things of ergonomicsand posture.
(39:44):
Um, so it's been, I've hadacupuncturists, um, uh, and
these are people who, um, havehelped me, I would say, age well
and understand and, and mainlywork with people who are
motivated like I am, you know,you know, dancers and athletes
(40:04):
and, and the like.
And without that, yeah.
Um, yeah, I, not to say thatit's victim blaming, but I can't
tell you how many friends I havewho've had hip replacements and
knee replacements and how manyshoulder surgeries and neck
fusions.
And you just see it graduallytake its toll for what, what
(40:26):
they can do in surfing asthey've gotten older.
And my role model has alwaysbeen, uh, Jerry Lopez.
Kush (40:34):
mm
Mark Renneker (40:34):
And Jerry, I knew from, uh, I was in a movie with
him called Rotting Giants in2004,
Kush (40:42):
sure.
Mark Renneker (40:43):
and, um, and he wrote a forward for a book I did
on surfer's health called, SurfSurvival,
Kush (40:50):
Mm-Hmm?
Mark Renneker (40:51):
now in its second edition, but the essence of him.
Of Lopez's teachings, if youwill, is surf today to surf
tomorrow, so it's prettyobvious.
So you see these guys come out.
They're just crashing burnartists on big days at
Mavericks, and they get hurt.
They just get hurt and, youknow, my goal is to literally
never fall, not not wipe outonce.
(41:13):
I remember I went an entirewinter without a single wipe
out.
What that means is you don'tcatch all the waves you want.
It means that, you know, if youdon't think there's at least a
90 percent probability of makingthe wave.
Not to go.
It also means getting reallygood equipment.
I know this is a big deal inother sports, maybe more so than
(41:34):
in surfing, but, um, I've alwayshad, uh, wonderful shapers to
work with and to, uh, make me alot of experimental boards and
interesting designs and, youknow, even just two days ago, I
got to ride, uh, a board thatjust blew my mind it's what's
called an edge board.
(41:54):
I never felt such a board.
under my feet before.
And it was, it's quiteinvigorating to, suddenly, you
know, think that you've seen itall and seen every idea and
here's something completely new.
Kush (42:06):
That's amazing.
Wow.
Mark Renneker (42:08):
and and in terms of nutrition, you know, all
through medical school and evenfor a long time thereafter, I
used to have a hamburger everyday
Kush (42:17):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (42:17):
and I have found that I could do study, medicine
or, you know, for medicalschool.
Best sort of sitting at arestaurant.
I used to go to Bill's placeover on Clements street.
I'd sit in the back there andthey just loved taking care of
me, the medical student, andthey would bring me all kinds of
treats and things.
I was never good at likestudying in the library or
something like that.
(42:38):
at some point I did herniate adisc.
And one of the things that Ibegan to explore was, okay,
maybe I'll become, you know,vegetarian or pescarian.
And that was, um, in about 1990,I've been essentially that since
I gave up, chicken and pork andturkey and, you know, all the
(43:00):
red meats for sure, and it'sinteresting that one time I
slipped, as it were, was in theAntarctica trip, the captain
and, owned an island in theFalklands where he would raise
his own lambs and he had allthis frozen lamb and, you know,
there is something wonderfulabout lamb.
There just is, you know, uh,and, um, so I got ill from
(43:22):
eating, lamb again after abouttwo days and that was in the
year 2000 when we did that trip.
I haven't had red meat since.
Kush (43:30):
Sure.
Got it.
Pescatarian, uh, almostcompletely vegetarian.
Any supplements
Mark Renneker (43:38):
Yeah, yeah, actually, there are.
I'm a believer in NAcetylcysteine or NAC, which
when you swallow it, it's aprodrug for what's called
glutathione.
Glutathione is the chemical thata huge number of cells in your
body produce as a way ofcleansing the organs.
to give you an example, NAC, ifyou you go mushroom collecting
(43:59):
with the next rain, up Up thecoast, you know, and you, you
pick the wrong mushroom and eatit and your liver is being
destroyed and you're, you know,orange is a pumpkin.
And you present to the emergencyroom, the very first therapy
they would give you would beintravenous NAC, in other words,
to save, to save your, to saveyour liver.
So NAC is something thatcleanses the organs, including
(44:21):
the kidneys, including lungs,including the heart, including
the brain.
I've always taken additionalamounts of vitamin D, you know,
on the order of about like 5,000, 5, 000 units a day.
Um, I've always liked magnesium,it takes some extra magnesium,
and then a friend of mine who'sa nutritional oncologist, um,
(44:44):
who is in the Chicago area, andhe's a surfer also, he actually
went on the Antarctica trip, andhe and I surf Lake Michigan and
places like that together.
But he has these supplementsthat he's put together that are
sort of a gamish of, you know,15 or 20 things that would sort
of be everything you might findat Whole Foods, and I've always
taken some of that.
Kush (45:05):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (45:06):
Oh, a little bit of curcumin, a little bit of
fish oil, but not too much.
If these things cause you tobleed, I did find for a while I
was taking sort of preventativelow dose or, you know, uh, baby
aspirin, but boy, you know, Ijust found, I mean, even like
punching through a lip, youknow, I would get these little,
(45:28):
you know, ecchymosis, little,you know, sort of bleeds under
the skin on my face.
It just, so I cut that out.
Kush (45:37):
I don't take any supplements.
I'm 44.
And I sometimes don't, don'teven know where to get started.
It seems there's so much varietyand so many types.
And then there also, you know,the, uh, snake oil, uh, sales
people out there peddling theirown, motley potions.
I will have to put in moreresearch
Mark Renneker (45:58):
the research gets very easy there's a branch of
integrative medicine calledfunctional medicine.
the principle of it is that youlook for biomarkers.
And if you want a not shotgun,with supplements so biomarkers
would be, yeah, looking atmicronutrient levels in the
blood, looking at vitamin levelsin the blood, looking at
(46:20):
inflammatory markers,coagulation markers, immune
function.
All of these things are easilydone and what's really
interesting now in the field ofhealth is that there's a lot of
direct to consumer ability ofordering all the lab tests that
you otherwise would have todepend on physicians for.
So you can go to like directlab.
(46:40):
com and you can order virtuallyanything that a physician would
order.
And if you want to, you know,play around and look online
under, what I would call terrainpanel.
So you want to look at.
Uh, not the disease qualities ofone's body, but the terrain,
meaning the healthy part of yourbody and you look at the worth
(47:01):
of normal levels would be foryou, you name it, magnesium or,
C reactive protein or, uh, youknow, things of that nature and,
or, and then, or all thedifferent antioxidants and, and
all that, and then you would,um, Say, oh, gosh, I'm like, I'm
below normal.
I don't know why that is, butI'll start taking such and such,
(47:24):
you know, more zinc, and then inthree months, I'll recheck that
on that dose of zinc and see ifI'm hitting the level that I
want some optimal level, ideallyon the upper range of normal.
And at least then.
Yeah, you're not shotgunning,you're actually working with
your own physiology from astandpoint of knowledge.
Kush (47:45):
yeah, no, that is very sanguine advice.
Uh, somebody else recommended,uh, functional medicine to me
for just the same, I think thesame sort of concerns I had
about shooting in the dark.
And I think, thank you forreinforcing that.
Mark Renneker (47:58):
Well, and the other thing to say in the field
of sports medicine, again, theytend to be, evidence based, but
they tend to be more datadriven.
And so, yeah, you can get a lotof good data in terms of
exercise physiology and sportsmedicine, or in terms of
physiatry or physical therapy,degrees of motion, even just
(48:19):
resting tension in the body,these can be measured and that's
what the elite athletes areworking with, whether they be
swimmers or, uh, rock climbersor what have you, they, a lot of
them, you know, they get to thatlevel by at some point kind of
going into, as it were, the, thebiomarkers or the science of
(48:40):
that, which they're endeavoringto do all those guys on, on the
warriors,
Kush (48:46):
yes, yes,
Mark Renneker (48:47):
they know their numbers.
Kush (48:49):
Oh, wow.
Okay.
Okay.
Okay.
Got
Mark Renneker (48:52):
and all the rest of us are farting around.
haha got it
Kush (48:58):
mean, no, there's no doubt that, uh, that, uh, those, those
sports that have a lot of moneyin them, those sports have,
certainly embraced a lot ofscience and I think sports like
ours, and also obviously I'm notlike.
An athlete of that caliber.
I think the rest of us kind ofhave to just take that lead and
(49:19):
learn from people who have, whoare doing those things and not,
not, you know, not reinvent, theproverbial, so no, I think
you're right.
Mark Renneker (49:26):
Now, the goal is to reinvent the wheel.
In other words, to learnsomething often is to, for you
to learn it The first time.
else may have learned it, butfor whatever reason it never
transferred into your realm.
You can, you can cognitively orintellectually understand it,
but, um.
And I think it does help whenyou, uh, even maybe this is the
(49:51):
ultimate purpose of your seriesis, trying on these other
strategies of other people andsee what fits for you.
And that's, of course, that'show we all go through life.
Kush (50:02):
I think that's exactly right.
I think it starts with like, uh,the cognition and then maybe
moves on to, uh, you know, thewillingness to take a chance and
put the, uh, resources towardsit and then ultimately figure
out through, uh,Experimentation, what is, what
isn't that works the best andthen kind of customize it few
(50:24):
things you excel at.
What is one thing that you wishyou were, uh, you were good at
that.
You're not.
Mark Renneker (50:30):
there was a guy from Australia who would come to
Mavericks every year named TonyRay.
Tony Ray could paddle fasterthan anyone I had ever seen.
And I really.
But watch him and watch how hewould use his arms and the how
deep he would put his hands intothe water and how thick his
board was.
And, and it isn't that I, obsessabout paddling faster, but in
(50:54):
answer to your question, I wouldlike to paddle faster.
And it is.
And also.
What I see among my peers,meaning surfers of my age, is
that they begin to not be ableto paddle as fast, and
consequently, they end up takingoff later, and they end up
(51:17):
falling, or not being able tostand on their board properly,
because the principal deficitbeing paddling speed.
So a lot of, you can make up forin terms of loss of speed.
Of going to lower rocker planes,so flatter boards, so like a
(51:37):
fish fundamentally is a flatterrocker plane, and they just
paddle a hell of a lot better.
They just do.
I consciously worked with thatas something to improve upon, if
you will.
Kush (51:49):
Got it.
And I don't think you're anyslouch when it comes to
battling, but I can see thatwhen you look at all your other
gifts.
With the, with the sport, maybethat's the one that you would
like to,
Mark Renneker (52:00):
No, but also I would tell you, honestly, it is
the one that I would notice asI've gotten older.
The paddling speed just dropsoff a little bit.
I can sprint paddle the same,
Kush (52:09):
yeah,
Mark Renneker (52:09):
but in doing my, some of these sort of, uh,
heroic paddles, if you will, youknow, these hour long paddles or
whatever, they take longer, Andif I'm paddling with a younger
friend or someone who's a greatpaddler, like Grant Washburn,
who I surf with a lot, anotherbig wave rider, Grant, he just
paddles faster than all of andhow much faster?
(52:29):
I don't know, 5%, 10 percentmaybe, but in big wave surfing,
that's everything.
Kush (52:36):
sure,
Mark Renneker (52:37):
percentage increments make a big
difference.
Kush (52:40):
no, I think it adds up over a long session, a long
battle, that little bit of extraspeed and, uh, capacity probably
has a Huge, huge impact on one'sperformance.
maybe In the last, maybe five or10 years, any new behavior, any
new habit you find has most,improved your life?
Mark Renneker (53:04):
I would say I just have an ever improving
bullshit detector.
I don't suffer fools gladly.
I just don't.
I don't waste a lot of time withpeople who, I don't know what
they, this can be a glib answerwhen people would say, what are
you afraid of?
What I'm afraid of issuperficiality.
I like depth.
(53:24):
I like complexity.
I like the unknown.
But if it's just whatever, smalltalk, you know, in this sense,
I, I prefer, prefer my owncompany actually, or, or friends
I have who are really rigorousand engaged.
Kush (53:40):
how does that translate to, uh, any new maybe behavior?
Mark Renneker (53:45):
You know, yeah, it does, it, um.
A degree of intolerance.
You know, uh, I, I've not to saythat there's a long line of
people wanting to, engage me asa person, it's a month's long
wait to work with me, it's likea six month wait at this point,
it's, it's embarrassing even,uh, especially for people with
(54:07):
life threatening illness, but,but I don't, um, it's hard, you
I don't, I didn't make it veryhard for you to get in touch
with me just because you, youknow, we had, I had a friend in
common, but, I don't have awebsite.
I don't make it easy for peopleto get to me.
I just don't.
The Biden Ballard writers andpeople want to do articles and
stuff.
Kush (54:27):
Mhm.
Mark Renneker (54:28):
I don't bother with them at all.
I've learned the hard way thatway.
I mean, I just, it isn't what itis.
I'm not interested in that.
Kush (54:35):
Fair.
Mark Renneker (54:36):
your proposal.
I liked the idea of, as it were.
What it is to, uh, agegracefully or to, to be healthy
as you get older as a surfer.
Kush (54:48):
Yes.
Mark Renneker (54:49):
Great.
That's a, that's a wonderfultopic.
Kush (54:52):
think it is.
And I think, uh, I think thisconversation shall hopefully
benefit a lot of people in, in amaterial way.
here's another, uh, another kindof interesting question.
do you love your, uh, yourfuture or your past more?
Mark Renneker (55:09):
Well, the future doesn't exist.
And the past, as we're learningthis more or less a matter of
interpretation or opinion orsort of the Rashomon effect.
So all there is, is the present.
And so.
Um, you know, I, I don't worryabout my past, really.
I, I, I've kept a log or ajournal basically since I was
(55:33):
16.
And I do, I do have a lot ofwritings, if you will.
but, I'm all about what'shappening right now.
Kush (55:43):
That's, uh, that's a great answer.
now is, the only dimension wehave, uh, in front of us that we
have the, highest ability toinfluence.
Mark Renneker (55:52):
Well, that and I mean, really, when you study
spiritual traditions, they allarrive at that same viewpoint.
It's only about the now.
Yeah, you're supposed to takelessons from the past.
but it's to the degree to whichyou can apply them.
It has to do with, to yourself,not to others.
Kush (56:12):
Do you have a meditation practice, Mark?
Mark Renneker (56:14):
Surfing.
there was one great book writtenby a guy named Kent Pearson, who
was an Australian sociologist,and I was interested in his
work.
He had died, and at one point Iwent specifically to see his
widow in Australia because Iwanted to see his papers.
I was really interested in hiswritings, and what he did was he
(56:35):
did studies of trying tounderstand why people surf.
These were in depth studies, Imean, PhD level.
Australians take this stuffseriously.
And, it wasn't even in as manywords as this.
It was, what's the principalreason why you serve?
And it was to do with itsmeditative properties.
(56:57):
and again, all that.
time that we spent sittingaround out there in the water
that strange feeling of thingssort of washing away that you
had been tussling with in yourmind and trying to figure out
with the problems with whomeverand whatever and the affording
this and that and bills and thefuture, the future, um, you
(57:17):
know, the future only becomesthis.
Really, really wonderfulchildish thing of believing that
there's going to be a great waythat's going to come to you in
the next few moments.
And that is its own meditation.
Fair enough
Kush (57:32):
I would agree that, ultimately for me, and I think
for many of us, I think.
sports assume a meditationquality when we find that flow
and allows us to, uh, be thatmuch more present, and that
heightened perception and all ofthose things that, come to that
state.
And I think that's probably whatI enjoy the most about them.
Mark Renneker (57:53):
One of the ways I proceed in my medical advocacy
practice is I only take on onenew case a week these, I don't
treat them.
I don't prescribe things tothem.
I, you know, I help them figureout things that they can do set
them up to sort of embark on adifferent course with their
illness.
And so I often, in my dreamseven,
Kush (58:15):
Mm hmm.
Mark Renneker (58:15):
also when I'm out in the water, the solution to a
case will come to me.
What I'm not specificallylooking for it,
Kush (58:23):
Fair.
Yeah.
Mark Renneker (58:25):
and that becomes, uh, something that I can't.
Deliberately create in thewater, but it happens when I
don't know, there's maybe it'spretty inconsistent and there's
just some ray of light over somebody of kelp or something.
And then boom, there it is.
And I know exactly what I needto do on a given case.
(58:47):
I don't have to write it down oranything else.
It's so evident.
I'll remember it.
that's happened so many timesand what it.
Yeah.
When it doesn't happen is whenI've taken on too many cases,
too much work, these problems ofothers that I'm trying to help
them solve, they becomesomething encumbering to me.
then sometimes for many peoplewho surf, they're trying to
(59:10):
leave the land, you know, on thebeach as it were.
I've actually, in the balance,if you will, tried to make it so
that it.
I don't mind carrying some ofthe people I'm trying to help
with me.
When I go out, especially onthese fairly complex, difficult
(59:31):
expeditions to the outer realmor what have you, because so
often what I'm going through iswhat they're going through,
trying to make something happenin the most unlikely conditions
imaginable.
In 20 and 30 foot surf, there'snobody else who even wanted to
go out.
(59:51):
They didn't even want to dealwith it.
And it can be, you know,horrific winds or something.
And I'm just trying to figureout, is it possible to go out
and actually get a ride?
Kush (01:00:00):
Sure, I'm going to do a crazy segue here, a question I
want to ask you that, surfingthe waters at Ocean Beach,
probably more than most peopleout there.
even myself in my, whatever,decade long span at the beach,
I've seen some prettyinteresting.
Marine life, when I tell peoplethat I've seen dolphins out
(01:00:23):
there just that part, I thinkdolphins and the occasional
whale out there.
I people get pretty astonished.
So curious what has been some ofthe most interesting wildlife
that you might have seen, in thewater.
And if you have also ever seenthe, the men in the, in the gray
suit.
So to speak.
Mark Renneker (01:00:44):
I have, I've had one encounter with, a great
white, at a sort of remote spotsouth of here.
Again, right in peak great whiteseason.
And, um, it was profound.
It was close to me and it wastelling me I'm here.
It was this, it came up out ofthe water about 15 feet away
from me but it first appeared asjust a dome of water being
(01:01:08):
lifted and when it was about 2feet high.
Then I saw pectoral fin justslicing through it, and it was
elegant.
It was elegant how it slidesthrough, and then the head
emerged on the other end of thedome, literally with the eye
looking at me.
And it was this, you know, itwas checking me out, uh, it was
territorial, the place where wewere is, uh, you know, it's a,
(01:01:30):
it's a seal rookery, so, so whatdo you expect, dumb shit, you
know, but in all these yearsI've been surfing there, I've
never had such an encounterright away it was okay, ever
more for about that June throughend of September, early October.
I'm not going to surf thereagain, and I've held to that
pretty rigorously.
(01:01:51):
The other most profoundexperience was I was out with
one friend on a big day atMavericks, and it was getting
into the spring, so February,March, something like that, and
this friend says, Doc, there's awhale going to ram us.
And it's coming up from thesouth.
it's a giant gray whale,whatever, 60 feet or something.
(01:02:13):
it's not doing the diving thingunderneath or porpoising kind of
thing.
It's just streaming across thesurface.
And it's, I don't know, 75 feetaway or something heading right
at us as a set came.
Kush (01:02:27):
Oh,
Mark Renneker (01:02:28):
I was exactly in position to take off and I, and
I just wanted to get out of theway.
And so I took off on this waveand I'm on like a 10 and a half
foot board or something.
And as I'm dropping in, thewhale's back was in the trough
in front of me.
And so I had to fade deep aroundthe whale, which I made, I made,
(01:02:50):
I made, I made the fade.
I made the bottom turn, rode thewave, came back out.
And my friend is sitting therewhite because the whale, after
it had done that, it had beenbreached through the back of the
wave.
And came down landing explodingright next to him just feet from
(01:03:11):
him and then just kept on hisway.
Kush (01:03:14):
gosh.
That's, uh, that's, that's aremarkable, uh, thing to happen
in the water.
And, sounds like both of youcame out unscathed, uh,
Mark Renneker (01:03:26):
Oh, yeah,
Kush (01:03:26):
like
Mark Renneker (01:03:27):
frequently re recreate the memory of it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you rememberthat time.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Kush (01:03:35):
That's awesome.
Mark, just some fun questions.
talked about your food habitsbefore, but, uh, if you had to,
you know, eat one meal for therest of your life, what would
that be?
Mark Renneker (01:03:47):
That's easy, I've done three long trips to Japan,
especially to the NorthernIsland Hokkaido, found some
amazing big waves there.
I could eat Japanese food threemeals a day and be utterly
happy.
Kush (01:04:02):
it's funny.
Uh, when I spoke to our commonfriend, Kevin Starr recently,
uh, guess what his, uh, responsewas.
Mark Renneker (01:04:09):
Similar,
Kush (01:04:10):
Yes.
Hey, Mark.
I know you love movies.
Uh, what's a favorite movie youcould watch again and again?
Mark Renneker (01:04:17):
you know, I worship Buster Keaton and I
never tire of watching Keaton'sfilms and, uh, During the
pandemic, even it was probablythe thing I missed the most.
We're seeing those kinds ofrepertory or silent films and
special showings and, I loveKurosawa's films from Japan and,
(01:04:38):
and I miss those too.
for better or for worse, justlove really bad, dumb movies.
And I've always, I've alwaysloved horror films.
Always.
And fortunately, there's noshortage of good, bad horror
films, so I put in a fair bit oftime with, with them,
Kush (01:05:00):
Excellent.
There was a big billboard outthere and, uh, you wanted to
leave a message for people outthere, what would it say?
Mark Renneker (01:05:07):
huh?
Kush (01:05:09):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (01:05:09):
I mean, the master, Jordan Peele is the
master now of, the short title,he hasn't done one called, huh,
but he'll get, he'll get there.
Kush (01:05:19):
Sure.
Mark Renneker (01:05:19):
I mean, and, and and part of that reflects, I
can't help but, of come down toearth on.
It's disappointing the issues oftruth in America, when I hear
The bullshit, if you will.
My reply is, is, huh?
It's like, what, huh?
No.
Kush (01:05:38):
I
Mark Renneker (01:05:38):
it.
or Jordan Peele would say nope.
Same difference.
Kush (01:05:44):
okay.
So Billboard one would be her,and maybe if there was a choice
for a second one, that would beNope, and I, I love
Mark Renneker (01:05:50):
But nope, nope's already taken.
that's his that's
Kush (01:05:55):
have to be like, the most original, exclusive one.
Maybe just the one, you know,one that resonates with you.
I think on that, that note ofnote, It's been most excellent,
conversation.
Mark Renneker (01:06:06):
Alrighty, Kush,
Yeti Stereo Microphone-3 (01:06:09):
Wow, how inspiring is mark?
Denesha is skilled.
And meticulous in his approachin seeking adventure of the
highest caliber.
At 70, he is chasing monsterwaves.
With the best of them.
With an approach honed overdecades.
Of hard work and awareness.
(01:06:30):
My jaw is still dropped fromsome fun stories.
I came out inspired and wantingto double down on my own physio
before the next season arrives.
Thanks for tuning in France.
Hope you enjoyed this chat asmuch as I did.
Please give us a follow Untilnext time stay.
ASIS.
Friends welcome back to the issues
athlete podcast, where we tapinto secret and stories of each
to find high performingathletes.
Uh, rainy weekend here in SanFrancisco, and I enjoyed
spending the day putting thisepisode together.
Broken only by soggy walksoutside with my dog.
Roger.
(00:25):
Once in a while you getexceedingly lucky and you get to
meet your heroes.
And poke them with defensiblequestions.
Dr.
Mark Raenuka is a legendary bigwave surfer icon from San
Francisco.
I learned to surf in the breaksaround the city, myself.
And could barely contain myexcitement when mark greet to
(00:46):
meet with me.
Mark is 70 years young.
Started surfing at 11 and he hasbeen exploring waves up and down
the California coast for almost60.
Remarkable years.
As a surf pioneer, mark holdsmany records to his name.
But alongside he juggled acareer as a medical doctor and
(01:07):
advocate He was.
Forcing foremost.
Maybe the only person who haveserved.
Kush (02:13):
Hi, Mark.
Good to have you here in person.
Mark Renneker (02:16):
Glad to be with you, Kush.
Kush (02:18):
Excellent.
I see that it is nighttime, inSan Francisco, uh, with fall
approaching.
you feel ready
Mark Renneker (02:24):
I was ready for this fall season, all through
the summer, and just kept hopingto see the first glimpse of fall
weather and fall swells, andtruth be told, here we are,
October 20th, and we've only hada glimmer just in the past two
days.
And otherwise it's, um, chalk itup up to global warming or what,
(02:48):
but it's concerning.
and the worst of it was that thewater got so warm,
Kush (02:54):
Mm hmm.
Mark Renneker (02:55):
over 60 degrees here in San Francisco's
beginning back in August.
Um, and there's this planktonbloom we call the Red Tide and
me and a lot of other surfersare intensely.
Reactive to it, uh, allergic,and boy, you'll see any number
of folks out of water with, um,any number of sort of sinus and
(03:20):
nose and ear and eye problems.
I saw a guy out in the waterjust two days ago.
He had this goof, goofyapparatus.
It was like a clip on hisnostrils and he had some little
thread or something that wasgoing to keep this thing.
Clipped onto his nose.
And I said, is that because ofthe red tide?
He goes, that's right.
(03:40):
And I said, does that work?
That thing you have on?
And he said, I think it does.
And I said, well, did you evertry just every time you're going
to punch through or you're goingto have your head underwater,
just breathing out through yournostrils.
And so the water can't come in.
He said, Oh, uh, but at anyrate, uh, Yeah, it's, it's,
(04:06):
it's, uh, this is not beginning,um, in a really strongly
positive way.
Normally, by the end ofSeptember, we would have had a
couple of days at Mavericks, acouple of solid double overhead
days here at Ocean Beach, andinstead, you know, yesterday,
the day before, you know, maybethere was a handful of waves
(04:28):
that were maybe double overheadand, but for the most part, not.
It's still, you know, Wasclassically Ocean Beach.
Like yesterday, four of us, fourgood friends all started
paddling together up by Rivera.
It was a 40 minute paddle out.
And, you know, if one werecounting how many times you had
(04:50):
to throw your board away or diveunder or duck dive or whatever.
You know, it's in the hundreds.
Uh, and one of the four didn'teven make it.
He finally just said, I'm out ofhere.
And, uh, and you know what, ofthat whole session and the rides
I got included, the mostmemorable part was the paddle
(05:11):
out.
And if you, if there's somethingsort of the great equalizer here
at Ocean Beach, but also the barthat you have to keep yourself
healthy and strong enough for.
It's to paddle out.
And even in the summer, it canbe a rough paddle out, but, you
know, famously at Ocean Beach,the fall winter is what brings
(05:35):
so many surfers to their kneesand they think they're the
greatest surfer in the world.
And they may well be.
It doesn't mean that you'regoing to get out.
And so you have to use a fairbit of cunning.
One of the guys who I paddledout with, he is currently under
treatment for an advancedmelanoma
Kush (05:54):
Wow.
Mark Renneker (05:56):
and he made it out and, um, When we got out
there, I sort of sort ofjokingly sort of paddled up to
him as if I was like a making afilm from a drug company or
something and wanted to know,you know, do I think that his,
the drug that he's on, it'scalled Keytruda.
Do I think that that contributedto his being able to get out?
And he said, well, yes, I dothink so.
(06:18):
And we had sort of a joke aboutthat, but I said, seriously,
Tom, um, to get out on a daylike today, or even on bigger
days, it takes a certainwillfulness.
And do you feel that the will toget out on a day like today is
somewhat similar to the willyou've had to have?
(06:40):
To go through the cancertreatments and he said,
absolutely, absolutely.
So it is, there is aparallelism.
I think, um, he's somewhatunique really to Ocean Beach
because most of the surfingworld.
There's nothing like this, youknow, for, for me, always, it
was easy to go to the Northshore and you could, you could
(07:03):
paddle out without getting yourhair wet It's a whole different
deal
Kush (07:07):
you know what, this is such an interesting, uh, subject
that, uh, I've thought about alot, in the last 10 years or so
that I've been learning andsurfing at Ocean Beach.
Um, just so people understandwhere we are and what we do
here, I would love to get aquick bio of yourself.
Mark, how old are you?
(07:27):
Where do you live?
What do you do for work?
Mark Renneker (07:30):
yeah,
Kush (07:30):
And uh,
Mark Renneker (07:32):
Good enough.
Good enough.
So I'm 70 years old and I grewup in West Los Angeles and at
age 11 with some friends, we dida junior lifeguard program right
by Santa Monica pier.
And that was when I first begansurfing and I ended up, um,
(07:54):
going to UC Santa Cruz as anundergrad and, uh, where I did
my pre med and
Kush (07:59):
mhm,
Mark Renneker (08:00):
got into UC San Francisco here for medical
school and that was in 1975 andwas immediately astonished to
see how big the surf was up herecompared to Santa Cruz, which I
thought was pretty big surf and,Once I'd gotten to Santa Cruz, I
was never intending to ever goback to Southern California,
(08:21):
which has generally pretty smalland very crowded surf.
And, you know, for me, it waslike heaven to find San
Francisco and all throughmedical school, I was never
intending to even be aphysician, really.
I just wanted the education.
I was more interested inactually the field of education.
And through the passage of, uh,getting into medical school, I'd
(08:45):
already been to like eightdifferent colleges.
Uh, or places of institutes, ifyou will, and had a number of
important role models.
Um, a guy named Gregory Bateson,who was a legendary cultural
anthropologist, a guy named IvanIllich, who was sort of a
defrocked priest.
Um, and both of them havinggreat, I don't know, great
(09:07):
inspiration for me in terms ofeducation and the power of that.
And I was intending to actuallygo and work with a guy named
Paulo Freire, who
Kush (09:16):
mhm,
Mark Renneker (09:17):
This whole notion of critical consciousness and
ways to sort of educate people.
And so my dream always was touse medicine as a way to, um,
create change
Kush (09:29):
mhm,
Mark Renneker (09:30):
rather than as it were to sort of dole out
medicines or, or do operationsor that kind of thing.
And it just so happened thatwhen I was finishing medical
school, I had an experience onin family medicine with a guy
named, uh, Ron Goldschmidt andthrough him began to learn
about.
This sort of the actualapplication of something I
(09:50):
learned from Bateson in termsof, um, the work of Milton
Erickson, who was a amazingbased on, on change, a change
agent, but using hypnosis,really, and, um, and I just
loved what I was doing there.
And that was at SF General.
And I just, so I applied toresidency.
(10:11):
It's the only place I evenapplied in family medicine at SF
General and did all that.
And, uh, yeah.
And when I finished, I was, Idid inner city family medicine
again, just sort of this wholeidea of trying to work with
people who, where you can reallymake profound change and along
the way began realizing that itwas advocacy that I was most
(10:33):
interested in.
And I started my own advocacypractice based on a television
show of the time called themedical.
I call it the medical equalizer,but there was a show called the
equalizer.
And it was made into movies andthat kind of thing, but it was
this idea of, you know, um, I'mgoing to say rescuing people,
but pairing up with people towhen they're feel like, uh, sort
(10:56):
of everything is stacked againstthem.
So I began doing that withpatients who feel that the
medical system had failed themutterly, or had given up on
them, or were actuallyobstructionistic.
And I devised a way of workingwith people never by zoom, uh,
but by phone, this was way backbefore people even talked about
(11:20):
telephone medicine as somethingyou could do, but I began doing
it, you know, in 1989, 90.
And, um, part of the, the, thesort of benefits of that was
that mostly the people I wouldbe speaking with, they were from
all around the country aroundthe world.
They'd find their way to methrough an underground of people
(11:40):
I'd already helped.
Um, and.
But they generally, the time totalk would be in the evening
when they were done dealing withdoctor appointments and whatever
crazy stuff that they had to dowith their lives.
And also when more of theirfamily members could be on the
line and we would do like groupcalls.
So I always, um, was protectingmy time for surf and I never was
(12:05):
in the closet about being ahardcore surfer and a big wave
rider.
And the patients loved that andit was fine with them if, if for
whatever reason we did have acall set up and I needed to,
because there was a big swell orI needed to go to surf a swell
somewhere, they were fine withit.
Okay, yeah, that's great.
You go surf and, you know, let'sreschedule it.
(12:27):
It was never an issue.
And, um, so I've been doing thatwork as the quote medical
equalizer or what I call medicaladvocacy.
I've been doing that for about30 years and I have a house
right here on the beach and nextto the house is another house
that I have for just an officeto do this
Kush (12:47):
hmm.
Sure.
Mark Renneker (12:49):
And I do a lot of teaching of medical advocacy to
medical students and otherphysicians who want to study
with me.
Kush (12:56):
Got it.
Got it.
Yeah.
One of the things I wanted to,uh, explore a bit is how you've
managed to, uh, organize yourlife so you can, uh, give
surfing the time that surfingneeds.
As well as give your career thetime that, uh, your patients and
(13:17):
your profession needs.
And I think I'm getting one clueright there, which is, which is
the work you have done with, uh,patient advocacy and being able
to, able to work with yourpatients to move times around.
By, by sharing with, uh, your,uh, your clientele, your, uh,
your, your, uh, other life, yourpassion for surfing, it sounds
(13:40):
like, uh, sounds like there'sbeen, uh, adequate empathy on,
on that front.
Uh, I'm curious, um, you know,now we have enough media out
there and people see, uh, maybepeople see surfing of all types.
But generally when I have talkedabout surfing, even in the last
(14:02):
dozen years that I've beensurfing, people's impressions of
surf are still kind of lockedinto what they might have seen
from movies, the, image of thatsurfer and, Waikiki beach in
Hawaii, on a perfectly,beautiful day.
Have you been?
Able to communicate how, surfingin San Francisco might be a bit
(14:24):
different than, uh, the popularstereotype.
that's one.
The second how would youdescribe Mark to the average
person, how that is different?
What makes, uh, surfing in SanFrancisco, interesting and, and
different
Mark Renneker (14:38):
So to the first question, there really isn't,
when you're talking aboutstereotypes, it's usually maybe
the stereotype that you holdyourself as virtually a chip on
your own shoulder.
And I've seen far too manyprofessionals, lawyers,
physicians, physicists, who,because they were a surfer, they
(14:59):
were literally in the closet orslightly ashamed of it, even.
And.
So, um, In the same way thatpeople have stereotypes, perhaps
about what a physician shouldbe, you know, in a white coat
and like something that you saw,you see on television or in a
movie, but in truth, the samediversity that you'll see in
(15:20):
medicine, you'll see in surfing.
And yeah, there really are somestereotypes.
Typical characters who becomethat way.
Largely, they're the highvisibility ones who are
sponsored surfers who, you know,they're just, they've got a gig
and they got to perform and goto work and, um, present
(15:41):
whatever is the company's, uh,what they're trying to sell.
And I've, uh, developedliterally a.
Almost an anaphylaxis to thosecharacters.
I mean, I, you know, throughthese years of sort of combining
medicine and surfing, I'vegotten to know kind of most of
the, you know, the name peoplein the surfing world.
(16:05):
And some of them are fantastic.
And some of them, they're justdoing it for a paycheck.
And, and some of them hardlyseem to enjoy surfing.
Um, and then they love to bewhen, uh, they can be a free
surfer, they call it.
And I remember one famous guywho said, he said, Well, now my
sponsors are letting me be afree surfer.
(16:26):
And I said, Do you see thecontradiction of what you're
saying?
They're letting you be a freesurfer?
What's that about?
So, um, the unique thing in SanFrancisco is that if you love, I
don't mean to be pretentious,but if you love culture, that
usually means being close to acity.
And, you know, I have A greataffinity for jazz.
(16:49):
I love seeing live jazz and Imust go to two or three shows a
month and have for a long timeand I, and I thrive on, on
movies.
I see a lot of movies.
And in terms of keeping thebalance, I remember I used to
have an index of, I'd go down inthe San Francisco Chronicle,
(17:10):
they don't even have these listsanymore, but it'd be all the
theaters and what they'reshowing, and I would do a tally
of how many of the movies I'dseen.
And I decided that if I hadn'tseen at least 20 of the movies,
and the total number wouldaverage around, in town there
might be a total of about 70, 75movies, but if I hadn't seen at
(17:30):
least 20 of them, it meant thatI was working too hard.
Then the other me, the othermeasure I, I began to use was,
yeah, you know, you can makemoney in medicine for sure.
There's, you know, you can takeon more gigs and push for, you
know, charging more and all thatkind of thing.
But what I came to realize wasthe real power is you in terms
(17:51):
of buying free time.
In other words that I have,it's, I'm lucky to be a
physician and I can make a lotof money if I need to, but it
also means I can create.
A lot of free time and so I'veset it up so that I don't
generally ever have anappointment before about 5 PM
and because the summer surfaceso crappy here.
(18:15):
I will, you know, do more workduring the day and more
appointments during the day andI just work a lot more hours and
then I literally downshift in myschedule big time starting right
around now and I'll keep that upthrough the big wave season
which for us goes right throughFebruary.
Kush (18:34):
it sounds like you've been able to create that schedule and
hone it over the years to whereyou kind of have.
Some you have that, balance andthe flexibility.
yeah, curious, um, to thelayperson, how would you, uh,
how would you describe orcompare, CF and disco surf to
maybe other kinds of surf?
(18:56):
And I'm not, I'm not trying toput all other kinds of surf in
one bucket, but if you were to,to make that distinction, how
would you go about it?
Mark Renneker (19:05):
you know, some people approach surfing from a
quantitative perspective, howmany waves they can catch.
for instance, uh, surfing in SanFrancisco is more of a
qualitative experience.
And big wave surfing in generalis more of a qualitative
experience.
So that, you know, on a big dayout here in San Francisco, A,
you feel Like you'veaccomplished a lot just having
(19:28):
made it outside and be if youend up catching more than two or
three waves That's you caught alot of waves that day.
And so a lot of people who wouldstand and watch surfers for
instance You know, they're sortof puzzle how little time we
actually spend riding waves, buthow much time we have to spend
Sort of working out all theangles as it were to figure out
(19:49):
where to sit and where to takeoff and how not to wipe out and
And the higher you go up theladder of big wave surfing,
always the fewer the wavesyou'll be catching.
So on big days at Mavericks, uh,you know, Mavericks doesn't even
start breaking until it's atleast triple overhead.
So let's say 15, 18 foot faces,um, you know, very few people
(20:13):
catch many waves.
Even when, even when there'snobody out, I mean, you know, I
surf a lot by myself atMavericks included.
And, um, yeah, you, you're not.
You're not doing it for how manyyou catch and you might even be
out there for three or fourhours and catch one wave.
And from a sort of a spiritualtradition, um, it's just about
(20:35):
perfect.
Kush (20:37):
What makes it perfect?
Mark Renneker (20:39):
It's, it's the oneness of it.
It's the, um, the fact that youhave, you have, you, you imagine
that you have some measure ofcontrol over it all, but for the
most part, you don't, other thanby your own experience and
fitness and cunning.
And a lot of it is cunning.
But having to put aside, it'slike people who now will say,
(21:03):
well, I'm done with this COVIDpandemic.
I'm just going to live my liferegularly.
The foolishness of that, toimagine that you can proclaim
that and that there's anyreality to that.
And the same with somebody who'sgoing to like conquer the surf
or, you know, take surf lessons.
(21:23):
And then I got a coach and thenI got, and then they, you know,
this and that and blah, blah,blah, blah.
And we watch these people cometo Mavericks thinking they're
these conquering heroes becausethey've done that elsewhere and
maybe in other aspects of theirlife.
And they're just reduced torubble.
Kush (21:41):
Sure, Mark, how long have you been surfing Ocean Beach and
Mavericks?
And maybe if you can just give aquick idea of how you've seen
the surf culture, uh, evolveover that time?
Mark Renneker (21:55):
So I started when I came up here to start medical
school, and I was looking aroundfor a place to live.
And it was, you know, offshoreit's this time of year and sunny
and they were good surf andthere was nobody else even in
the water and I was getting somegreat waves and there was one
guy who weighs up the beach andI paddled up to where he was and
(22:16):
said, you know, what do you callthis spot right here?
And he said, Oh, this is calledpillbox and that's called purple
cow.
And he's all these things hestarts saying, he goes, are you
new here?
And I said, yeah, I just movedup here to start medical school.
And he paddled over right upnext to me and he put out his
hand.
And he said, Dan suey third yearand so, uh, and I, so it was
(22:36):
like, yeah, that was moreimportant than any white coat
ceremony sort of for theinitiation of becoming sort of
in this, uh, this group andright away.
I all the surfboards I'd hadfrom.
You know, LA area and Santa Cruzwere useless up here.
And I gradually began to realizeI had to get bigger guns,
(23:00):
bigger, longer boards, which youcouldn't even get here.
I mean, there weren't.
Shapers for the most part, andeven in Santa Cruz, they didn't
have big boards.
So for whatever reason, I begangoing to the North Shore when
the surf here would get crappy,which is usually in February,
and there they'd still have bigwaves, and most of the pros had
left town, and they often wouldleave behind their big guns.
(23:21):
So I would just buy a pile ofthem and fly them back home,
five or six boards even.
And the problem here was, um, wewere just breaking boards all
the time because of how powerfulthe surf is.
And also is when leases werereally pretty primitive.
I mean, the leases would justbreak willy nilly.
my goal was really to surf aplace that breaks about three to
(23:46):
four miles out called the potatopatch.
Which I had seen the first timeI, in anatomy lab on the 14th
floor of the medical school, youcould see the potato patch
breaking.
It would just blow my mind.
And these were waves that were50 foot faces, something like
that.
I mean, really, and some of thewaves would, would go on for
like a minute.
(24:07):
And, um, so
Kush (24:09):
And, And, Mark.
This is just, if you don't minddescribing this place, it's,
it's a fascinating, uh, naturalphenomena, right?
Believe It's outside the GoldenGate Bridge.
Mark Renneker (24:18):
if you just think of like a river mouth, where the
sand is, comes out the river anddeposits sandbars, that's really
what San Francisco Bay is, it'sthis one big river mouth and all
the sand goes out and in ahorseshoe crown that stretches
from the north on the rune sideall the way down here, comes in
kind of closer here, down byTarabel Street, And, um, and on
(24:42):
the outer realm of it is wherethe shipping channel has to be
dredged to for the big ships tocome in.
it's about four fathoms deep.
So about 24 feet deep and theonly way to access it.
Originally, I tried with myfriend who had a power boat and
I ended up worrying more aboutthe guy in the boat and then I
just, I didn't like doing that.
(25:02):
And, so then I just began tryingto paddle out to it.
And after a number ofexperiments figured out that on
an outgoing tide, I could justjump in up by the cliff house.
And literally ride the currentall the way out without
paddling, even it was hilarious.
You could just sit on your boardand it just takes you two to
three knots an hour.
(25:23):
I mean, it was, it was easy.
You just had to time it for whenthe tide stopped outgoing
because otherwise you couldn'tstay in position out there.
But on some of those days whereI wouldn't even catch a wave,
you know, I might have literallypaddled or covered maybe 10 or
12 miles.
And I always liked paddling.
Paddling seemed to me a delightand sometimes, you know, the
(25:45):
current would help too, but, andthen finally, um, and I would do
this with friends in the, in thebeginning, and again, I hate to
say this, but they would kind ofchicken out or lose heart or,
you know, and I would say, no,no, we got to get about another
mile or two further out.
We're just on the inside here.
And they would go, no, I don'tknow.
And then the Coast Guard wouldsend out one of their rescue
(26:06):
boats because there was somereports and, I don't know.
They'd, they'd, those guys,you've seen them on the big days
where they bust through thewaves and make a quite a, quite
a show for people.
But, and then they would, theywould look over and they'd go,
Oh, it's you doc.
Oh, okay.
No problem.
And then they would justdisappear.
And finally, I ended up doing itby myself and caught a wave.
(26:28):
Uh, this was about 2005.
Um, that, you know, solid 25foot wave.
And it wrote it for about aminute.
And with no photographers, noother people there, and, and
that was just the way I like it.
That's beautiful.
the few times when I have beenfortunate to be out in the
water, uh, by myself and catch awave like that, uh, not a wave
(26:51):
like that, but a wave, uh, youknow, much more, humble in its,
uh, dimensions.
it's still been, uh, anoutstanding, moment for me.
So I think I can, I can onlyimagine what it must be like to,
uh, to be out there.
Um, and having not only caughtthat wave, but put in the effort
(27:11):
and time to earn that wave, uh,which I think is a big part of
what surfing is.
Well, for me, though, I must saya lot of it has been, again,
really interwoven with the sameprocess that I use in medicine
of seemingly something, uh,unsolvable.
Someone with an advanced, youknow, metastatic cancer or
(27:32):
something.
So what's the way out of it?
What's the way, what can you dodifferently?
And, um.
Or additionally, and so it's alot of research.
And so these places that I'll goand surf, it's incremental in
the study that I engage in oftena lot of cartography and, you
(27:54):
know, bathymetrics and, youknow, ocean, oceanic kind of
inquiries and talking to peoplewho know areas.
Whether they be fishermen orwhether they be researchers, um,
to get a better handle on it.
And so I've taken that level of,of exploration or inquiry
Kush (28:16):
uh,
Mark Renneker (28:16):
into not just the local area here, but I've been
systematically exploring theArctic and the Antarctic and the
sub Arctic, sub Antarctic areas.
And have organized and led firstexpeditions to surf Antarctica,
Iceland, Northern Norway,Svalbard, Greenland, um.
(28:43):
All of Alaska and what I'm mostexcited about now is I'm putting
together a trip to explore allthe way to the end of the
Aleutian Islands.
That'll, it'll be like a monthlong trip next August.
Yeti Stereo Microphone (28:56):
Holy smokes.
That sounds incredible.
Kush (28:59):
uh, amongst all those trips and, all the memorable,
uh, surf sessions over thedecades, uh, including the one
where you caught that eponymouswave at, uh, the Potato Patch,
any other, like, highlights ofproud moments, maybe a couple
that stand out that you wouldlike to share?
Mark Renneker (29:18):
I have a way that I surf some hours north from
here.
I have a little 10 by 12 footcabin, no electricity on a cliff
over a surf break.
And then it looks out over wayout in the ocean and the outer
reef spot that I first surfed in85, 86, and it remains my
(29:39):
favorite big wave spot in theworld.
And I've managed to keep it asecret for the most part and not
let what befell Mavericks happento it.
And so I've had experiences outthere that, uh, just would blow
anyone's mind.
And usually surfing alone abouta mile from shore.
(30:02):
And the one that most comes tomind actually is, again, the
lessons of hubris are criticalto me.
And so I had paddled out aloneon a 10.
9 brand new board that JeffClark made me.
And it was, you know, 20 to 25foot, something like that.
So that would be like four tosix times overhead.
(30:23):
And, um,
Kush (30:25):
Wow.
Mark Renneker (30:25):
when I do this on my own to these outer reef
spots, I promise myself I'llonly take three waves.
And the first wave will, I'lljust, it'll be an easy one.
Uh, you know, I'm not gonna sayshoulder hop, but sort of.
And the goal is to try and do itwithout getting my hair wet.
Kush (30:41):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (30:41):
it's not like Ocean Beach, where you got to
dive through the whitewater.
These are places you can accessthrough relatively calm water.
It's just, it can take 45minutes or an hour to paddle
out.
But, and then the third wavewould be the only one that I
would really Take a chance andsort of sit deeper, uh, maybe a
bigger wave, whatever.
(31:02):
And so I'd already caught myfirst two waves
Kush (31:05):
Mm
Mark Renneker (31:06):
and then this fog bank appeared and it would
happen like so fast.
It was like a bad special effectin a movie or something, but
literally.
No visibility.
And, um, I don't know, 50 feet,something like that.
And, and so I have my lineupsout there based on way on shore
(31:27):
sort of areas that I triangulateand figure out where I am and to
where the wave would break.
But I also know the kelp bedpretty well and the boils pretty
well.
And I said, okay, I know whereI'm sitting.
I'm just gonna, I'll just waitfor the fog to lift because I
really want to get that thirdwave.
I really want to get that thirdwave.
And, you know, it was kind of.
(31:48):
Amazing, because as soon as Isort of had convinced myself
that I would get a third wave,this giant wave broke outside of
me.
Just, I didn't even see itcoming.
We're talking huge, huge wave.
Throw your board away, dive asdeep as you can, the leash
breaks,
Kush (32:06):
Oh, goodness.
Mark Renneker (32:07):
It's one of those things where it's, it's so
violent that it sort of launchesyou back up from the depths like
a torpedo shooting out of thewater or something.
And I go, Oh man, this is, thiswill be a challenge.
And I just looked at my watch.
It was 347.
I remember exactly and I thoughtthere's time it was dead of
(32:30):
winter, so it was going to turndark at five
Kush (32:33):
Mm
Mark Renneker (32:34):
and I wasn't really worried about swimming
in.
I've practiced swimming and outthere before.
It's really tricky to swim in.
You have to swim in throughthese rocks and we call it the
keyhole and it's it.
It's formidable.
But really what I was worriedwas to find my new board.
Um, and I have a pretty goodidea where the boards go from
(32:55):
having this having happenedbefore, but never in the dense
fog.
And part of it was that you hadto stay with where the waves
were breaking, because that'swhere the board would go, which
meant that you had to let thesestill giant waves just I want
you and I did all of the above,and was swimming around out in
the ocean again, about a mileoffshore, looking for my board
(33:17):
in the fog and never found it.
Kush (33:20):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (33:21):
And then finally swam in and my car was parked
pretty far away.
And so I'm running along theroad with, with my broken leash
and now the sun's come out.
Now I can see everything and allI want to do is get binoculars
so I can look for it.
And some guy driving by whorecognizes me, he says, doc,
what are you doing?
And I said, I just lost my portand he goes, you were fucking
(33:44):
out there and I said, yeah, Isaid, could you help me find my
board and he said, yeah, yeah,great.
So he's got binoculars too.
And so we stood on the cliff andjust watched and watched and
watched never found the boardturned dark.
And that was the end of the day.
Yeti Stereo Microphone-4 (33:59):
Godly.
That's quite a story.
That was not what I expected.
Quite the adventure you had outthere and did not expect the
ending.
And, uh, it brings together somany elements of surfing.
That many of us experienced, youjust have experienced that on a
(34:21):
much.
More intense and grander scale.
But it brings together the highsand the lows and the cheeses and
the losses.
And the elements.
Out in nature.
Yeti Stereo Microphone-5 (34:37):
Oh, and sorry about that board.
A brand new board from JeffClark.
Indeed.
Sounds quite special.
Mark Renneker (34:45):
I had a board, one of my favorite boards.
It's still one of my favoritewords.
I still write it.
The day parmenter made me, itwas an eight foot fish that he
made me for Mavericks workedfantastically well at Mavericks.
one day, The leash broke and Iswam and swam and swam and
looked for it and never found itlet the, harbor master know if,
that if anybody with a fishingboat or whatever found a board,
(35:09):
you know, sort of purple, redone, you know, to call me a
month goes by, he calls, Ithink, I think we've got your
board.
And I said, what?
And he goes, yeah, wonderful.
The captains, you know, he foundthis board floating out in the
ocean He just wants to, youknow, make sure that, it's yours
and I said, well, and Idescribed some as it were sort
(35:30):
of like in, you know, policeprocedural, identifying, tattoos
or scars.
I said, yeah, there's a dinghere and there's a blah, blah,
blah, and this and that.
He goes, yeah, it sounds likeyou're bored.
And I said, well, what do I haveto do to get it back?
He goes, well, you know, therules about recovery at sea.
And I said, Oh, that's fine.
If he wants some money, I'mhappy to pay him.
(35:52):
I really love that board.
And he, I said, how much does hewant?
He goes, a C note.
I said, a C note.
Did he say a C note?
And he said, yep.
And I don't know if Kush wouldeven know what a C note is.
Well, it's gangster slang for ahundred dollar bill.
Kush (36:10):
Oh, century note.
Got it.
Mark Renneker (36:12):
yeah.
And, but, but I said to him, Isaid, God, this guy is no
authentic captain.
And he, he said, yeah, justbring me a C note.
So I had to go, like, go to thebank, get a C note, went down
there and got my board back.
Kush (36:27):
That's hilarious.
That's, uh, I mean, it couldhave been a C note wrapped
around a bottle of rum orsomething to make it even more,
Mark Renneker (36:35):
could have, yeah, yeah.
Kush (36:37):
that's, that's, that's crazy.
Um, Marek, you've been, youknow, you've been surfing at,
at, uh, you've been surfing forsuch a long time at, at such a
high level.
Um, how do you keep your body,your, you know, how do you stay
in shape?
Do you have, uh, do you crosstrain?
Do you have any other rituals?
(36:57):
any dietary habits that you haverefined over the years?
Mm-Hmm.
Mark Renneker (37:02):
Yeah, and it's been just like everything else
in surfing and medicine.
It's been incremental.
So I've been surfing for, what,60 years, started when I was,
you know, 10 or 11, thereabouts.
And, um, what I didn't want wasto do anything that would
interfere with surfing.
(37:22):
So I was a hardcoreskateboarder, you know, pretty
radical skateboarder.
But I kept getting injured, andthen I couldn't surf, and I
hated that.
So I gave up that.
I gave up skiing.
Kush (37:34):
mm
Mark Renneker (37:35):
Um, I used to do rock climbing and surfers
generally make good rockclimbers.
The problem is that if you fallsurfing, it's no big deal.
The water is soft, but I hadsome, I had some good falls and
I thought this is stupid.
I'm not going to do that.
I won't be able to surf.
And so that was like one rule ofthumb.
The second was, um, I hadlearned yoga early on and always
(38:00):
kept up some practice of yoga orcertain poses that I knew would
help me not have sort ofstiffness or loss of
flexibility.
Um, and also I began, um,working with different people
like a cranial osteopath.
(38:21):
In other words, a, a treatingmanual medicine specialist And
with my stated goal being, Iwant you to keep me able to surf
as I get older.
And so just a standingappointment once a month, and
it's just proactive.
It's just looking forrestrictions or issues that if
(38:42):
left unattended or un, uh,worked on could really add up to
a problem.
And, and then amidst that, theninvariably there are injuries
that happen.
And I have about four differentpeople of different specialties.
One is an Atlas orthogonalchiropractor who only adjusts
(39:04):
just the Atlas.
Another is a brilliant,brilliant, um, you would call it
a sort of a muscle.
Specialist, but he, um, did alot of dance medicine and took
care of Baryshnikov and, haddeveloped a lot of his own style
of working with people to, know,look for restrictions, you know,
(39:24):
at different segments of thespine and the hip and ankles and
all of that.
Um, and I've worked with him alot to help sort of.
Reverse or improves like ascoliosis that I've had, um, and
work with things of ergonomicsand posture.
(39:44):
Um, so it's been, I've hadacupuncturists, um, uh, and
these are people who, um, havehelped me, I would say, age well
and understand and, and mainlywork with people who are
motivated like I am, you know,you know, dancers and athletes
(40:04):
and, and the like.
And without that, yeah.
Um, yeah, I, not to say thatit's victim blaming, but I can't
tell you how many friends I havewho've had hip replacements and
knee replacements and how manyshoulder surgeries and neck
fusions.
And you just see it graduallytake its toll for what, what
(40:26):
they can do in surfing asthey've gotten older.
And my role model has alwaysbeen, uh, Jerry Lopez.
Kush (40:34):
mm
Mark Renneker (40:34):
And Jerry, I knew from, uh, I was in a movie with
him called Rotting Giants in2004,
Kush (40:42):
sure.
Mark Renneker (40:43):
and, um, and he wrote a forward for a book I did
on surfer's health called, SurfSurvival,
Kush (40:50):
Mm-Hmm?
Mark Renneker (40:51):
now in its second edition, but the essence of him.
Of Lopez's teachings, if youwill, is surf today to surf
tomorrow, so it's prettyobvious.
So you see these guys come out.
They're just crashing burnartists on big days at
Mavericks, and they get hurt.
They just get hurt and, youknow, my goal is to literally
never fall, not not wipe outonce.
(41:13):
I remember I went an entirewinter without a single wipe
out.
What that means is you don'tcatch all the waves you want.
It means that, you know, if youdon't think there's at least a
90 percent probability of makingthe wave.
Not to go.
It also means getting reallygood equipment.
I know this is a big deal inother sports, maybe more so than
(41:34):
in surfing, but, um, I've alwayshad, uh, wonderful shapers to
work with and to, uh, make me alot of experimental boards and
interesting designs and, youknow, even just two days ago, I
got to ride, uh, a board thatjust blew my mind it's what's
called an edge board.
(41:54):
I never felt such a board.
under my feet before.
And it was, it's quiteinvigorating to, suddenly, you
know, think that you've seen itall and seen every idea and
here's something completely new.
Kush (42:06):
That's amazing.
Wow.
Mark Renneker (42:08):
and and in terms of nutrition, you know, all
through medical school and evenfor a long time thereafter, I
used to have a hamburger everyday
Kush (42:17):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (42:17):
and I have found that I could do study, medicine
or, you know, for medicalschool.
Best sort of sitting at arestaurant.
I used to go to Bill's placeover on Clements street.
I'd sit in the back there andthey just loved taking care of
me, the medical student, andthey would bring me all kinds of
treats and things.
I was never good at likestudying in the library or
something like that.
(42:38):
at some point I did herniate adisc.
And one of the things that Ibegan to explore was, okay,
maybe I'll become, you know,vegetarian or pescarian.
And that was, um, in about 1990,I've been essentially that since
I gave up, chicken and pork andturkey and, you know, all the
(43:00):
red meats for sure, and it'sinteresting that one time I
slipped, as it were, was in theAntarctica trip, the captain
and, owned an island in theFalklands where he would raise
his own lambs and he had allthis frozen lamb and, you know,
there is something wonderfulabout lamb.
There just is, you know, uh,and, um, so I got ill from
(43:22):
eating, lamb again after abouttwo days and that was in the
year 2000 when we did that trip.
I haven't had red meat since.
Kush (43:30):
Sure.
Got it.
Pescatarian, uh, almostcompletely vegetarian.
Any supplements
Mark Renneker (43:38):
Yeah, yeah, actually, there are.
I'm a believer in NAcetylcysteine or NAC, which
when you swallow it, it's aprodrug for what's called
glutathione.
Glutathione is the chemical thata huge number of cells in your
body produce as a way ofcleansing the organs.
to give you an example, NAC, ifyou you go mushroom collecting
(43:59):
with the next rain, up Up thecoast, you know, and you, you
pick the wrong mushroom and eatit and your liver is being
destroyed and you're, you know,orange is a pumpkin.
And you present to the emergencyroom, the very first therapy
they would give you would beintravenous NAC, in other words,
to save, to save your, to saveyour liver.
So NAC is something thatcleanses the organs, including
(44:21):
the kidneys, including lungs,including the heart, including
the brain.
I've always taken additionalamounts of vitamin D, you know,
on the order of about like 5,000, 5, 000 units a day.
Um, I've always liked magnesium,it takes some extra magnesium,
and then a friend of mine who'sa nutritional oncologist, um,
(44:44):
who is in the Chicago area, andhe's a surfer also, he actually
went on the Antarctica trip, andhe and I surf Lake Michigan and
places like that together.
But he has these supplementsthat he's put together that are
sort of a gamish of, you know,15 or 20 things that would sort
of be everything you might findat Whole Foods, and I've always
taken some of that.
Kush (45:05):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (45:06):
Oh, a little bit of curcumin, a little bit of
fish oil, but not too much.
If these things cause you tobleed, I did find for a while I
was taking sort of preventativelow dose or, you know, uh, baby
aspirin, but boy, you know, Ijust found, I mean, even like
punching through a lip, youknow, I would get these little,
(45:28):
you know, ecchymosis, little,you know, sort of bleeds under
the skin on my face.
It just, so I cut that out.
Kush (45:37):
I don't take any supplements.
I'm 44.
And I sometimes don't, don'teven know where to get started.
It seems there's so much varietyand so many types.
And then there also, you know,the, uh, snake oil, uh, sales
people out there peddling theirown, motley potions.
I will have to put in moreresearch
Mark Renneker (45:58):
the research gets very easy there's a branch of
integrative medicine calledfunctional medicine.
the principle of it is that youlook for biomarkers.
And if you want a not shotgun,with supplements so biomarkers
would be, yeah, looking atmicronutrient levels in the
blood, looking at vitamin levelsin the blood, looking at
(46:20):
inflammatory markers,coagulation markers, immune
function.
All of these things are easilydone and what's really
interesting now in the field ofhealth is that there's a lot of
direct to consumer ability ofordering all the lab tests that
you otherwise would have todepend on physicians for.
So you can go to like directlab.
(46:40):
com and you can order virtuallyanything that a physician would
order.
And if you want to, you know,play around and look online
under, what I would call terrainpanel.
So you want to look at.
Uh, not the disease qualities ofone's body, but the terrain,
meaning the healthy part of yourbody and you look at the worth
(47:01):
of normal levels would be foryou, you name it, magnesium or,
C reactive protein or, uh, youknow, things of that nature and,
or, and then, or all thedifferent antioxidants and, and
all that, and then you would,um, Say, oh, gosh, I'm like, I'm
below normal.
I don't know why that is, butI'll start taking such and such,
(47:24):
you know, more zinc, and then inthree months, I'll recheck that
on that dose of zinc and see ifI'm hitting the level that I
want some optimal level, ideallyon the upper range of normal.
And at least then.
Yeah, you're not shotgunning,you're actually working with
your own physiology from astandpoint of knowledge.
Kush (47:45):
yeah, no, that is very sanguine advice.
Uh, somebody else recommended,uh, functional medicine to me
for just the same, I think thesame sort of concerns I had
about shooting in the dark.
And I think, thank you forreinforcing that.
Mark Renneker (47:58):
Well, and the other thing to say in the field
of sports medicine, again, theytend to be, evidence based, but
they tend to be more datadriven.
And so, yeah, you can get a lotof good data in terms of
exercise physiology and sportsmedicine, or in terms of
physiatry or physical therapy,degrees of motion, even just
(48:19):
resting tension in the body,these can be measured and that's
what the elite athletes areworking with, whether they be
swimmers or, uh, rock climbersor what have you, they, a lot of
them, you know, they get to thatlevel by at some point kind of
going into, as it were, the, thebiomarkers or the science of
(48:40):
that, which they're endeavoringto do all those guys on, on the
warriors,
Kush (48:46):
yes, yes,
Mark Renneker (48:47):
they know their numbers.
Kush (48:49):
Oh, wow.
Okay.
Okay.
Okay.
Got
Mark Renneker (48:52):
and all the rest of us are farting around.
haha got it
Kush (48:58):
mean, no, there's no doubt that, uh, that, uh, those, those
sports that have a lot of moneyin them, those sports have,
certainly embraced a lot ofscience and I think sports like
ours, and also obviously I'm notlike.
An athlete of that caliber.
I think the rest of us kind ofhave to just take that lead and
(49:19):
learn from people who have, whoare doing those things and not,
not, you know, not reinvent, theproverbial, so no, I think
you're right.
Mark Renneker (49:26):
Now, the goal is to reinvent the wheel.
In other words, to learnsomething often is to, for you
to learn it The first time.
else may have learned it, butfor whatever reason it never
transferred into your realm.
You can, you can cognitively orintellectually understand it,
but, um.
And I think it does help whenyou, uh, even maybe this is the
(49:51):
ultimate purpose of your seriesis, trying on these other
strategies of other people andsee what fits for you.
And that's, of course, that'show we all go through life.
Kush (50:02):
I think that's exactly right.
I think it starts with like, uh,the cognition and then maybe
moves on to, uh, you know, thewillingness to take a chance and
put the, uh, resources towardsit and then ultimately figure
out through, uh,Experimentation, what is, what
isn't that works the best andthen kind of customize it few
(50:24):
things you excel at.
What is one thing that you wishyou were, uh, you were good at
that.
You're not.
Mark Renneker (50:30):
there was a guy from Australia who would come to
Mavericks every year named TonyRay.
Tony Ray could paddle fasterthan anyone I had ever seen.
And I really.
But watch him and watch how hewould use his arms and the how
deep he would put his hands intothe water and how thick his
board was.
And, and it isn't that I, obsessabout paddling faster, but in
(50:54):
answer to your question, I wouldlike to paddle faster.
And it is.
And also.
What I see among my peers,meaning surfers of my age, is
that they begin to not be ableto paddle as fast, and
consequently, they end up takingoff later, and they end up
(51:17):
falling, or not being able tostand on their board properly,
because the principal deficitbeing paddling speed.
So a lot of, you can make up forin terms of loss of speed.
Of going to lower rocker planes,so flatter boards, so like a
(51:37):
fish fundamentally is a flatterrocker plane, and they just
paddle a hell of a lot better.
They just do.
I consciously worked with thatas something to improve upon, if
you will.
Kush (51:49):
Got it.
And I don't think you're anyslouch when it comes to
battling, but I can see thatwhen you look at all your other
gifts.
With the, with the sport, maybethat's the one that you would
like to,
Mark Renneker (52:00):
No, but also I would tell you, honestly, it is
the one that I would notice asI've gotten older.
The paddling speed just dropsoff a little bit.
I can sprint paddle the same,
Kush (52:09):
yeah,
Mark Renneker (52:09):
but in doing my, some of these sort of, uh,
heroic paddles, if you will, youknow, these hour long paddles or
whatever, they take longer, Andif I'm paddling with a younger
friend or someone who's a greatpaddler, like Grant Washburn,
who I surf with a lot, anotherbig wave rider, Grant, he just
paddles faster than all of andhow much faster?
(52:29):
I don't know, 5%, 10 percentmaybe, but in big wave surfing,
that's everything.
Kush (52:36):
sure,
Mark Renneker (52:37):
percentage increments make a big
difference.
Kush (52:40):
no, I think it adds up over a long session, a long
battle, that little bit of extraspeed and, uh, capacity probably
has a Huge, huge impact on one'sperformance.
maybe In the last, maybe five or10 years, any new behavior, any
new habit you find has most,improved your life?
Mark Renneker (53:04):
I would say I just have an ever improving
bullshit detector.
I don't suffer fools gladly.
I just don't.
I don't waste a lot of time withpeople who, I don't know what
they, this can be a glib answerwhen people would say, what are
you afraid of?
What I'm afraid of issuperficiality.
I like depth.
(53:24):
I like complexity.
I like the unknown.
But if it's just whatever, smalltalk, you know, in this sense,
I, I prefer, prefer my owncompany actually, or, or friends
I have who are really rigorousand engaged.
Kush (53:40):
how does that translate to, uh, any new maybe behavior?
Mark Renneker (53:45):
You know, yeah, it does, it, um.
A degree of intolerance.
You know, uh, I, I've not to saythat there's a long line of
people wanting to, engage me asa person, it's a month's long
wait to work with me, it's likea six month wait at this point,
it's, it's embarrassing even,uh, especially for people with
(54:07):
life threatening illness, but,but I don't, um, it's hard, you
I don't, I didn't make it veryhard for you to get in touch
with me just because you, youknow, we had, I had a friend in
common, but, I don't have awebsite.
I don't make it easy for peopleto get to me.
I just don't.
The Biden Ballard writers andpeople want to do articles and
stuff.
Kush (54:27):
Mhm.
Mark Renneker (54:28):
I don't bother with them at all.
I've learned the hard way thatway.
I mean, I just, it isn't what itis.
I'm not interested in that.
Kush (54:35):
Fair.
Mark Renneker (54:36):
your proposal.
I liked the idea of, as it were.
What it is to, uh, agegracefully or to, to be healthy
as you get older as a surfer.
Kush (54:48):
Yes.
Mark Renneker (54:49):
Great.
That's a, that's a wonderfultopic.
Kush (54:52):
think it is.
And I think, uh, I think thisconversation shall hopefully
benefit a lot of people in, in amaterial way.
here's another, uh, another kindof interesting question.
do you love your, uh, yourfuture or your past more?
Mark Renneker (55:09):
Well, the future doesn't exist.
And the past, as we're learningthis more or less a matter of
interpretation or opinion orsort of the Rashomon effect.
So all there is, is the present.
And so.
Um, you know, I, I don't worryabout my past, really.
I, I, I've kept a log or ajournal basically since I was
(55:33):
16.
And I do, I do have a lot ofwritings, if you will.
but, I'm all about what'shappening right now.
Kush (55:43):
That's, uh, that's a great answer.
now is, the only dimension wehave, uh, in front of us that we
have the, highest ability toinfluence.
Mark Renneker (55:52):
Well, that and I mean, really, when you study
spiritual traditions, they allarrive at that same viewpoint.
It's only about the now.
Yeah, you're supposed to takelessons from the past.
but it's to the degree to whichyou can apply them.
It has to do with, to yourself,not to others.
Kush (56:12):
Do you have a meditation practice, Mark?
Mark Renneker (56:14):
Surfing.
there was one great book writtenby a guy named Kent Pearson, who
was an Australian sociologist,and I was interested in his
work.
He had died, and at one point Iwent specifically to see his
widow in Australia because Iwanted to see his papers.
I was really interested in hiswritings, and what he did was he
(56:35):
did studies of trying tounderstand why people surf.
These were in depth studies, Imean, PhD level.
Australians take this stuffseriously.
And, it wasn't even in as manywords as this.
It was, what's the principalreason why you serve?
And it was to do with itsmeditative properties.
(56:57):
and again, all that.
time that we spent sittingaround out there in the water
that strange feeling of thingssort of washing away that you
had been tussling with in yourmind and trying to figure out
with the problems with whomeverand whatever and the affording
this and that and bills and thefuture, the future, um, you
(57:17):
know, the future only becomesthis.
Really, really wonderfulchildish thing of believing that
there's going to be a great waythat's going to come to you in
the next few moments.
And that is its own meditation.
Fair enough
Kush (57:32):
I would agree that, ultimately for me, and I think
for many of us, I think.
sports assume a meditationquality when we find that flow
and allows us to, uh, be thatmuch more present, and that
heightened perception and all ofthose things that, come to that
state.
And I think that's probably whatI enjoy the most about them.
Mark Renneker (57:53):
One of the ways I proceed in my medical advocacy
practice is I only take on onenew case a week these, I don't
treat them.
I don't prescribe things tothem.
I, you know, I help them figureout things that they can do set
them up to sort of embark on adifferent course with their
illness.
And so I often, in my dreamseven,
Kush (58:15):
Mm hmm.
Mark Renneker (58:15):
also when I'm out in the water, the solution to a
case will come to me.
What I'm not specificallylooking for it,
Kush (58:23):
Fair.
Yeah.
Mark Renneker (58:25):
and that becomes, uh, something that I can't.
Deliberately create in thewater, but it happens when I
don't know, there's maybe it'spretty inconsistent and there's
just some ray of light over somebody of kelp or something.
And then boom, there it is.
And I know exactly what I needto do on a given case.
(58:47):
I don't have to write it down oranything else.
It's so evident.
I'll remember it.
that's happened so many timesand what it.
Yeah.
When it doesn't happen is whenI've taken on too many cases,
too much work, these problems ofothers that I'm trying to help
them solve, they becomesomething encumbering to me.
then sometimes for many peoplewho surf, they're trying to
(59:10):
leave the land, you know, on thebeach as it were.
I've actually, in the balance,if you will, tried to make it so
that it.
I don't mind carrying some ofthe people I'm trying to help
with me.
When I go out, especially onthese fairly complex, difficult
(59:31):
expeditions to the outer realmor what have you, because so
often what I'm going through iswhat they're going through,
trying to make something happenin the most unlikely conditions
imaginable.
In 20 and 30 foot surf, there'snobody else who even wanted to
go out.
(59:51):
They didn't even want to dealwith it.
And it can be, you know,horrific winds or something.
And I'm just trying to figureout, is it possible to go out
and actually get a ride?
Kush (01:00:00):
Sure, I'm going to do a crazy segue here, a question I
want to ask you that, surfingthe waters at Ocean Beach,
probably more than most peopleout there.
even myself in my, whatever,decade long span at the beach,
I've seen some prettyinteresting.
Marine life, when I tell peoplethat I've seen dolphins out
(01:00:23):
there just that part, I thinkdolphins and the occasional
whale out there.
I people get pretty astonished.
So curious what has been some ofthe most interesting wildlife
that you might have seen, in thewater.
And if you have also ever seenthe, the men in the, in the gray
suit.
So to speak.
Mark Renneker (01:00:44):
I have, I've had one encounter with, a great
white, at a sort of remote spotsouth of here.
Again, right in peak great whiteseason.
And, um, it was profound.
It was close to me and it wastelling me I'm here.
It was this, it came up out ofthe water about 15 feet away
from me but it first appeared asjust a dome of water being
(01:01:08):
lifted and when it was about 2feet high.
Then I saw pectoral fin justslicing through it, and it was
elegant.
It was elegant how it slidesthrough, and then the head
emerged on the other end of thedome, literally with the eye
looking at me.
And it was this, you know, itwas checking me out, uh, it was
territorial, the place where wewere is, uh, you know, it's a,
(01:01:30):
it's a seal rookery, so, so whatdo you expect, dumb shit, you
know, but in all these yearsI've been surfing there, I've
never had such an encounterright away it was okay, ever
more for about that June throughend of September, early October.
I'm not going to surf thereagain, and I've held to that
pretty rigorously.
(01:01:51):
The other most profoundexperience was I was out with
one friend on a big day atMavericks, and it was getting
into the spring, so February,March, something like that, and
this friend says, Doc, there's awhale going to ram us.
And it's coming up from thesouth.
it's a giant gray whale,whatever, 60 feet or something.
(01:02:13):
it's not doing the diving thingunderneath or porpoising kind of
thing.
It's just streaming across thesurface.
And it's, I don't know, 75 feetaway or something heading right
at us as a set came.
Kush (01:02:27):
Oh,
Mark Renneker (01:02:28):
I was exactly in position to take off and I, and
I just wanted to get out of theway.
And so I took off on this waveand I'm on like a 10 and a half
foot board or something.
And as I'm dropping in, thewhale's back was in the trough
in front of me.
And so I had to fade deep aroundthe whale, which I made, I made,
(01:02:50):
I made, I made the fade.
I made the bottom turn, rode thewave, came back out.
And my friend is sitting therewhite because the whale, after
it had done that, it had beenbreached through the back of the
wave.
And came down landing explodingright next to him just feet from
(01:03:11):
him and then just kept on hisway.
Kush (01:03:14):
gosh.
That's, uh, that's, that's aremarkable, uh, thing to happen
in the water.
And, sounds like both of youcame out unscathed, uh,
Mark Renneker (01:03:26):
Oh, yeah,
Kush (01:03:26):
like
Mark Renneker (01:03:27):
frequently re recreate the memory of it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you rememberthat time.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Kush (01:03:35):
That's awesome.
Mark, just some fun questions.
talked about your food habitsbefore, but, uh, if you had to,
you know, eat one meal for therest of your life, what would
that be?
Mark Renneker (01:03:47):
That's easy, I've done three long trips to Japan,
especially to the NorthernIsland Hokkaido, found some
amazing big waves there.
I could eat Japanese food threemeals a day and be utterly
happy.
Kush (01:04:02):
it's funny.
Uh, when I spoke to our commonfriend, Kevin Starr recently,
uh, guess what his, uh, responsewas.
Mark Renneker (01:04:09):
Similar,
Kush (01:04:10):
Yes.
Hey, Mark.
I know you love movies.
Uh, what's a favorite movie youcould watch again and again?
Mark Renneker (01:04:17):
you know, I worship Buster Keaton and I
never tire of watching Keaton'sfilms and, uh, During the
pandemic, even it was probablythe thing I missed the most.
We're seeing those kinds ofrepertory or silent films and
special showings and, I loveKurosawa's films from Japan and,
(01:04:38):
and I miss those too.
for better or for worse, justlove really bad, dumb movies.
And I've always, I've alwaysloved horror films.
Always.
And fortunately, there's noshortage of good, bad horror
films, so I put in a fair bit oftime with, with them,
Kush (01:05:00):
Excellent.
There was a big billboard outthere and, uh, you wanted to
leave a message for people outthere, what would it say?
Mark Renneker (01:05:07):
huh?
Kush (01:05:09):
Okay.
Mark Renneker (01:05:09):
I mean, the master, Jordan Peele is the
master now of, the short title,he hasn't done one called, huh,
but he'll get, he'll get there.
Kush (01:05:19):
Sure.
Mark Renneker (01:05:19):
I mean, and, and and part of that reflects, I
can't help but, of come down toearth on.
It's disappointing the issues oftruth in America, when I hear
The bullshit, if you will.
My reply is, is, huh?
It's like, what, huh?
No.
Kush (01:05:38):
I
Mark Renneker (01:05:38):
it.
or Jordan Peele would say nope.
Same difference.
Kush (01:05:44):
okay.
So Billboard one would be her,and maybe if there was a choice
for a second one, that would beNope, and I, I love
Mark Renneker (01:05:50):
But nope, nope's already taken.
that's his that's
Kush (01:05:55):
have to be like, the most original, exclusive one.
Maybe just the one, you know,one that resonates with you.
I think on that, that note ofnote, It's been most excellent,
conversation.
Mark Renneker (01:06:06):
Alrighty, Kush,
Yeti Stereo Microphone-3 (01:06:09):
Wow, how inspiring is mark?
Denesha is skilled.
And meticulous in his approachin seeking adventure of the
highest caliber.
At 70, he is chasing monsterwaves.
With the best of them.
With an approach honed overdecades.
Of hard work and awareness.
(01:06:30):
My jaw is still dropped fromsome fun stories.
I came out inspired and wantingto double down on my own physio
before the next season arrives.
Thanks for tuning in France.
Hope you enjoyed this chat asmuch as I did.
Please give us a follow Untilnext time stay.
ASIS.
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