In 1994, the number of big-wave riders in the world totaled less than a hundred. These days, it’s well into the thousands. The same holds for the extreme wing of every other action and adventure category. The phenomenon is ubiquitous. Right now, more people are risking their lives for their sports than ever before in history, and, as Thomas Pynchon wrote in Gravity’s Rainbow, “It is not often that Death is told so clearly to fuck off.”
