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GRAHAM EZZY: SHIFT IN FOCUS

The following is transcribed from a chat between John Carter and Graham Ezzy on the beach in Sylt. They speak about how his focus has changed from the competitive side of windsurfing into his popular online coaching community. JC also receives a few tips from Graham about English literature and learns more about Graham’s life between Maui and Germany as well as his plans for the future.

Words: Graham Ezzy // Photos: John Carter

MINDSET

I started competing when I was very young. My first World Cup on Maui was when I was fourteen – so around 19 years ago. I grabbed the last slot available at the event. I can remember I was up against Jonas Ceballos in the first heat, at that time he was second in the world. I was the last seed. I ended up beating him, which was a nice experience at that age. I expected competitions to continue like that, but it wasn’t the case, and I ended up struggling over the following year to repeat that experience. I just couldn’t pull off what I normally did in free sailing in competitions heats. Now almost twenty years later, I am a lot less interested in the competition side of windsurfing. I am more interested in different ways of riding waves and trying to push my level and explore my vision of riding waves on a windsurfer.

LETTING GO

Still, I went to Pozo in 2023, I made the decision to go there at the last minute because I wanted to compete on Maui at the end of the season, and I knew I needed a ranking, otherwise I would have to rely on the politics of a wild card. The forecast for Pozo looked pretty good, and I had not been to Pozo for a few years. I felt really good on the water and I was having a lot of fun. I did well in the single finishing 9th, and in the double I had a good draw, but I had to leave to go pick up my kids, so I didn’t compete in the double, and I fell back in the results. It was a shame, but at the same time I felt good that I had sailed well in the single. That was the best I have ever done in a Pozo single. It felt good to have that freedom. To have done well, but to leave mid-competition and go and support my family and to be there for my kids. It felt good to have done the right thing for my family on two levels. One, was to be there for my kids and two, not being so obsessed by the competition. Before, competing was overwhelmingly emotional for me, which hindered my performance and my happiness. To be able to just leave that event was really liberating!

COVID, COACHING & CHALLENGES

I didn’t expect to get into coaching. However, people were stuck at home during COVID, lockdowns were happening all around the world, and I wanted to interact with the windsurfers around the world and give back to them somehow. So, I started doing livestreams just to interact with everyone stuck at home. I asked what people wanted, and they wanted coaching. I was in Maui at that time, and I enjoyed the challenge. It is not as easy as just saying what to do because if you just tell somebody what to do, that doesn’t really help them unlock their windsurfing. I found that teaching people was actually a difficult communication problem, which kept me interested.

Most of my coaching is virtual. I do a free live stream every week, and have a private community on Facebook, which is free to join. We have almost six thousand people in it! It is amazing how it works because they all help each other. It is so cool to see the knowledge in the community. It is not just me talking about my experience, and what I know. If someone asks a question about bottom turning in a spot in the Netherlands, there can be ten other people who also windsurf in that same spot. They have good answers and tell people where to line up etc. I love seeing the windsurf community working together. Online communities tend to get sour, but people in the Graham Ezzy Coaching Community are so nice and supportive.

MERGING PASSION AND BUSINESS

This all started out as a passion project, but it is turning more into a business project. I have been doing some in person clinics, Windsurfing Masterclass weeks, and more and more online instruction as well. I do one-on-ones online, and I am also developing online courses that people can take in their own time. They have access to my instruction but don’t have to spend the time and money to come on actual courses with me. I have done quite a few live and virtual courses for fast tacks, forward loops, Vulcans, and a few other moves.

Teaching online is obviously a challenge. I am not with the people. I work a lot with footage reviews, People submit their footage, and the other members comment on it, and I talk about the footage on the livestream every Sunday. In the courses, I try and develop them in a way where I teach the theory and the technique from videos that I have personally shot. I then give clear concise exercises where people can work on the moves themselves.

BEING COMFORTABLE WITH BEING UNCOMFORTABLE

For most people the easiest way to get better is to see themselves. Too often, what you are doing is not what you think you are doing. When you see yourself for the first time it is shocking. That is an important process. Your footage is uncomfortable to watch, but learning is uncomfortable, so you have to embrace that. The more footage you see of yourself, you realise what you are doing wrong, but more importantly, once you have seen yourself doing what you think is ‘correct’, you can close the gap between what you think you are doing and what you are actually doing, which then enables you to better adjust your technique because if you are not doing what you think you are doing, how can you possibly make an adjustment?

MISCONCEPTION

The easiest fixes are with the gear. Many riders set their gear up in ways that make improvement almost impossible. There is a misconception among amateur riders that the gear doesn’t matter because they are not going to feel the difference. I hear people say that all the time. However, I think it is actually the other way around. The pro riders can make anything work, while the lower your level is, the more you benefit from having the fin in the right place or the right board for your weight. Gear is even more important for the average windsurfer than it is for a pro.

DON’T ASSUME

We talk about so many things in our group. How to line up for a wave, how to catch a wave, and all about priority. My number one thing with priority is to ask the locals. I think it is a mistake if you are travelling that you can assume the priority rules because many spots have different rules. I was talking with Finn Mullen about the rules in Ireland where the person who is upwind has the priority, whereas in Maui that is not the case. It does not matter if you are more upwind, it is about the first person on the wave. It can get subjective, but the point is to ask the locals and not assume you know best.

FUNDAMENTALS

Other things we discuss are the fundamentals of riding a wave. These are wave selection, wave placement, and timing. So, selection, placement and timing. If you don’t do those things, even with the right technique your wave riding is not going to work. If you have those three things, even if your technique is off, you will still ride the wave nicely, because the power transfers from the wave to your board. That really is what wave riding is all about, taking the energy that is in the ocean, which is caused by storms and transferred into waves, and then turning that energy into board speed. You need to be aware of what that wave is doing and how the energy is transferring to your board. I talk about looking for waves, where the power sources are on the wave. Normally a wave is not going to be pushing the same amount of power in every place. If it is, it will probably close out. You want to start at a power source and aim your bottom turn towards the wave’s next power source. That energy needs to be transferred into your board.

FORWARD THINKING

Riders have to want to be coached. Unsolicited advice rarely goes down well. Change has to come from within. If someone wants to get better at windsurfing they can seek out ways to, but if they don’t, it doesn’t matter how much advice is knocking at their door. If they don’t want to improve, they are not going to change. I hear people say, “I don’t need to get better, I just windsurf for fun!”, which I find weird because from my experience, from watching both pro sailors and amateurs alike, you have more fun the better you get. If you are better, you catch more waves. Isn’t riding more waves the fun part of windsurfing? It is not very fun to slog around, get pounded and do a walk of shame back up the beach. If you are better and more efficient, your tacks are better and you catch more waves, then you are going to naturally have more fun! Also, it gives you something to work on – when the conditions are not good, on a day that you would not normally go out, maybe you can work on tacks or something which will open up a lot more doors later on.

PRACTICE WHAT YOU PREACH

I am open to criticism of my own sailing, and I am still willing to learn. Doing the coaching has changed my perspective on this. Have I received coaching? Not as much as I would have liked. Kevin Pritchard is amazing competitor, and I wasn’t, so I went to him for coaching on how to compete better. Pritchard’s coaching was helpful for me. I have since realised I need coaching for other aspects of my life too. Since I started coaching windsurfing, I have taken writing courses and courses about teaching courses. I realised that I should be practising what I preach and looking for advice in the areas of my life where I can do better.

EZZY SAILS INVOLVEMENT

My work is all in windsurfing and it all gets blended together – I work with my dad for Ezzy Sails. During COVID I was doing a lot of work with the company on all different sides. From the development of the sails to coordinating with the factory. We are one of the last sail companies in windsurfing to own our production, and there is a lot of logistics involved with keeping it running. I also deal with the importers around the world and that side of the business. At the end of the day it is a small team running the show, and we have to wear many hats. But going forward, I’m stepping away from the sails to focus on the coaching.

DEFINING SUCCESS

Right now, I am most excited about coaching. In competition, just one person is happy at the end, the winner of the event. I have won events before, and for a short while that is great, but then you start thinking about the next event. Winning is not a satisfaction that lasts. Everyone’s success comes at the expense of everyone else’s success. Whereas with the coaching, I am successful when everyone else is successful. I find that I am happier and more fulfilled doing the coaching than competing.

EDUCATION AND WRITING

I studied English Literature at Princetown, and writing is also an important part of my life. I have been working on a collection of essays about my life as a windsurfer, father, and a husband to a German wife. I have been working on these over the last year. I will release them somewhere; but I don’t know where yet.

INSPIRATION

On the water, I try and draw as much inspiration as I can from my peers on the waves. In terms of writing, my biggest influence right now is Helen MacDonald’s “H is for Hawk”. She blends first person narrative, literary curiosity, and something technical, which in her case is falconry. My writing looks at a cross-cultural marriage, the books that I read, and windsurfing. In German, the word for debt “schuldt” also means guilt. When we signed the papers for the loan to buy our property on Maui, my wife was crying because of all the guilt she felt she was taking on.

COACHING INFLUENCE

In my coaching, I try to find inspiration outside of windsurfing. I look to other sports, and I look at theories of learning. Learning is hard and uncomfortable, and that is the only way that the brain and body know to change, to adapt, to integrate something new. Windsurfing is one of the most difficult sports in the world. But if you try too hard, if you focus on the technique too much, you’ll do it wrong. You need to be loose and relaxed and aware of the concepts more than the technique. My theory of windsurf coaching doesn’t come from teaching beginners, but rather being a pro and watching the other high level pros, and applying the solutions for the highest level problems to the lower level ones. When it comes to wave riding, the concepts are simple, and the technique can get in the way of that. I see so many people worrying about how wide their grip is or whether they’re leaning forward enough, but they are on the completely wrong part of the wave! And I tell them where they need to go and what they need to think about and they trust their body to do it, and suddenly the technique happens.

COMMUNITY

I enjoy living between Hawaii and Germany. Hawaii, if I am there for too long starts to feel stifling. Maui is such a s small island, but that said, I would really like to spend more time in Maui over the next few years. Our plan is to get set up on Maui, so come 2025 we can move there for at least the next five years. Our oldest child turns six soon, so it is time for him to start school and I would like him to do that on Maui. In Hamburg, Germany, there are a tonne of elementary schools whereas in Maui, in Haiku, there is only one! So, if you go to school in Haiku, like I did, you really feel like you are part of the community and I think that is important for him.

COMPETITIVE OUTLOOK

I am not very interested in competition at the moment, but I have some unfinished business on Maui. I have been on the podium of the event there a couple of times. I have had a few top fives and a lot of top tens. In terms of a world ranking or the World Tour, I have moved on. I feel like I have a lot more respect now than ten years ago for what it takes to win a world title. I have watched Brawzinho [Marcilio Browne], and I had a close view of how hard he has worked and how hard he has trained to earn his titles. I have so much respect for him. I am okay with that. I have made different decisions in my life, and I have had these varied interests and have not had that single focus like Brawzinho. It is very cool and inspiring to see what he has achieved. It has also been freeing because I have seen what it took for Braw and that was something that I was not willing to do.

STEPPING DOWN FROM THE PWA

I was on the management board of the PWA for almost ten years. I want the tour to succeed. However, I am not going to compete full-time. Ten years ago, I was one of the riders always complaining, which is precisely why I stepped up to be on the board. I figured if I am complaining then I should step up to try to change things. It was interesting and eye-opening being on the board. We did change a lot, but also, I realised that a lot of things are the way they are because there is no other option.

Interested in being coached by Graham? Then check out his website @ www.windsurfingmasterclass.com