Laird Hamilton, Gabby Reece: Good stewards of the high-performance community

27 septembre 2023

MALIBU, CALIFORNIA — Gabby Reece isn’t trying to fool anyone. All those workouts that she and her husband, big wave surfer Laird Hamilton, host at their lovely home in Malibu? The hours and hours they devote to training and working with everyone from elite athletes to Hollywood stars to the USA men’s national team and everyone in between? The virtually open-door policy they have at their home?

Selfish, she said. Purely selfish.

“The return, selfishly, is so magical,” Reece said in early September, after putting me and Tri Bourne through a pool workout while Hamilton worked with an NBA player. “To see another athlete invigorates both of us because it’s so exciting to put it out there. We’ve been really, really blessed and we’re aware of it and we’re just going to be good stewards.”

She’s joking about the selfish bit, of course, for it is only selfish in the sense that no good deed comes without an intrinsic reward. It calls to mind an episode from Friends — a show in which Reece’s good friend, Courtney Cox, starred as Monica — when Phoebe challenges Joey to find a purely selfless good deed, one that comes with no reward. He finds it impossible. That episode, goofy as it may be, is a fair depiction of the current phase of Hamilton’s and Reece’s careers and lives: The good stewards of the high performance community, where their rewards are not fame or money or anything measurable, but the sweet satisfaction within.

“The things we were able to learn, we have a responsibility to share, because they were shared with us,” Hamilton said. “The only way to true fulfillment is through service. It just happens to be that we get to do it with shiny people. Our thing is a little more glamorous.”

Indeed, it is glamorous what they get to do, Hamilton surfing big waves, revolutionizing what humans are capable of doing on a board, Reece hosting the brightest minds in the health and wellness space on her eponymous podcast, both of them working with high-powered athletes and stars in their pool and sauna in Malibu. It’s a glamor they don’t necessarily care for, more a cool side to the entrée that has been their life as constant doers, pioneers in their own respective spaces, be it big wave surfing or volleyball or media, a field in which both excel.

There is little glamor, for example, when you’ve been dumped off a wave taller than an office building and that wave proceeds to hold you down for minutes at a time. When it finally allows you to surface, it leaves you precious few seconds for a brief exhale and a quick inhale before another one comes crashing on your head.

“People look at me and some of the things I’ve done, and I’ll say ‘You want to be me until you’re in the water and an 80-footer is going to land on your head.’ Everything up until then is good until that day,” Hamilton said, laughing. “And then you’re in the thing and you’re like ‘Hmm, I don’t want to be here.’ Your intentions will dictate how you respond in the moment of truth. When you’re in that spot, you better love it.”

And that, more than anything, defines Reece and Hamilton: They love what they do. Hamilton loves pushing athletes far beyond their comfort zone, when he asks them to do one more rep, then another, while they felt as if their oxygen ran out 30 seconds ago (it did not, and that’s the point). Reece loves doing her podcast, picking the brains of some of the brightest individuals in the world. They both love the interactions they have on the daily with the community who descends upon their home.

“We have a lot of very smart people coming around,” Reece said. “What I’ve been learning over and over is every best person I know in their field, they’re saying let’s take out the things that keep you from being successful, they’re not adding things in, because people are already overwhelmed. For both of us, it’s like ‘How do we get to the essential parts of what we’re talking about?’ Keep it simple, but keep an open mind, keep learning, so you get new input but try not to get turned upside down or overcomplicated by the new input.”

Now, like anything, they don’t love all of it. Hamilton, who might spend more time in nature than any human alive — even then, he probably doesn’t spend as much time outdoors as he’d like — is not particularly enthused about, say, answering emails. Both would rather be working out with athletes in their pool than being in business meetings, navigating the latest obstacles presented by Laird Apparel or Laird Superfood. But those are minor nuisances, the price of admission to the remarkable lives they have carved out for themselves between Malibu and Hawaii.

“I think we are separately aware and grateful because you’re really fortunate if you get to do what you love to do for a living, and do it with someone you love, in a space that you believe in,” Reece said. “It’s easy to talk about Laird Superfood or XPT or Laird Apparel but you’re so busy solving problems and living and trying to hit your own marks — in your relationship, with your children, in your business — that it’s a combination.

“Typically we wouldn’t do things that we didn’t really believe in. It’s really important people realize — maybe we didn’t want bosses, but that might mean you have to work on a Sunday or at 9 p.m. You’d have to be willing. It is possible to create the life you want and the things you do want to be solving but you will have to work more or differently. Then, no matter what, you’re fortunate.”

There is a simple rule of thumb in the Hamilton-Reece household: If they don’t feel good about it, they don’t do it.

“We feel good about this stuff. I’m just glad I don’t have to be involved with too many things I don’t feel good about,” Hamilton said. “It still is effort. No matter what you’re doing, you’re still going to put effort in. If you’re going to be a carpenter, it’s effort. I’m honored we get to do something we love for sure.”

And by doing what they love, they’ve managed to create a sizable impact on virtually anyone they touch. NFL running back Christian McCaffrey, with all the resources of the San Francisco 49ers at his disposal, chose to spend an off-season not in Santa Clara, but in Malibu, training with Hamilton and Reece.

“I came here because I didn’t want as much tread on my tires but I wanted to stay fit and I wanted to keep my joints healthy so I found you guys and that’s what led me to you guys and it worked,” he said, and then he just kept on coming back, to the point that, when he was introduced on Reece’s podcast this past March, he said “Welcome to my second home.”

It isn’t just McCaffrey, either. Anyone who is fortunate enough to walk through the gates of Reece’s and Hamilton’s home feels as if they are, well, home. Reece won’t hesitate to make loco mocos after a workout. Hamilton will point you to the direction of the coffee machine that will brew any type of Laird Superfood concoction you’d like. Their house is your house.

“That’s aloha,” Hamilton said. “I’m on the big game. You know what the big game is? The championship? You’re still around – families, relationship, endure life. That’s the big game. There’s a big game. It’s called life. When you go in the hole, what’s it going to say? If it says good man, good husband, good friend — champion. Champion. For me, that’s the real game.”

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