Mike Lay. Photo: Nick Pumphrey

“Surfing is such an addictive thing for me that it almost pushes everything else out of the way.”

The life of the professional athlete is truly an exalted one. There’s the travel. The free kit. The adulation. And the fact that you’re being paid to do what you love.

Small wonder that so many professional athletes get swept along with it all, and start to believe their own hype. As I know from my experience of working in the industry for almost three decades, nothing is more common than the pro athlete who has made the fundamental mistake of thinking their current situation is permanent.

Mike in a typically poised position. Photo: Nick Pumphrey.

It’s why characters like Mike Lay are such a breath of fresh air. Sure, he’s one of the finest longboarders the UK has ever produced, with a truly beautiful, considered style. But he’s also that rare thing: somebody who is amazingly good at riding a board, and also able to see far beyond the margins of our insular little world.

You can see it in the writing he does for the various surf magazines he contributes to, and in the curiosity that seems to come naturally to him. As you’ll discover, he’s a creative, a dreamer, a reader, a writer and, above all, a thinker, as well as a surfer.

Photo: David Gray

These are the conversations I look forward to the most, the ones that take off into unexpected regions in the finest Looking Sideways tradition. I’m really grateful to Mike for going out of his way to make this conversation happen, and for approaching it in such a spirit of honesty and open-mindedness. Hope you enjoy it.

Listen to the episode here: