EP 11 | Lana Herman - Big Air Competitive Kitesurfer

Lana Herman is a professional Big Air kitesurfer from Slovenia, a Harlem Kite team rider, and a GKA tour competitor currently based between Brazil, Cape Town and wherever the next competition takes her. Before turning professional, she was a finance consultant. She quit to risk it for the biscuit — her words — and hasn't looked back.

In this episode, recorded on a rest day in Brazil where Lana is training with her coach ahead of a packed competition season, the conversation goes everywhere. They cover the mental side of learning high-risk tricks — the meditation, the visualisation, the step-by-step process of not getting injured — and the story of how Harlem rejected her sponsorship application, then came back and offered her a spot on the team after her profile started getting attention from other brands. There's also a great thread on the Slovenian and Slavic identity, collective suffering as a cultural value system ("my mother grew up thinking if you suffer in life you are doing good"), pre-competition Balkan yugorock pump-up playlists, and the social media post where she asked ChatGPT to make her look rich. The life philosophy holding it all together: "Life sucks and then you die." It makes more sense in context, we promise.

A warm, funny and surprisingly deep episode — Lana is exactly as good company as she looks on the water. 🪁

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Episoder(15)

EP 14 I Sarah Sadek - big air kitesurfing, sustainability & competition

Sarah Sadek is the first and only female Egyptian professional kitesurfer (for now), a Harlem Kite team rider, GKA Big Air competitor, and the woman who went kitesurfing on the morning of her own wedd...

25 Aug 1h 18min

EP 13 | Zara Hoogenraad - kitesurfing, building community and being open online

Zara Hoogenraad is one of the most recognised names in Big Air kitesurfing — a GKA tour competitor, two-time King of the Air runner-up, world champion, Capital.com and Mystic team rider, and one of th...

18 Aug 1h 29min

EP 12 || Alessa Sophia Mensch - female hormones, mental health & Big Air kitesurfing

Alessa Sophia Mensch is a professional Big Air kitesurfer, GKA tour competitor, Brunotti and Naish team rider, and the co-founder of a women's health app currently in development and launching in Dece...

11 Aug 1h 53min

EP 10 | Leilani - Rise with the Wind - female empowerment

Leilani is a French engineer turned barefoot entrepreneur, kitesurfing instructor and the founder of Rise with the Wind — an organisation helping women from underprivileged backgrounds gain IKO certif...

17 Jul 1h 22min

EP 9 | Nathalie Lambrecht - competitive Big Air kitesurfer

Nathalie Lambrecht is one of the most exciting kitesurfers in the world right now — a professional Big Air athlete, North and Mystic team rider, GKA competitor, and reigning Red Bull King of the Air W...

3 Jul 1h 15min

EP 8 | Emely Freja Petersen - Ocean Soul - kite & yoga

Emely is a kitesurfing and yoga instructor who runs camps in Akayaka, Turkey — a place she fell in love with on a visit nearly seven years ago and never left. Recorded beach-side at Sydvestpynten, one...

18 Jun 58min

EP 7 | Lena - Cold Water Sirens - cold water surfing & surfing as therapy

Lena is an artist, surf coach, certified surf therapy facilitator, and the founder of Cold Water Sirens - a community built around cold water surfing on the North Sea coast of Denmark. What started as...

22 Mai 1h 3min