This is a theme for the common man:

Imagine this: You have a strong understanding for the fighter pilot mentality of the pro surfer. You know the drill. Downplay everything.

But to walk through the sleepy village of Teahupoo and down to the water’s edge in the afternoon; to place your board in the water at the cool river mouth, to lay down on it and to dip your arms into gin clear water; to paddle out through the children and their topless mothers playing in the shore break; to make your way around the channel markers, dodging every manner of buzzing watercraft on earth, to get lost on the reef, to thread your way through the coral, to be buzzed by a lunatic in an ultra-light aircraft that has a zodiac boat attached to it as the cockpit; to paddle for your life to get over a set in the wrong place on the reef to finally arrive in the channel next to the reef pass break of Teahupoo and to join the other five hundred screaming people bobbing around on boats within eighty feet of the most hydraulic wave on the planet ...is to witness a spectacle beyond any in any sporting world.

Ever.

You find yourself considering these hydraulics first. Massive heaving black foothills of water, unencumbered and uninterested in an anything that is going on, swinging in from two points of the compass after a long, exhausting, silent journey across the trackless pacific. These foothills are then arrested by a domed reef and then turn their attention to its destruction. And that’s just the beginning of your life here. As these foothills stop and scream and stand up to express their outrage, two surfers, flotsam really, combined weight of 340lbs, hand paddle around in the maelstrom on tiny little sliver boards looking for some kind of opportunity to make it to the channel alive. In this case it is his Holiness, Mr. Kelly Slater, and a prince with eyes on his throne named Jaime O’Brien. Within this maelstrom, with the whole world watching...literally, due to the live internet, Kelly suddenly becomes interested. And that is when it all changes. Kelly must kill this prince. It has been decreed by Shakespearian ode since the beginning of time. Kelly decides it has already happened and suddenly these malevolent foothills seems to take an interest in Kelly himself. Only two surfers in history have been loved by waves. Tom Curren and Kelly. And Jaime knows this. And Jaime ends up screaming to the heavens. Kelly wants ten titles before he is through. A nice round number. Un-reachable forever. And during this the heat of the day, the only number that seems to matter. Kelly emerges from another impossible cyclone of water to the subdued gasps of the channel fanfare. The King is one step closer to his moonshot. Ten titles. And many are not quite sure what to make of it.

But you forget yourself. With all this thought of Kings and Princes, you are struck with the thought that these waves, these hydraulic monsters, would break here and crush coral and roar shoreward and resound over the village of Teahupoo all night whether or not any human drama unfolded in the line-up or not.

Which brings you back to your point about the fighter pilot mentality of the pro surfer. Bones and hearts were broken today, blood raced through veins at top fuel speeds, announcers screamed and women swooned and pro surfers bowed their heads and dove deep and clenched their teeth and held their breath and swam for the sky...and still, still the giants came. Great giant blue walls of horror.

And here is where the theme to the common man comes in.

The pro surfers called the surf today four to six foot.

A mortal man, the common man, would run in fear.