“I’m living the best life imaginable” World champ surfer CJ Hobgood on pivot to the slow-ish lane

"I really believe that the perfect curve is growing up in a small town and then going out into the bigger world."

Florida surf lives near the bottom of the global swell totem pole.

Check that — it is at the bottom.

Sure, you’ve got your occasional bangers when spots like Reef Road, or RC’s, or Pumphouse light up.

But generally speaking, Florida surf rats survive on short period windswell slop and the occasional hurricane or cold front groundswell.

Maybe because of that, or maybe because of something in the water, we Floridians (by birth, at least) take a special pride in sending it around the world.

And we take notice when one of our own do the same.

So click back with me to 2005, pre-Instagram, pre-You Tubers, pre all the instant media stuff we now take for granted. If you were paying attention back then, one clip lit up the OG internet surf world — CJ Hobgood, dropping into the void of a full throated Teahupoo monster.

Still today, looking back at that wave gives me chills.

As CJ springs to his feet, it seems impossible that he’ll make it to the bottom.

Pause the clip halfway down and his board is fully vertical, the wave already inverted, the lip pitching over his head.

Somehow, he wrangles the drop, his fins catch, and he pulls up into a full steeze stance in what, at that time, was possibly the greatest paddle-in barrel at Chopes ever caught on film.

I’ve watched a lot of Florida surfers in my day.

But that wave, and CJ’s reckless disdain for his own skin in pursuit of an epic barrel, filled me with a kind of pride and joy I’ve rarely experienced.

Sure, people can talk shit about Florida waves — but they can never, ever, throw shade at the surfers who ride them. CJ and his brother Damien and all the other Florida chargers before and since have made that truth certain.

So it was with no little trepidation that I reached out to CJ a day or so ago for a chat about growing up in the Sunshine State and what it meant to him to have FL permanently etched next to his name.

As I’ve said repeatedly here, I’m no one — not a surf industry guy, not a surfer anyone would know, just a random dude who became obsessed with waves as a Florida grom.

And CJ is the furthest thing from that, save the Florida grom part.

A world title holder, a best wave at Chopes ever guy, a dude well into his third act as a hotshot Space Coast real estate mogul worthy of the best of Derek’s Real Estate Grit posts — why would a legit FL legend care to respond to a cold text from a 757 number he’d never seen?

You’d have to ask him that question — because he did, and we talked in and around him picking up a kid from tennis.

Turns out he’s as much a legend in real life as that guy I saw dropping into a Tahiti saltwater avalanche 20 years ago.

In classic Florida fan boy style, I wasted a fair bit of our conversation reminiscing about bygone days at far flung east coast hot spots.

But I won’t waste your time here with a bunch of my own excess verbiage around what CJ managed to fit in during the moments I paused for a breath —needless to say, his thoughts need no commentary.

On spots he remembers surfing as a Florida grom: “I really remember RC’s the most, and guys like Justin Carver, Sam Barker and John Homan. I remember watching them and thinking that was what great surfing was.

“And I remember seeing Kelly for the first time out at RC’s.

“I also remember surfing Monster Hole, and it being the kind of wave you could believe you would surf in places like Fiji. It wasn’t really the equivalent of Restaurants, but on the right kind of day you could imagine it being similar.

“I remember catching Stuart Rocks really good,* and some places further south like Lake Worth.

And of course spots like the Inlet and Spanish House.”

On charging heavy water as a Florida surfer and whether taking off on short period windswell barrels was any kind of prep for ledging reef breaks: “Maybe there’s something to [growing up in a surf environment that prized quick pop ups].

“But I really think it’s like that saying, ‘necessity is the mother of invention.’

“Here you are in a dreamlike situation with these amazing waves — it’s such a great motivator.

“Getting to surf waves like that at home in Florida was not an option, so you had no choice but to figure it out and send it if you wanted to surf those beautiful waves.”

On the moment he knew he could make it as a pro surfer: “Yeah, I vividly remember that moment. I was 17 years old and had just come in from a surf. I had this hose and was spraying water on my head, and I just had this moment. It dawned on me.

“My dad walked out and I said, ‘Dad, you know what, I think I can make it as a pro surfer.’ And my Dad said, ‘really, you think so?’

“And I said, ‘Yeah, I think I can. Andy and Bruce are above me [in my generation], but after that who else is there?’

“Before I had that moment, my back up was a boat man on Tavarua or maybe after that a sales rep for one of the surf brands. But that was the exact moment when I realized I could do it.”

On his years of hard work getting Salty Crew off the ground: “These days I’m just the shake hands/kiss the babies guy. I’ll go on trips and stuff like that.

“But for 7 or 8 years I worked really hard and did the grind. If you weren’t deep in the surf industry you probably didn’t ever realize how much I was working. I didn’t go out in public and talk about it.

“I hear some of these guys on the podcasts and wherever talking about the years of hard work, and I think, ‘yeah, I know it.’ But I didn’t talk about it the same way.

“And when I see or hear some of the negativity out there from some well-known names in the surf industry, I just think, ‘can’t you just post a photo of some good waves, why do you have to be so negative?’”

On Kelly and that bananas wave at Teahupoo: “You know, it just goes to show that as you get older the last thing that goes is your barrel riding.”

[Some random effusiveness from yours truly about Kelly’s wave omitted].

On the absence of Florida surfers on today’s WCT after Kelly and the Lopez brothers and he and Damo had it on lock for so many years: “Yeah, there’s really only Caroline Marks holding it down for the guys and girls. And nobody on the horizon. I’m not sure why.

“I do know that you have to be really committed to getting better all the time during that period from like 22 to 25 years old. And you can’t really take a year off and then come back because the judges look at you and think, ‘yeah, we already saw that last year.’”

On whether he wished he had grown up somewhere other than FL: “Maybe to a fault, I really believe that the perfect curve is growing up in a small town and then going out into the bigger world.

“You gotta get out, but then you always come back, they all come back.

“And now I’m really living the best life imaginable. I live across the street from the ocean, travel a lot, love my family.

“You know, if I didn’t grow up where I did, who knows whether I would have had all of it.”

Like I said, legend.

*Shameless plug: Stuart Rocks is the spot referenced in your guy Rocks Local’s avatar.