"It was a dream wave, and I was on fire!”
Surfer Jamie O’Brien means that literally – he set himself on fire while riding the huge waves off the coast of Tahiti!
The fiery feat was just another day at work for the 32-year-old, whose video series of surfing stunts is sponsored by the energy drink Red Bull.
“I got a direct message on Instagram that said it would be cool if you lit yourself on fire,” explained Jamie. “And I kinda thought, ‘Why not?’ So I went to Red Bull and said, ‘Hey, I want to light myself on fire!’”
Fortunately, Jamie didn’t rush into the dangerous experiment. He hooked up with movie stunt coordinator Riley Harper – whose crew did a few fire tests with Jamie in California and Hawaii before heading to Tahiti.
“During [one] test, I burned a quarter of my eyelash and eyebrow, but it was really cool!” he said.
Still, Jamie faced some new challenges when he hit the beach in Tahiti.
The determined daredevil surfed over the island’s razor-sharp reefs and wore 15 pounds of protective gear when he lit himself up!
But the biggest problem was finding the right hour to ride the waves.
“You don’t want to be there too early, and you don’t want to be there too late,” Jamie dished. “You gotta be on fire at the perfect time to get the glow!”
And that’s got to be the hottest way yet to hit The Odd List!
