There's surfing waves, and then there's Australian daredevil Robbie Maddison surfing waves on his motorbike "and performing other God-like activities to slam home the fact that he is not a human," as Jenni Ryall at Mashable puts it. Incredible footage shows Maddison pulling stunts on a modified dirtbike with skis attached that allows the 34-year-old to not only ride on water, but actually surf Tahiti's famous waves. "It spanned two and a half years, testing and building and fitting, to do this thing," a designer reveals. "There's a lot of stuff that we were learning," he continues. "It's amazing. He amazes me."
Maddison is an X Games champion, award-winning stuntman, and world record holder for the longest motorcycle jump. "He has backflipped the Tower Bridge in London, flown across the Corinth Canal in Greece, and scaled the Arc de Triomphe replica at the Paris Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas," writes Ryall, who calls the "Pipe Dream" stunt "the most hardcore he has performed." As impressive as the video is, Maddison insists there's nothing like the real thing. "The images and footage say something awesome," he tells Surfer Mag, "but the ferocity and how gnarly that thing was can't really be put into words." (More extreme sports stories.)