PHOTO: Lawrence

It’s long been established that surf trips are difficult. Wind, swell, angles, coastlines, sand, reefs and human behavior all combine for a wild social cocktail. And the thing that’s rarely spoken of is how much time we have to get to know each other while chasing these conditions in a car. With the majority of our time devoted to driving down dirty, lonely roads, checking beach after beach, you tend to listen and learn a lot about each other that you may or may not have wanted to know. And during filming of this new What Youth series, This Is Us, we’ve had the pleasure of getting to know some new faces like Creed McTaggart who excite us about the future of surfing.

Creed is from Western Australia. He’s unashamed of any exploits from his juvenile years, and his musical taste ranges from the Ramone’s to the darkest metal you’ve ever conceived — while somehow maintaining the demeamour of a polite Disney character. He’s happy, cruisy and genuinely stoked to be traveling the world surfing with his friends. When we pull up to a wave, he’s out there, subtly tossing jokes into the wind like, “I went to Target the other day…and I missed.” And if we pull up to a skate park, he’ll act shy, then dominate and Smith grind down a rail only to coyly retreat to a cigarette in the corner so he can cheer you on.

In the water he’s consistent, stylish and full of flash. And he seems to be fearless of sharks. Today for instance, everyone paddled in out of terror when Dillon Perillo thought he saw a fin enter the lineup. As everyone raced in, Creed calmly continued to look for waves instead of scratch in like a panicked maniac, as the rest of the group did. After coming in, establishing it was a dolphin, Creed then just grinned with his closed-jaw smile and paddled back out shaking his head side to side. We’re extremely excited about Creed and our new friendship. Stay tuned for more from the filming of This Is Us: Australia, and check out Creed’s shots in What Youth Issue 3 as well.