We chat to 14-year-old Marley Franco about Maui’s North Shore and having Jesse Richman as a mentor.

Marley Franco is the definition of the word grom. He lives on Maui’s North Shore and has all the skills to make the most of the epic conditions there. The 14-year-old grew up surfing, kiting, & foiling the same spots as the likes of Jesse Richman & Kai Lenny. How lucky is that? We caught up with him after his recent Hood River trip.

Hey Marley, thanks for doing the interview with us! How did you get into watersports & foiling?

I started water sports at a young age, my parents were always surfing, standup paddling, kiting, windsurfing, and playing in the ocean before I was born. When I was young I was always in the water being pushed into waves on a bodyboard, surfboard or kiting between my dad's legs, surfing on the front of my mom's board, or just goofing around in the water. It was always natural to be in the ocean and wind.

As soon as I was able to be surfing, wingfoiling, and kiting on my own, I continued to play in the ocean. These are most of the water sports I do, surf, wing, foil, kite, and stand-up paddle. I do downwinders by myself from Ho’okipa to the youth center a lot and my mom meets me there to pick up gear before she goes to work. 

Living on Maui surrounded by the ocean you learn to play in all conditions, big waves, small waves, windy or not. Always searching for ways to go have fun with my friends who are into the same sports. 

Such a cool way to grow up! How old are you Marley? When did you first go on a foil?

I am currently 14 years old, when I was around 8 years old I started doing a little prone foiling and standup foiling when I was around 9 years old Cyril Coste from Takuma and Wing Ride stocked me up with some wings and foils so I tried wing foiling and had fun learning the sport. Then a few weeks later I broke my arm and then my wrist that year, so I couldn’t continue to learn to wing for a while and had to wait till Jan 2020.

We love your Instagram handle - @GnarlyMarley - is it a long-lasting nickname?

I was given the name Gnarly Marley by my cousins Nina and Kesia. When I was young I was always doing crazy things and they started calling me Gnarly Marley. I got a little bit older, around 7 years old and my cousin Nina created an Instagram profile for me and she named it gnarly.marley. 

That original account was deleted during covid and so we had to make a new account and named it "The Real Gnarly Marley" around August of 2020. About 8 months ago Jesse Richman reached out to the person who had taken my original name, they had only a few followers so Jesse convinced them to give the name back to me and she did. We lost all the data and history from when I was younger but at least I got my original IG name back, thanks to Jesse.  

That's super cool! It must be great having parents that are into watersports? Weekends must be fun!

It’s really cool to have parents to do water sports with because we can all go out together and do the same or different sports and help each other or just goof around. My parents have helped me out a lot and some of my friends have learned a few of the water sports. Now I can help my parents with winging or if something happens out there I can help them. Some days my Dad will jump over us if we are winging and I will mess with them back too. My mom will tow me foiling while she's kiting or whatever fun thing we come up with. We just go have fun with it.                                                          

That's so rad. What’s it like being in the North team?

Being on the North team is amazing because the team is awesome and the riders are amazing. They are always so positive and everybody is always super stoked. The team is progressive and the products that North produces are so good, it makes me as a rider want to keep pushing to be the best.

Am I right in saying that Jesse Richman is your mentor? A connection made through North? What’s that like, learning from the best?

Yes, Jesse Richman is my mentor. Jesse as a mentor and as a friend is the most awesome thing ever, he is so fun, energetic, and positive. He has lots of information to share, and all around he is amazing to be a team rider with. The connection was made through my parents, they have known Jesse since he was a little grom and when I was learning to kite and the north next GEN program came up, Jesse chose me as his grom and taught me a lot about kiting. I have become way better since we first started and I have helped him some with wing foiling. When we have a session together or do photo shoots it's always super fun, even in the gnarly conditions. I am now on the North International Team for wing foiling and it's really great. The whole team is super supportive. 

What would you say is your favourite discipline? What are your goals right now? Any tricks or competitions you want to do?

That’s a good question, I don’t think I can choose one discipline. I love to do a lot of water sports and I love doing them all on Maui because of the conditions. When the surf is up, I surf and foil a lot. When the wind is on I wingfoil and kite more. It also depends if there are any specific events coming up, I try to do that sport more to prepare. 

My goals right now are to keep progressing with surfing, foiling, wing foiling, and kitesurfing. I would like to do a double backflip foiling, surf bigger waves tow surfing and tow foiling, learn more freestyle kite tricks, and land a 720 wing foiling. I feel like I have individual goals for each water sport.

There are a couple of competitions and trips I would like to do, I want to enter the GWA Youth World Tour 15 and under division next year and make some trips to other places to do water sports. Like Tahiti, New Zealand, Europe, Bali, and Australia. I love traveling so I'm always excited to go on a trip. 

What’s your best-ever session?

My favourite session ever was in the late afternoon at Lanes with Jesse. There were some big waves and decent wind, even kai Lenny was out testing his new gun surfboards. Jesse and I just received the new North wings and foils so we decided the best thing to do was go out and test them. 

We jumped off the rock at Lanes and got some pretty good-sized waves for winging, at the end of the session I went past Kai Lenny and he yelled “do a backflip” so I did a fun backflip. The energy of the big waves pumped us all up and we had some fun waves that afternoon. 

What wing, board, & foil do you ride most? Can you be specific about foil size, fuse, stab, etc.?

The North wing board I ride is the 3'10 Swell and the foil set up is the 85cm mast, 600 fuselage, 210 sonar stabiliser, and HA 550 Front wing. The new HA North foils are super fast with lots of agility and stability. I use the HA 650 for lighter wind days and the HA 750 and 850 for prone foiling. 

I ride the North Nova wings, mostly in the smaller sizes 2.5m, 2.9m, 3.5m. I recently rode one of the new North Mode wings in a 4.2 and it was amazing. It's such a good wing and is lightweight. I'm hoping they will make it in smaller sizes soon because they are so fun for freestyle.

Finally, it must be amazing living on Maui. What's it like?

Growing up on the Maui North Shore and living in Hawaii is amazing. There is always something to do, surf when the surfs up, wind sports when the wind is up, or both in one day. If there are no water sports to do because of bad weather or conditions, you can always skateboard, fish, dive, mountain bike, hike, jump into waterfalls or just hang out and relax. The tough part about living here is you always have to fly to get off the island and that can get expensive. 

Marley, thanks for taking the time. Keep on shredding!

Videos

North Foils with Marley Franco. #RunFlyBe
By Jack Galloway

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