I know from the days of surfing reefs , you can be a metre outside the break zone and have massive walls staring down at you then they just die off ....hawaii reefs are renound for that , just the formation .
The guy was obviously playing the side of the wave where the water pressure actually pushes more sideways then forward ..doesn't have as much speed...so i can understand how that is possible without broaching ..however crazy stuff !
The Narooma bar picks look more scary to me ....a sand bar has no where near the consistency in placement of the break and makes it a lot harder to judge succesfully. they could have been rat$hit REALLY easy.