Getting to Know USA Surfing Board Chair Rob Pendergist
Welcome newly-elected USA Surfing board chair Rob Pendergist — a former elite decathlete coach, and current East Coast financial adviser, fundraiser, business owner, avid outdoorsman, and surf fan. In his first months on the job, Rob helped attract and steward USA Surfing’s recent $1 million Jersey Mike’s sponsorship.
We asked Rob a few questions about his background and approach to chairing USA Surfing’s board of directors:
Q. What made you want to be involved with USA Surfing?
A. As a former and still active athlete at heart, I am very excited to be joining the USA Surfing team. I, like many of you, had Olympic dreams. My sport (decathlon) was overtly similar to surfing: grossly underfunded. My experiences range across a multitude of nonprofits in helping to fund their work. After finishing college on a full ride as a decathlete, I coached at three division I schools and after retiring from sport got into financial markets. I have spent 20-plus years working in the financial markets and have a strong track record of raising money and building indelible relationships built on stoke and trust.
I am learning a great deal about where USA Surfing has been and also where it’s headed. I am stoked that surfing has become a mainstay in the Olympic Games, and with a sustainable, smart, responsible budget and business plan that continuously adds value for surfers and our sport, the organization can evolve and advance. I would like to play a key role in making the vision of a stronger USA Surfing a reality.
Q. You’ve spoken a lot about why you think surfing is such a special sport and way of life. Tell us a bit about that.
A. Surfers at the most elite levels can surf them all and make it look easy. I have so much respect for that. I was fortunate to meet Kelly slater at his wave pool and attempt to surf that wave and gained a completely different perspective on just how hard it is, and the talent it takes to actually ride a wave the way he and other pro surfers do.
Q. As someone who has competed and worked inside and outside the surfing realm, how do you see surfing’s future?
A. The stars are aligning in surfing in a very interesting way. It’s like seeing a startup company.
This may sound like a stretch, but I think surfing has a lot in common with decathlon when it comes to the mental and physical strength required to success. For those who don’t know, the decathlon — is one of the most challenging athletic tests that takes place over two days and includes ten events: 100-meter dash, long jump, shot put, high jump, 400-meter dash, 110-meter hurdles, discus, pole vault, javelin, and 1,500-meter run. You have to train for so many unique feats of strength, speed, and athletic finesse. The same is true for surfing. It’s an enormously challenging and frankly often misunderstood and under-appreciated sport.
With surfing’s enormously successful debut in the Olympics, there is so much opportunity to capitalize on and put back in the sport to benefit the next generations of talent. I’m really looking forward to it.
Q. USA Surfing’s para surf team won team silver and broke records in the 2023 ISA World Para Surfing Championship. You’ve said one of your biggest sporting and life lessons came from a para athlete. Tell us about that.
A. I joined my brother in law — a former football player who lost his leg in a motorcycle accident, at an adaptive ski event. I went into it thinking I was there to be his ski guide. But in the process I met a guy who said he was going to teach me how to snowboard. To my surprise, he asked me to help him put on his two prosthetic legs first.
After doing that he took me all the way to the top of the mountain and said: “You have two arms and two legs I will see you at the bottom.” I was thinking oh my god I’m at the top of the mountain and have never done this before, but I have to suck it up and go considering all that he’s managing so proficiently.
The next three days I was never more bruised, battered and humbled in my life. I was an elite decathlete at top level condition thinking I could do anything. As fit as I was, I got the heck beat out of me.
The perspective and humility of that experience taught me a great deal about life. So I enter this position with incredible respect and desire to support all USA Surfing’s athletes — especially those who’ve overcome so much and represent our country and organization with such honor and distinction.
I start this role with a healthy realization of all that I don’t know and a desire to learn and work together with those who do, and to put my network and business acumen to work to create a healthy, strong USA Surfing future. With shortboard surfing permanently added to the Olympic lineup, we’re intensifying the push for Para Surfing’s Paralympic inclusion in the LA2028 Olympic Games. and support the Pan American Games disciplines — SUP surfing and racing — with an eye toward eventual inclusion in the Olympics.
I’m here to help this sport progress. I want to help dreams come true.
