Editing Laird Hamilton (section)

===1990s===
An early attempt at media recognition was his quest to be the first surfer to complete a 360 degree loop while strapped to his board. The attempt was chronicled in Greg Stump's 1990 ski film, ''Groove - Requiem in the key of Ski''. In the early 1990s, Hamilton, along with a small group of friends collectively dubbed the "Strapped Crew" because their feet were strapped to their boards, pushed the boundaries of surfing at [[Jaws surf break]] off the north central coast of [[Maui]]. The Strapped Crew tackled bigger waves featuring stunts. Stunts included:  launching {{convert|30|ft|m|adj=on}} jumps on sailboards, then mating the boards to paragliders to experiment with some of the earliest kiteboards.<ref>''Strapped: The Evolution of Tow-in Surfing'' DVD produced October 29, 2002</ref>

In late 1992, Hamilton with two of his close friends, big wave riders [[Darrick Doerner]] and [[Buzzy Kerbox]] (also an occasional men's fashion model; Hamilton and Kerbox later lost their friendship over a property disagreement),<ref name="deadmens"/> started using inflatable boats to tow one another into waves which were too big to catch under paddle power alone. This innovation is chronicled in the documentary film, ''[[Riding Giants]]''.<ref name="giants"/>  The technique would later be modified to use [[personal water craft]] and become a popular innovation. [[Tow-in surfing]], as it became known, pushed the confinements and possibilities of big wave surfing to a new level. Although met with mixed reactions from the surfing community, some of whom felt that it was cheating and polluting, Hamilton explained that tow-in surfing was the only way to catch the monstrous sized waves. Using tow-in surfing methods, Hamilton learned how to survive {{convert|70|ft|m|adj=on}} waves and carving arcs across walls of water.{{Citation needed|date=January 2010}}

Hamilton appeared as [[Kevin Costner]]'s stunt double during the 1995 filming of ''[[Waterworld]]''. Reportedly, Hamilton was nearly lost at sea when his Kawasaki Jet Ski ran out of fuel during a squall. He then drifted for hours before being rescued by Coast Guard off the Island of Maui. Hamilton commuted daily to the enclosed set between Maui and the Big Island by jet ski.

Hamilton met women's professional [[volleyball]] player and New York fashion model [[Gabrielle Reece]] in [[Maui]] in 1995 after a television interview by Reece, who was hosting the show 'The Extremists'.<ref>[https://people.com/archive/endless-summer-vol-53-no-20/ Endless Summer] People. 22 May 2000.</ref> People magazine named him one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in the World the following year, and he pushed for and took from his future wife the correspondent position for the syndicated cable series 'The Extremists'.<ref name="mahalo.com"/> They later married on November 30, 1997. In 1989 Reece had been named by ''[[Elle (magazine)|Elle]]'' magazine as one of the Five Most Beautiful Women in the World.{{Citation needed|date=January 2010}}

By the late 1990s, Hamilton continued with [[windsurfing]], [[waterskiing]] and [[kitesurfing]]. In 1996 Hamilton and [[Manu Bertin]] were instrumental in demonstrating and popularizing kitesurfing off the Hawaiian coast of Maui.
In 1999 Hamilton sailed his windsurfer between the Hawaiian islands of Oahu and [[Kauai|Kaua{{okina}}i]], some fifty miles away, in just under six hours.{{Citation needed |date= December 2010}}

Hamilton has also experimented with the [[foilboard]], an innovative [[surfboard]] which incorporates [[hydrofoil]] technology allowing a higher degree of precision and effectiveness of aerial techniques within the water.<ref>{{cite web  |title= Laird Hamilton: A Surfermag.com exclusive interview |author= Scott Bass |work= [[Surfer (magazine)|Surfer Magazine]] |year= 2009 |url= http://www.surfermag.com/features/onlineexclusives/lairdintrvu/ |access-date= December 2, 2010}}</ref><ref name="surfermag1">{{cite web|url=http://www.surfermag.com/blogs/random-happenings/laird-hamilton-foil-boarding-raglan/#7kgppwH6Ck8lvJhM.97|title=Laird Hamilton, Foil Boarding Glory at Raglan|date=23 February 2015 |publisher=surfermag.com|access-date=2015-05-07}}</ref> He has become a proponent of [[Stand up paddle surfing]], an [[ancient Hawaii]]an technique that requires a longboard and a long-handled paddle, as well as considerable skill, strength and agility. Purist surfers have blasted him for this, but Hamilton calls it a return to the traditional Hawaiian way of surfing, as practiced by King [[Kamehameha I]] and his queen [[Kaahumanu|Ka{{okina}}ahumanu]] almost three hundred years ago.