Gearóid Mcdaid, known across the surfing world as G-Man, grew up twenty minutes from Mullaghmore, County Sligo's fearsome slab wave, and now holds the 2025 European shortboard title with an eye on the 2028 LA Olympics. John and Martin caught him mid-vacation in New York, tucked into Georgie's Chelsea, right under a photograph of the man himself mid-wave.

"It's a pretty cool thing that surfing's in the Olympics now," he says. Gearóid's victory at the European Championships last year did its part for the sport back home, proof, as he puts it, that Ireland has surfers who can compete with the best in the world.

Gearóid walks us through the two lives of a pro surfer: the technical, judged world of competition, and the far riskier business of chasing 50-foot slabs at Mullaghmore, a wave made by limestone reef geology and giant North Athlantic swells. Chasing those waves takes a safety crew on jet skis and a fair amount of nerve, skills built on a childhood his surfer father set in motion, long before Mullaghmore's entered the picture.

"You're always scared," he admits, "but it's just trying to push through it and enjoy it."

He talks sponsors, wave pool training in Scotland, four straight years of injuries, and the tight-knit, fast-growing surf scene back home. "The Irish surf community's so small," he says. "Everyone knows each other that surfs."

Next up for G-Man: a video trip to France for Monster in October, then the World Championships in Peru in November, all building toward one goal. As Martin puts it, fingers crossed we'll see the Irish flag flying on a beach at the LA Olympics in 2028.

LINKS

GEARÓID MCDAID

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  • Mullaghmore in the Summer - Hurricane Erin Swell
  • Mullaghmore in the Winter - Dec 2025
• Seamus Plug: Jackdaw
  
  

GEORGIES CHELSEA (our hosts for this episode)

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POINTBREAK (this episode's featured music)

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IRISH STEW LINKS

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• Media Partner: IrishCentral

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 24; Total Episode Count: 165

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One year and a week since taking his new post, the Consul General of Ireland in New York Gerald Angley hosted the Irish Stew podcasters in his office high above Park Avenue for a behind-the-scenes look at Irish diplomacy in action while sharing his reflections on the first year on the job.

One event stands out for Gerald.

"The scale of St. Patrick's Day blew our minds,” he says. “It's 24/7 for a number of weeks."

Gerald walks listeners through the impressive scale of his six-state consular territory of New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Connecticut, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.

"That's 59 million people. That's the same population as the UK," he notes, adding that the region ranks as the world's third-largest economy in its own right.

The conversation traces Gerald’s path from a University College Dublin commerce degree and a stint at Citibank to a career in the Department of Foreign Affairs, with postings in Brussels, Paris, and London during Brexit. On landing the coveted New York job, he admits to a bold move: "I wrote a letter that said, 'I dare you not to pick me.'"

Talk turns to the perennial Irish Stew topic of diaspora engagement, where the diplomat reflects on evolving Irish American identity, saying, "We have to look at it not as purely Irish-born people, but rather people who have several identities."

He also points to what distinguishes Ireland's mission from other consulates: "We're one of the only countries that has an immigrant support fund... we need to be bigger than most of the other consulates, and we are."

As the episode wraps, Gerald provides the listeners with his must-read book recommendation and previews of the imminent launch the Green Pages, the new directory of Irish organizations in his consul region.

And what’s it like to be a Consul General in New York? Gerald quotes a predecessor in his role who said, "It’s Wall Street by day, Broadway by night!”

Links:

Gerald Angley

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Consulate General of Ireland in New York

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Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 23; Total Episode Count: 164

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Why doesn’t a country good enough to produce Ryanair and Stripe have a normal venture fund industry? Alan Merriman spent three years lobbying the Irish government just to be allowed to launch one, and what he ran into along the way says more about Ireland’s capital gap than most economic reports ever will.

Merriman built Elkstone from a boutique advisory firm into one of Ireland's most active venture investors, and in this conversation he's candid about what it actually took to get there. In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why Ireland’s tax code made venture investing nearly impossible before 2022, and what it took to change it
• Why Merriman puts the quality of a founder at eighty percent of any investment decision, and what he’s really screening for
• Why Elkstone bets on the country instead of a sector, and what that says about the depth of the Irish market
• What Merriman calls “network compounding,” and his pitch for why the Irish diaspora is worth more than its checkbook

If you've ever wondered what it actually takes to build serious venture capital in a small country, or how Merriman makes the case for engaging the Irish diaspora as more than a source of sentiment, this one's worth the full listen.

ALAN MERRIMAN LINKS

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• Elkstone

IRISH STEW LINKS

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• Media Partner: IrishCentral
  
  

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 22; Total Episode Count: 163

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