John Holeman

John David Holeman, born in 1963 in Washington, D.C., is a professional surfer who moved to Florida in 1967 and began surfing at the age of five. He rose through the East Coast competitive ranks and took many titles in the National Scholastic Surfing Association and the Eastern Surfing Association before turning professional in 1984, when he received the rookie of the year award. A virus that followed pneumonia in 2002 damaged his heart, and he received a pacemaker and defibrillator at 39 and a heart transplant in 2003. He was inducted into the East Coast Surfing Hall of Fame on 13 January 2012, and later ran a surf school in Satellite Beach, Florida, renamed Air360 Surf School in 2021.