CARLSBAD — Surfing is Scott Chandler’s life, so it’s no surprise that his daughter would want to ride the waves as well. What often does surprise people is seeing Chandler and 8-year-old Tyler surfing on the same board.

With their dog, Zoe.

The trio have been surfing together for years, Chandler said.

“They both wanted to do everything I did. If I took only my dog on the board, my daughter would cry, but if I took her on the board, the dog would cry,” Chandler said. “The answer was to bring them both.”

Zoe was recently named the world champion dog surfer at the first Ruff Riders, a dog surfing competition to benefit the Progressive Animal Welfare Society. The Jack Russell terrier was by far the best surfer at the event, Chandler said.

“The rest of the dogs were standing on boards in ankle-deep water,” he said. “I don’t think they were really expecting the dogs to catch any waves.”

Chandler has been invited to appear on many television shows, such as “Good Morning America” and “The Montel Williams Show.”

“People just seem to like to hear about me surfing with my dog,” Chandler said.

But to him, it’s a little mundane. In the surfing community, Chandler is known not for his dog, but for his appetite for big waves. With winter on the way, Chandler, a big-wave surfer for 20 years, is preparing for the big-wave season. He has already been invited to the tow-in surf championship set for December in Oahu.

Tow-in surfing, Chandler explained, is when a team of two surfers will take a personal watercraft partway out to sea. While one stays with the craft, the other catches eye-popping waves.

“If you were trying to paddle to a 50-foot wave, it would just mow you over,” Chandler said. He has caught waves in excess of 60-feet, and says the feeling is awe-inspiring.

“It’s kind of like snowboarding down a mountain of water as it’s chasing you,” Chandler said. Waves that size are often found out in the middle of the ocean, he said, where deep-water swells meet underwater hills.

Even fishing is thrill-intensive for Chandler, who in 2005 caught a 168-pound Mako shark off the coast of Carlsbad.

And when he’s not out in the water, Chandler helps other surfers get outfitted with his surfboard company Chandler Surf. His designs include everything from standard makes to more specialized tow-in or foil boards. “I make every kind of surfboard imaginable,” he said.

He said his company allows him to make a living doing what he loves, and also protects him from his life’s biggest fear.

What could a guy who surfs waves the size of a seven-story building be afraid of?

“A nine-to-five job — now that would kill me!”