BLAKES OWN WORDS

“I get nervous a lot of the time but it’s just one of those things where you have to calm those issues whenever they come at you,” said the 31-year-old Wallenda in a phone interview with The Maui News on Tuesday afternoon. “You just have to be confident in your abilities.”

Tightrope walking requires many hours of practice, weightlifting and engineering “to pull something off like that,” said Wallenda, the seventh generation of high wire walkers.

“It takes a constant amount of practice,” he said. “Even if you get the skills, you have to keep up on your game.”