Kelly Slater: On Being Local
"Surfing seemed like this mysterious, mystical adventure to me in some way. I’d look at surf magazines of waves and distant lands and imagine going to that place one day." Kelly Slater
You may have heard of Kelly Slater. The 11X World Champion is the undisputed GOAT. Surf-Forecast recently had some exclusive one-on-one time with Kelly, and discussed growing up in Florida, how his local wave Sebastian Inlet worked, how it changed and how he is a local all over the world.
SF: What was it like growing up in Florida?
Kelly Slater: My local Cocoa Beach had some of the best surfers from Florida. Pros like Matt Kechele and Charlie Kuhn were locals and everyone surfed this one beach. And it just seemed like this mysterious, mystical adventure to me in some way. I’d look at surf magazines of waves and distant lands and imagine going to that place one day. Just once in a while, we get a nice clean wave in Cocoa Beach, you know, that maybe, on a big day, was head high or something. And sometimes, till about 10 or 11, it’d be glassy in the summer when there was no wind. I would dream about these glassy, perfect peeling tubes. But even though the waves were pretty average, something about it captured me and I just wanted to learn how to fit in with that energy and those patterns in the water.
And what was the role of those local legends of the sport where you grew up?
Back then there was a real hierarchy and it was because the centre of our universe in Central Florida was Sebastian Inlet. And Sebastian was a very unique wave. It was bigger and had more energy than every other wave around it because it bounced off this jetty and created a wedge. (That is backed by our energy rating which factors in how different swells align with your local break to estimate the maximum breaking wave energy. Sebastian Inlet's average energy rating is significantly higher than breaks nearby.)
What difference did that make?
On our stretch of coast, it was always bigger there because that wedge would come off the jetty and almost sort of make the wave 50% bigger. And so there was always a little pocket of energy you could surf in Sebastian, even on the smallest days.
And so was it a focus for competitions too?
Yeah, they used to have the Stubbies Trials and the two winners got to go to Australia and surf in the trials of the main event of the Stubbies. And that's when I started hanging out with Matt Kechele. He was competing in that as a 20-year-old. He made the finals a couple of times. Pat Mulhern and Jeff Klugel, who became a tour judge, also made the Final there. So it was kind of a launching pad for local surfers. But the hierarchy in Sebastian was very distinct. There's a First Peak, a Second peak and kind of a Third Peak (We provide forecasts for each one!) On First Peak was where all the heavy locals sat. That was Jeff Crawford and Lewis Graves, who is Dylan Graves’ dad, the Kecheles and Kuhns and Mike Tabeling.
It sounds intense?
It was, but I like that. You had to earn your keep in the lineup. And that has a way of humbling you and putting you in the right place. And so when you do get that priority, it's earned over years of friendships, of putting your face in that lineup and time in the water and paying your dues with other people. And so I think there's something a little bit lost there nowadays. And Sebastian is no longer really a wave. It's filled in with sand, it's quite shallow outside and the wave doesn't break in the same place. I mean, everyone goes, “Kirra was better when…” I mean Sebastian was factually a better wave.
And yet Kirra still gets good? One of your waves from last year was incredible (see below)
Yes, but people have to remember that the old Kirra was only good once in a blue moon. I’d argue the Superbank has provided more great waves in the last two decades than Kirra ever has.
So I'm not just living in a fantasy world of the past. The water at Sebastian was a lot deeper, probably twice as deep. And the beach has moved out about 50 yards. And the jetty has a new kink, so it actually wedges incorrectly. So that was the change in the landscape, but the hierarchy has kind of disappeared with the wave. Because that was the centre of where everyone surfed together. Now it’s just spread along the coast anywhere that breaks. So you don't really have that same kind of camaraderie and building off each other, and that kind of fire in the water too.
Where do you find that now? Or where is home?
I have pretty tight communities around the world. I have family almost everywhere I go. Down at Bells, I've stayed with the Greens for 25 years. Alan was my boss. Barb's like a second mom to me. On the Gold Coast, the Munros are like a family, I’ve lived with them and watched the kids grow up. I have close friends in France and Bali. In Hawaii, I grew up with a bunch of families there. Every single day in winter, I'm seeing people I've known for 30-plus years. So I feel like I’m home in all these places.
And where does Florida fit in?
With Florida, I still consider it my home. It's where I feel like I can unplug. And I don't necessarily surf a lot, but I'll go surf with my old buddies, and guys I grew up with and I feel like I get a little practice in. We kind of even get a little competitive fire. I grew up with a guy named Dave Spears, who was a really good surfer. Dave and I battled as kids. We were best friends, but also our biggest rivals as teenagers. And we recently went and surfed at the beach in front of the condo where he grew up. And when we were kids, we named these two sections, these little rip banks, that were really distinctive for this one season. We called them SB1 and SB2. Sand Bar One and Sand Bar Two. And we recently took the bikes on the beach, me and him, and those two peaks were forming again. Yeah, so he and I went out and just surfed and there was no one around. And to me, that's like, you know, kind of just reliving your childhood again in some way.
How much joy does a session like that compare to surfing perfect waves?
I can still literally get as psyched for good two-foot waves in Florida as I can for eight to 10-foot Pipe and Backdoor. It's not the physical thing, it's the emotional exchange of joy of a situation. That's what surfing can bring. That's what you should always be chasing.
