Despite the recent unveiling of his wave pool, as well as his various other side projects, Kelly Slater has silenced doubts about his presence on the 2016 world tour in an interview with the Guardian.
“I feel pretty old.” he said. “Not mentally, just in my body. At the moment I’m training to overcome injuries so I can be strong for the next world tour [Slater has won 11 world championships, making him the youngest and oldest title holder at 20 and 39]. I’m not retiring. I have every intention of being 90 and surfing Hawaii’s Backdoor Pipeline.”
The interview contains many other interesting insights including:
“My mum sold her banjo so I could go to a contest in Cornwall. I can’t help but still feel bad about that.”
and the 11 time world seemed to go down well with The Guardians readership, with the article enjoying receiving comments such as:
“Professional surfer.
Ah well, there you are, never mind.”
“Just sold the banjo, should have been burnt at the tideline.”
“surfing the Backdoor Pipeline” I’m pretty sure is a euphemism.”
We also managed to catch up with Kelly (where he actually elaborated further on some of the points he touched upon in The Guardian piece) back in October, read our interview with him in full here.