INTERVIEW – Close to retirement, the 52-year-old American with XXL awards takes stock of the evolution of his discipline and the oceans after thirty years of competition at the highest level.
Meeting Kelly Slater in Paris is a bit like meeting a polar bear in the desert. An incongruity. The greatest surfer of all time does not belong in the city but rather on the beaches, board under his arm and lycra on his body, near the seas and oceans of the world. But he was there, on the Champs-Elysées, for the opening of the pop-up of Breitling, the watch brand which is celebrating its 140th anniversary and of which he is an ambassador (member of the “Surfer Squad”). And the opportunity was too good.
At 52, the American was ejected from the elite world circuit for the first time and retirement is near. He, the shy guy from Cocoa Beach (Florida) who became eleven times world champion, the pioneer with a career spanning more than thirty years and more than fifty victories, how many more interviews will he give? For Le Figarohe talks about the evolution of his discipline and the oceans, his relationship to notoriety, but also his place in the history of sport.
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