Surf legend Kelly Slater telegraphs death, end of career, in naked new interview: “My competitive flame is burning low, but it can spark up at times.”

The king is still alive. Long live the king.

As JP Currie pointed out this morning, nobody does naked vulnerability like the world’s greatest surfer Kelly Slater. Oh that “world’s greatest” business is entirely beyond dispute no matter your feelings on the “surf industry,” “competitive professional surfing” or politics. Slater has conquered every niche of our water world, save the kooky bits like SUPing and foiling, and, yet, is still approachable enough, still raw enough to be the only championship tour participant to accept interviews after losses, the only to let the camera linger, capturing real hurt and tenderness (see above photograph).

The end is, of course, nigh and we have all know that for quite some time but now it appears that Slater knows it too.

In a sweet and poignant interview with People magazine, dutifully promoting the Apple Television program Make or Break Season 2, the 11x World Champion says about the end, “”I think about it a lot. It’s a reality, because it’s not far off for me. My competitive flame is burning low, but it can spark up at times.”

The fantastic bit of self-awareness led to other gems including, but not limited to…

Dying:

I don’t ever envision that time in my life where I’m not surfing. I’ve said it before and it sounds kind of strange, but I’d be totally fine passing away, out in the ocean somewhere, someday when I’m 100 years old. I want to surf until my final days.

A second career:

I would like to try my hand (in professional golf) at some point. I’m at a level where I should be able to perform if I’m not too nervous.

Marriage:

We (Kalani Miller plus GOAT) talk about it a lot, so it’ll probably happen at some point there.

And his perpetual golden wildcard/dude cruise:

I’ll still probably surf an event here or there for a few years to come. I really want to focus my life on going to my favorite places on the planet and maybe getting a boat and doing a lot of it just with a couple people. I don’t know. It’s a never-ending journey for surfers. There’s always another wave and another place you want to go.

What will we do without him?

More to the point, what will the World Surf League do?

David Lee Scales and I did not discuss this on our weekly chat but, man, they should be extremely worried unless Chief Tinky Winky Jessi Miley-Dyer has already ginned up a solid plan. I’d imagine Dirk Ziff gifts a chunk of his professional surfing organization to Slater as a sweet pair of golden handcuffs to match those golden wildcards.

Fun.

Scales and I, anyhow, did discuss the issue of trans women in sport from a white cis male perspective.

Groundbreaking.