"It’s a privilege and an honour to give BeachGrit so much to talk about.”
If you knew Chris Cote like I know Chris Cote, you’d find the sweetest Peewee Herman-esque lover of life, gags, tumbling, surf all day, no-alcohol parties all night, and positivity wherever he can find it.
Also a shill for the World Surf League, but we all gotta make a living, the truth be told.
The respect is mutual, as you might imagine, with Chris Cote describing Chas Smith as the Tucker Carlson of surf media and BeachGrit as the sport’s own Fox News. A heady double compliment!
“Think about it, right,” said Chris Cote. “They talk to their base. They fire up their base. Chas is kind of like the Tucker Carlson of surf media. They’ve got their Bill O’Riellys and their made-up name people. People on their message board and it’s vicious. But it’s a lot of fun and it’s a privilege and an honor to give BeachGrit so much to talk about.”
BeachGrit commenter TodaysEmpiresTomorrowsAshes describes Chris Cote as a, “a pre-pubescent boy trapped in the body of a middle-aged man wrapped in the wardrobe of a 00s So-Cal high schooler.”
When asked about the criticism he replied, “I use it for humility purposes.”
Wise!
In this episode of Chas Hates Surfing,
Chris Cote talks about the killing of the surf industry, the joys of toxic positivity, the wild threats he receives, or received back when he was on the tiller at Transworld Surf, speculates on the reasons for Eric Logan’s disappearance (no he doesn’t!) and explains why the median age for surfers is now forty-five plus.
