Kelly Slater Cypher Boardshort Series

What makes Kelly Slater the greatest surfer of all time? There's the trophies - 42 ASP wins, 9 world titles, 6 Pipe Masters, Eddie Aikau victory. Then there's the stuff of myth, the high five with Rob Machado at Pipe, the rivalry with Andy Irons, the Letting Go tube at Teahupo'o, the dolphin guiding him to a winning wave at J-Bay. There's also the neatly book ended story - a poor kid with a single mom grows up at a beach in Florida with almost no waves, but natural talent and a burning competitive spirit take him to the top and he stays there. He becomes the youngest and oldest world champ in history. Ambition and charisma make him the sport's first true celebrity. Kelly Slater - he's Ali, Jordan and Woods all in one. If Kelly didn't exist an author would have invented him. Now that he's won his 9th ASP world title we wait and wonder what's next. But we're secure in the knowledge that just as he always has, he'll take us along for the ride.

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"Record" for Largest Wave Ever Ridden Trivializes Big-Wave Surfing

A return to old-school measuring techniques is in order

Consider two representations of two very big waves, below. The first is a photograph of Mike Parsons at Cortes Bank. The second is a video of Garrett McNamara near Nazare, Portugal. Now take out some measuring tape and make the distance of one foot between your hands. That's the amount, according to the Billabong XXL committee, that McNamara's wave is bigger than Parsons's wave.