Sports are the perfect embodiment of the competitive spirit. However, sometimes, this competitive spirit turns personal, giving birth to rivalries among athletes. There are various examples throughout history. Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer, and the list is endless. In surfing, Kelly Slater and Andy Irons were the controversial pair.
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While most of these rivalries started and ended in the professional arena, the same was not the case with Slater and Irons. Theirs was a rivalry long and fierce, and dirty, more often than not. The contention between Kelly Slater and Andy Irons was akin to that between Tupac and Biggie- you had to choose a side!
Kelly Slater and Andy Irons- the epitome of love and hate
The foundation was laid sometime before, but it was in the year 2003 when it all really began. Andy Irons had just won his first championship title in 2002 and was pumped to win another one. Kelly Slater had just come out of semi-retirement in 2003 and was jonesing for a comeback win. The competition got fierce, and a rivalry was born.
The stories of their feud were a common occurrence in the media. However, it was the documentary called A Fly in the Champagne (2009) which really gave a personal insight into the situation. The documentary stars Kelly Slater, Andy Irons, and a few other surfing icons. In the documentary, Irons revealed exactly how heated the strife got at one point. He said, “I ended up kind of running with it, and just kinda going, “You know what? Yeah, f**k Kelly””. Irons also opened up about the crucifixion he faced at the hands of newspapers and magazines.
He recalled, “I remember reading so much stuff that Kelly had said, and I remember seeing stuff in like… Sports Illustrated wrote a completely biased article that made me look horrible, and they fabricated a bunch of stuff.” The made-up stories definitely put the late Andy Irons on the edge. He continued, “Which I thought was really heavy, because not even surf mags were doing what Sports Illustrated, this giant magazine, wrote.” Slater had a different view about the friction between them.
Slater’s viewpoint on the situation
According to Kelly Slater, their spite might have run deeper than people realized. He said, “You know, it’s funny because, in ways, it was blown totally out of proportion in the media, that tension between us. And in other ways, people didn’t know about it. It was maybe more than people thought.” When Irons had just started to make his name in surfing, Slater was already a legend.
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There was clearly friction between the two, but there was also a begrudging respect. Both surfers knew what the other was capable of. They were, after all, both world champions. A Fly in the Champagne is the ideal manifestation of the relationship between the two greats. Despite his unfortunate demise in 2010, Andy Iron’s name was immortalized in consonance with Kelly Slater as his most fierce competitor.
Watch this story: 51-Year-Old Legend Kelly Slater Gets Candid About the Toughest Moments in His Surfing Career
Which is the most ferocious player rivalry, according to you?
