♪ we had a lot of frictionbetween us. i think there were some fightsand things that happened behind the scenesthat people don't know about. i started believingwhat i was reading. i started gettinginto the character. i still have a lot of peoplelike pulling for me, but i have a lot of people,like, with a voodoo doll out. there was a timewhere i literally
would go to sleep at nightthinking of ways to punch himin the face. rivalries existin every sport known to man. since the earliest daysof athletes competing in gamesof skill and daring, individuals have risenthrough the ranks and placed themselvesat the pinnacle of their sport. in the end of these contests,sometimes brutal in form, one man would standon the apex
with the competitionflailing below him. but just as everychampion rises, there will always bea contender with his sights set on taking downall adversaries and claiming his spotat the top of the field. for every spartacus,there is a hungry gladiator with sharpened swordand fierce, determined heart. surfing,like all warrior games, had been forever ripewith fierce rivalries,
but in 1998, when a youngand ravenous competitor named andy irons got called upto the big leagues, which was being dominatedby five-time world champion and unstoppable forcekelly slater, the battlehad only just begun, and surfing'sgreatest rivalry was born. people don't get pushedby nothing. you know, competitivelyin sports and stuff, you get to seewhat people are made of
when they really get pushed,their back to the wall, and when somebody fillsthat space two people can't, that's whentension happens. i remember sayinga couple things to him, like, "you know, you're notin your backyard anymore." he said something like, "youknow, this ain't kauai either." you know, stuff he'd said,stuff i'd said, it was just to the pointwhere i literally wanted to go and get physical.
the first time i met kelly was at the surf expo showin orlando. there was this kidwho was very dark-skinned, and his eyesjust lit up, and they were veryfocused and intense, and, you know,he talked about surfing and winning contestsand becoming a pro and all these things,we're looking at him, "yeah, right, that's whateverybody's dream is.
sure, kid." and we heard,you know, this kid was reallythe real deal, and maybe the next comingof tom curren. growing up in florida,you don't take surf for granted. surfing really small wavesall the time really teaches youhow to read waves better than some guyswould be able to read 'em coming from somewhere elsebecause, you know,
trying to analyzea one-foot wave versus always surfingfive-foot waves and bigger, i think you reallygot to pay attention to whata wave's doing, and i think that'shelped kelly, too. i mean honestly,since he was little, everybody already knew,you know, that he was gonna besomething big, but when he actually, like,busted onto the scene for me
was at the contestat lowers. ♪ got this sinking feelingi sank with the tulip ♪ ♪ there ain't no habitthat i would not defend ♪ ♪ let's come back,well, i don't resend ♪ ♪ and i'm broken house,break you, you on the mend ♪ ♪ when you ♪ he just really hada polished, incredible actthat just was unbeatable at that point,he was so good,
and he definitely stampedhis place on the surfing world. ♪ it's ever beginning,that's a duel to the end ♪ that's when it kind of separatedhim and put him on the map as this kid's not justa floridian, not just an east coaster,but he's one of the best coming out right nowfrom the u.s. the pressure that probablymounted and built within kelly himselfto sustain and hold that positionas a dominant amateur surfer,
it's almost unbearable. a lot of people said,"oh, yeah, he's had too much contests,too much this..." the other thing was,"oh, he can't surf big waves." you know,blah-blah-blah. ♪ i do believe ♪ ♪ i'm in you ♪ ♪ you're on me ♪ ♪ easy ♪
he was wide-eyed, and, you know, just astoundedat hawaii and probably blown awayat the waves, the power, the size,the crowds, the intensity in the water,all that kind of stuff, but from what i understand,he adapted pretty quickly, and he did fine. i don't recallany time
there ever beinglike a slowdown and transitionfrom amateur to pro. he pretty much just,you know, kept climbing. it's pretty safe to sayi would have thought he would achievea world title, but i wouldn't have forecastedthe success he's had to the magnitudethat he's had. still to this day,i have not seen another kelly slater.
kauai is such an incredibleplace for waves, where andy lives,you know, in hanaleiwhere he grew up. he kind of camefrom nothing. he didn't come from a lotof money and wealth, he didn't have a lotof money to travel, yet he wasin the perfect place to becomewhat he is, you know, with thewaves that he had,
he surfedevery day. his whole surfingrevolves around instinct, and i think he was able to surfthese incredible reef breaks, and also thatthe little competitive zone down in pine trees. this beach break out here is the best training groundon the planet, probably. you know,the boys had that since they were nine,ten years old.
they were so ultra competitiveas brothers that there's no doubtin my mind that theirgrowing up together helped shaped theminto the surfers, the dynamic surfersthey are today. and all of a sudden, andy grewand he got real gawky and gangly. didn't look right. you know,he was scrawny.
and bruce was allform and perfect, then it shifted, "oh, hey,bruce is gonna be the guy. look at the style,look at the form." and then andy just--when he turned 16, everything kicked in. andy was a little kid when kelly started winningworld titles. i guarantee you he watchedevery single video tape that kellyhad ever been on,
and dissected him, tried to surflike kelly, guaranteed. and guaranteedhe was kelly's biggest fan. he had the dominant,kind of, gonna-be-a-world-champattitude, even when he wasa young kid. he didn't want to lose,he wanted to win every contest. i think when he reallybecame a household name is when he qualifiedso quick in the wqs, onto the ct,and then as we all know,
did that huge riseand crash. andy was a brashyoung kid and cockywhen he went on tour. going into that next level, if you don't haveyour game tight, no matter who it is,not andy, not anybody else, the big boysare ready to chew you up and spit you outfor breakfast. all a sudden, he thought,"hey, this is me,
i'm a rock star." he kind of gota little loud and didn't realizewhat he kinda had going and got swept upinto the fast life on tour, which isso easy to do. falling off the tour was a rude awakening,in a sense, but a nice slapof reality that kind of set himon his course.
kelly and andy had to workfor what they got. it didn't come to them,you know, where it wassome sort of legacy or some trust-fund kid. they came from very humblebeginnings, both of them. kelly was bred to bemore of a smooth machine whereas andy was bredto be a rigid killer. you know, that first yeari got back on tour, andy really stepped it up,he won a couple of contests
early in the year,and i think that was-- you know, 2002 was reallythe year of the rise of andy. kelly was the best surferon earth, undisputed. when andycame on the scene, he was far from the bestsurfer on earth. you know, i mean,he was an amazing surfer, he had a lot of talent,but he kicked and scratched his way, all the way,from here to here, and like was,you know?
then he'd come back into thegame after being on hiatus, and then coming back inand expecting to be right back on top,and all of a sudden, who's this guy in the ringthat keeps knocking me out? then all of a sudden,that's when the rivalry starts. in 2002, andy and ihad a really, like... we had a lot of frictionbetween us. they'd ask me about it,and i'd be like, "you know, i don't wantto talk about it."
he won all that stuffback in the day, you know, that was then,this is now. i think going into 2002,kelly, for him, that was almostsort of a year back and recharginghis batteries, trying to figure out whatit was like to compete again because he hadn't done itfor quite some time, and it probably cameto him as a shock how quickly andy becamesuch a dominant force.
at that point, i thinkit kind of turned, and then it led the media--naturally, did what it did and helped to reallyfuel the fire of that rivalry. here comesthe world champion, andy irons! i won 2002, and that's when it all--the media, i was trying to get used to,but 2003 was wild. i remember reading so much stuffthat kelly had said,
and i remember seeing stuffin like, sports illustrated, wrote a totalbiased article that made melook horrible, and they fabricateda bunch of stuff, which i thoughtwas really heavy, because not even surf magswere doing what sports illustrated,this giant magazine, wrote. ♪ a teenage love affair ♪ ♪ a teenage love ♪
you know, it's funny,because in ways, it was totally blownout of proportion in the media, that tensionbetween us, and in other ways,people didn't know about it. it was maybe morethan people thought. i ended upkind of running with it and just kinda going,"you know what? yeah, (bleep) kelly." when you become obsessedwith being
the best you can beand winning, you have to comeat every angle you can come up withor figure out. it's good, bad,and uglies of how i'm gonna takethis guy down. he's read all those books,i guarantee you. the art of war, how to get in the othercompetitor's head. he denies it, and i knowhe'll say he doesn't do it,
but there's no doubtabout it. there was a time i went overto housesit off the wall, and it was a househe was staying at or whatever. i didn't even know it,i just--i thought that-- i thought this guythat worked for bruce was staying there,somebody's like, "yeah, damien's stayingat that house." he shows up at my house,walks right in, asking for some guynamed damien.
i'm like,"what? damien?" and he knewi was staying there, i mean,i'm pretty sure he knew. and andy was making foodin the kitchen, and steve sherman was there,and he like, slyly tooka photo of it. yeah, the infamous photo. to me, it seemed likea little bit of a mind game. like, he was stalkingand checking out my territory
and seeingwhat was going on. because he took itthat way, i realized, like, "whoa, this isheavier than i even thought." those guys were at each other'sthroats mentally, like, watching itand like, it was that close to seeminglike it was gonna turn over into being somethingeven more, like, physical. we were out practicingfor the contest. we were just outwarming up a pipe,
and it wasa pretty crowded day. andy was paddlingfor the wave, and i flipped aroundand backed him up, and he missed itand i caught it, and i fell back out, and hejust started screaming at me. just lighting me upin the water in front of everybody,it was pretty funny. my whole driving forceright now is to take his little pretty pictureand just crush it.
the guy came up to mebefore the final at the pipeline masters 2003, biggest heat of the year,the final, right before it allgoes down, coming up to me,pats me on the back. might have been sincere,might not have. "i just want to let you know,i love you like a brother." right before the biggest heatof my life. like, "what?"
he thought like,"oh, he's playing a mind game with me or something." that's just weird. i don't knowhow to take that. i blocked itright out, went outand surfed my heat. i think at that point,i had already given up. i knew i wasgonna lose. i woke up that morningand i knew i was gonna lose.
i was so stressed out. it was my dad's birthday, and he had dieda year before, and there was justa lot of things all accumulating. i just wanted that dayto be over with. i wanted that yearto be over with. i wanted it allto just go away. kelly put every ounceof his abilities
and performanceinto 2003, and he came up just shortof beating andy that year, and that was probablyone of the most difficult losses i think kelly everwas able to take. it was tough for me, you know,'cause i lost, and... that was sort of symbolicof like, my life. i felt like i was losingat that time. he wasn't the guy i grew uplooking up to anymore. he was the guy that i wantedto beat more than anything.
he was sayingall this kind of crap, and i just wantednothing better than to leave himon the beach with a loss. ♪ give me one reasonand i'll give you more ♪ ♪ it seems i'm not... ♪ '04 was like,you know, that year to mewas just a wash. i just felt likei stayed stuck in the same placei was.
not only was andyreally battling kelly for real, he was literallyschooling him. like, hands downregulating him. i never thoughti'd see the day. pure emotion, rage. i just put my heartinto it. everything i hadin myself to, you know, whatever it tookto beat him. that's so good.
i remember i wasin france one time. i remember i was like,hitting this bag. i was just training one day,and i was hitting it, and i was just like,imagining it was andy. we were so intense,it was so deep, where i would be on the beachwith my voodoo doll hoping that hewould lose, and every turn,i'd be so critical on every turn he did,on every wave he caught.
buddy i know was like,"he's looking to overscore it" kind of a thing. i thought andycertainly had the talentand the ability to be able to beatanyone in the world, but to be able to sustain thatfor three years is unbelievable. losing is where you startto learn about yourself. losing's where, you know,the good stuff happens inside.
the next year,i seen just how... how gnarly he can bewhen he gets on a roll, and how he literallyjust... it's so hardto get him off it. jeffreys wasanother good one, but unfortunately,andy was like, really, really bummedat that contest, you know? kelly needed a 9.3, and he did three turns thatwere, you know, pretty good.
and he fell on his fourth,and i was on the beach, i saw the wave,i was like, "there's no way they can give him a score,"but i couldn't hear 'em, and they gave him a 9.5, and i saw him claimingin the water, i was like,"there's no way." and i wasin disbelief. my other score wasa little underballed maybe, so maybe they gave mea little...
i mean, i was reallystoked when i won it, but afterwards i waskinda bummed, you know, 'cause andywas so bummed. you know what, i've beenin the same case. i've had a heatagainst him in france where i should have lost, i should have lostin the semi-finals against him. he surfeda lot sharper, and i got overscoredon my last wave,
i needed an 8.5and got a 9. in japan, i hadsuch a good contest, i was so on my game, and i felt really,really good about that. when they were competing,it was nothing for them to be behindby a 9.5 with 30 seconds leftin the heat. in japan, andy pulled outa 9.6 i think it was, or it could have beeneven a 10-point run,
literally with 30 secondsleft to go in the heat. fair and square,he won. i was still stoked,you know, he outdid mein the final. kelly had rivals,you know, there were timesin kelly's career where a guy would reallygive him a run for a year, whether it be sunnyor whether it be shane beschen at one point,or rob made a run
for like six monthsor something, but... it was neversuper significant, and it wasnever equal. and that's really whatthe spirit of competition is about. can guyson the same level go at it? i think he's pushed me as much as tom curren has,you know?
i think it's taken methrough competition to a place that i don't thinki could have ever gotten to. i got so closethat one year, it would have beenlike four titles, i would have beenso stoked. i mean, i'm stillstoked with three, but the fourth one,the one you don't get, is always the oneyou want the most. and, uh,the next year,
he won by likea thousand points. like, i wasn'teven close to him. to be on top,to be there all the time, you always knowsomebody wants to beat you, somebody wantsto take you down, and that pressure, it's either gonnamake or break a person. i caught myselfgetting less interested and startedpartying a lot.
and then i kind of gotin a bad slump and then lostpretty much all interest in the wholecompetitive thing. just wasn't fun to meanymore, i was miserable. it like, made mechange my surfing. i didn't have funsurfing anymore. i'd go weekswithout surfing. and i've never had thathappen in my life, where surfing's been the onlything that's been there for me,
non-stop, 100 percent,i could always count on surfing. it's always been there for goodand bad times, no matter what. right now, i didn'teven want to surf. i was justkind of over it. just burned, fried. so, that was hard. the things that arereally difficult are the thingsthat really change people. you know,roll with the punches.
♪ winter ♪ ♪ from the ♪ ♪ size of ♪ ♪ the lump in ♪ ♪ my throat ♪ ♪ got a lump in my throat ♪ ♪ rusted wheel ♪ ♪ planted still ♪ ♪ can't move on ♪
♪ and it feels ♪ ♪ just like ♪ ♪ the ground ♪ ♪ but trapped in another way ♪ ♪ just still in the ground ♪ had a lot of things change. i got married, got someonethat's gonna be there for the rest of my life,i love her, and that just made mewant to get motivated
back into competitionand get my life back on track. it's simple science. when a fire is fueled, the flames will burn. in the caseof kelly and andy, it was outside influencesthat suddenly had the two believingin their own hype. mere competitorshad become mortal enemies, but somewherealong the way,
both surfers had to stopand ask themselves, "why?" when i was on the gold coastthis year, contest was on, andy and i haven't surfedagainst each other yet, and he came up and just said,"hey, i want to talk to you," and he opened up to meabout a lot of things that, you know,are very personal to him, and his world just wentfrom this to this, you know,just totally opened up.
he said, "i'd loveto do something with you. i'd like to goon a surf trip, put this thing to rest,and like, actually not workagainst each other." i wrote him a reallylong email after that and told him how,you know, it was sucha great week, and the really importantthing to me was what happenedbetween us.
to me, that was likea big growing thing for both of us. he's embraced itenough to where i'm fortunate enoughto be that guy taking him on. i mean, luckily, you know,it could be taj, it could've been parko,could've been nick. you know, it's beenamazing for my career, you know,all the way around, and it's given mea great position in surfing.
truth be told, nobody expectedthis trip to happen. to get two seemingly mortalenemies to agree to sequester themselveson a tiny island seemed likea ridiculous notion. yet despite hectic schedules,preconceived notions, and the most heated rivalryin modern surf history, somehow it allcame together. the end result:
a ten-day purgingof feelings, dispelling of rumors, and a burying of the hatchetonce and for all. deep down, we probablywanted to be friends, and there's still,you know, there's still that littletension thing there. it's not bad,you know, we're not readyto fight each other. there's still that,"hey, just...
remember i'm over here." "i'm over here, too." ♪ choke ♪ ♪ you choke itbut you know ♪ ♪ it comes backwhen you're sleeping ♪ ♪ cuts youin the dark ♪ ♪ burn ♪ ♪ the cityis too bright ♪ ♪ i'll stay herewith my secrets ♪
♪ until it fadesto dust ♪ it's so cool to look over,and i know it's weird, i catch myselfin contest strategy where i'm out theretrying to get the best wave, i'm trying to get--you know. it's pure progression,you know. i see him surfing,it makes me want to try to surf that much betterand that much harder. i don't know, he's stillsort of every bit as intense
when he's just outhaving a brief surf. i started off competitivewith my brother, then graduated to the bigleagues with kelly slater, the ultimate surfer,and now i'm still doing it. that's the only thingi think that pushes me, keeps me, you know,doing good at what i do. i know that andy has made mea better, more focused, and stronger competitorand surfer. you know, whether i havebeen in situations
i wantedto admit it or not, he's always been oneof my favorite surfers, and this thingkind of consumed us. it took us--it was likepeople were speaking for us. you know, and the true--the real feelings in there maybe were a little bitdifferent, you know? i didn't want to justgo blindly asking people to come on the trip with us,inviting people, but... i said, "what do you thinkabout pottz coming?"
and andy was like, "sick!" i'd been hanging out with pottz,who was my original very first favorite surferof my life was pottz, so having him hanging--i've never really hung out with himthe way we have here, and to see a guyripping so hard at 43 is nothing but inspirational. i can't wait to be 43 now. like, i can beproperly psyched
to try to be rippingat 43. i told him ross was gonna come,too, maybe, and he's like,"yeah, full on, bring him." so, and then i said,you know, i said, "shane's in bali, we can tryto get him up here," and he's like,"that would be insane!" he's been a friend of mesince the beginning, someone i've traveled withand stayed with him. the reason i ride for billabongis, you know,
guys like occyand shane. those two, to me,to be able to go traveland surf with them was a big part of mesigning with billabong. to have him aroundis awesome. andy and i have this, like,weird connection, you know? because shane's likemy best buddy, and andy and himare super close, and then i grew upwith brock,
brock and andyare super tight, but brock's kind of likemy older brother, borg's like andy'solder brother, and then borg and brockare best friends. it's like, we havesuch a weird connection. like, there's no choice. like, we gotta figure outhow to get along. i think it's gonna benothing but great from here on out,you know?
as far as competitively,it's gonna be on as always. on a personalone-on-one level, almost straight up,you know? you know, we have been importantin each other's lives, you know,in some way, and there's always good thingsto learn from that, take from that. you don't go out and dothe thing you're best at because you wantto kill somebody.
you know,you go out and do that because you wantto make people better. ♪ nervous john ♪ ♪ rescues all the whores ♪ ♪ bleeding nose... ♪ sometimes i wishi wouldn't have said some of the things i did,and, you know, i can't take them back,but, you know, it's worked out to the way itis, and i wouldn't change it now
because i wouldn't bewhere i'm at now. and life's good right now,i like where i'm at, and, you know,maybe that's what it took to teach mea few lessons. there have been those timesthat andy has been just all-consuming to me,pissing me off, and, you know,by the sounds of things, i did a pretty good jobthrowing it back. you know,i'm at an age now
where i want to takethe positives out of things. ♪ steal your sweet decline ♪ ♪ this is the longest goodbye ♪ ♪ aching to get your pocket ♪ those three yearsthere straight where andy just hadthat magic all the time, but now he's--i think he's doing it from a different placeright now, and he's trying to figure outhis bearings a little bit,
and, you know, again,i think, you know, maybe he'll findfor himself, maybe those resultswill be the end result of all this work he's doingin his life, you know? it's not over for me,definitely. he's 36and winning again. that just makes meall that more motivated to go and winanother title. you know, i think i definitelygot another title in me,
and guys like himare gonna push me to try to get that. you know, this year, like isaid, since the beginning, we've gotten alongin a whole different light, so he's back to the guythat i look up to. ♪ dead state,i can feel the weight ♪ ♪ light streaming inthrough the open grate ♪ ♪ tooth red scoretearing up the floor ♪ ♪ out in the alleywith the trigger draw ♪
♪ numb hands,i can see the strand ♪ ♪ hold it togetherwith a severed band ♪ ♪ three lost yearsi've been crying here ♪ ♪ i'm over, i'm over,i'm over, i'm broken ♪ ♪ strung out on the wingsof the dawn ♪ ♪ hole in the back,soul in the storm ♪ ♪ torn down through the cracksin the dark ♪ ♪ we're miles adrift,we're inches apart ♪ i think that when--
when it starts clickingfor him, whether that's in a weekor in a month or a year,whatever it is, that it's gonna bestronger than ever, and it'll probablybe pretty scary. ♪ stood up on the sideof the earth ♪ ♪ thrown back to the trackto the dirt ♪ ♪ tooth red,lose an hour a day ♪ ♪ we're miles adrift,we're inches away ♪
♪ hold it together ♪ ♪ with a severed band ♪ ♪ can't feel the blood ♪ as it goesin the wars of the world, when treaties are signedand peace is made, progress follows, and while the battleof these wave warriors never quite escalatedto physical violence, the mental warfarethey waged was epic.
when the smoke cleared, forgivenesswas followed by friendship. surfing's two titanshave set a new course, united,progression of the sport they both love. ♪ who is the flyin your champagne ♪ ♪ who's got the bodyand who's got the brain ♪ ♪ i'll take your bloodand i'll kill my pain ♪ ♪ you are the onethat i desire ♪
♪ you are the dark,i'm the vampire ♪ ♪ vampire ♪ ♪ who is the spyin your campaign ♪ ♪ is it the wifeor is it your advisor ♪ ♪ i wanna suck the bloodfrom their veins ♪ ♪ you are the onethat i despise ♪ ♪ you are the light,i'm the vampire ♪ ♪ oh ♪ ♪ well you know you'llnever find an easy way ♪
♪ bet you know youwanna ride the new wave ♪ ♪ yeah ♪ ♪ who's got the body... ♪ unique new york. (laughing) ♪ women and childrenall disclaim ♪ ♪ you're not the wiser,you're not to blame ♪ ♪ stick 'em in a casketnext to mine ♪ ♪ then we will seewho is alive ♪
♪ then we will seethe vampire ♪ ♪ oh, well you know you'llnever find an easy way ♪ ♪ it's in your head ♪ ♪ the devil sayswhen it's over ♪ ♪ over ♪ ♪ you sound like him ♪ ♪ it's got me till ♪ ♪ now it's over ♪ ♪ yeah, it's over, yeah ♪
game! that's gameright here. right here! look out. hey. that was pretty good. there's some sortof sick irony in the questioningthat was happening there. just a knockout blow.
very classic.
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