In an intriguing article on surfing phenom Kelli Slater, Matt Higgins raised the controversial question as to whether the ten time champion should be considered one of the greatest athletes of all time. A recent sport illustrated columnist had him listed among the finalists. Chris Mauro made the case for Slater after he won the World Surfing Championship in Puerto Rico earlier this year. Undoubtedly, trying to decide who is the best ever is an act of enormous stupidity when there are so many different types of sports and so many dominant athletes around today. With that said, I believe that Slater can in no way be considered the best ever; in fact it is possible that he is not the best surfer. Quite possibly Laird Hamilton is the better surfer and a more monumental figure in the sport. Hamilton, who at an early age showed great promise in the sport, shunned international competitions believing that the competitive element of competition was not what the sport was really about. Instead he believed that surfing was about pushing the limits to what was possible. He was one of the pioneers of tow-in surfing where the surfer is towed out miles into the middle of the ocean to where rogue waves over hundred feet high are breaking. Here and here are highlight links for the two surfers. Here is a video of a recent Daily Show interview with Susan Kasey author of Wave.

This debate between Hamilton and Slater highlights one of the central problems: In counter culture sports such as Surfing and rock climbing, in which many of the top performers shun competition, it is sometimes hard to know if the person with the most championships is really the best.