A day at the ASP comp and meeting The King, Kelly Slater.

What a day it was. What a treat. How exciting. Just great. Can you tell I’m so very happy ? The title says it all really. I went to the comp and met The King, Mr. Kelly Slater. I got the chance to meet him thanks to my dad, step mum and of course the other people who got us in there : Kelly’s friends Gabe Davies, Lauren Davies.

To cut a long story short my step-mum is a painter (www.jamesonartgallery.blogspot.com/¬). My dad gave her the idea to do portraits of inspirational people and to start with Kelly Slater. Thanks to Gabe and Lauren – mentioned above - we arranged to meet Kelly at the ASP World tour in Hossegor.

The day came. My dad, step-mum and myself headed up to the comp. As it was a Friday there weren’t too many people which was great. We hung out on the beach, chilling and just taking the whole thing in really. I loved it so much. Taking pictures. Checking out all the people and all the pros. Watching all the people running after the pros to get an autograph.
After a while down the beach we were able to get hold of Kelly. We were next to the barriers. A friend of ours - Lauren Davies - went to get Kelly. He came down from where he was. We hopped over the barrier. It didn’t go down very well for me though because I had a camera. A bouncer came to tell me off but I said I was with Kelly so he let me off. You should of seen it, as soon as people saw he was down with us doing something a troop of people turned up. All with cameras, video cameras, you name it. Then official people came with their cameras filming my step mum giving the painting to Kelly and everything else that was going on. It was so surreal. Absolutely crazy.
Slater is such a nice guy. I am stocked I got a shot with him. It’s really not that often that people tend to get a picture taken with him at comps. He’s always surrounded in people. So I’m very grateful to have been given the chance.

I would love to be a photographer for the ASP World Tour. This is what I want to do. Travel around the world, taking pictures and having a great laugh. I can’t think of a better job than that.

I just want to add what a shame it is that Kelly didn’t win the 2010 finals at Hossegor. He was surfing really good as well as all the other pros. It just came down to luck – wave luck- really that Mick won, and talent of course ! I mean Mick got the chance to catch some decent waves whereas Kelly just didn’t get the opportunity. It was really difficult out there in the finals as you might of seen. The jet-skis had trouble getting out in the first place. Huge, gnarly sets were braking all over the place. They got axed ! I have full and total respect for what these guys do. It was Hossegor unleashed.

Congratulations to Kelly and Mick. Bring on the next event in Hossegor in 2011.

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