If you’re like us, you’ve probably wondered what famous people add to their carts. Not the JAR brooch and Louis XV chair but the hairspray and the electric toothbrush. We asked surfer Kelly Slater — who’s also the co-founder of clothing brand Outerknown — about the massage tool, reef-safe sunscreen, and blender he can’t live without.
They’re really big at surf competitions. Anytime one is sitting around the warm-up area at a contest, the other surfers will steal it and use the batteries up, so you have to hide it if you have one. I use it anytime my body needs some loosening up — mostly after I surf, though. I’ll take a really hot bath for an hour or two and then use it once my muscles are loose. I’ll also use it on a plane because if I’m sitting for 10, 12, 14 hours, it’s a great time to focus on a little bit of body work. The Hypervolt is pretty quiet, so you don’t really hear it. I had a Theragun before this, but I found it to be really loud — and if I’m being honest, too expensive. The Hypervolt has different heads I can put on, is half the price, and much quieter.
Manda just makes a good, simple product. It’s a physical, reef-safe sunscreen, which is important because I’m in the ocean a lot. And there are minimal ingredients. If you read the label, I think there are like five to seven ingredients in it? Because it’s a paste, it’s a lot thicker, but that’s really good when you’re in the tropics. I like my sunscreens to be really thick, where it’s almost hard to put on. You have to rub this around in your hands first to heat it up before you can get it on. I feel like it lasts longer that way. I wipe my nose a lot — it’s kind of a thing that all surfers do, just wipe their face all the time in the water — but this will stay on for a long time, sometimes all day long.
I always wondered what made a Vitamix blender so special. People would say I needed one, but I was like, “Whatever, a blender is a blender.” Then, after I moved into a new house about 13 years ago, my friend sent me one as a housewarming gift. Now I understand why it’s so popular. My main requirement for a blender is that it’s strong enough to grind up ice and frozen fruits and that kind of thing — many blenders kind of cavitate and don’t work properly. The Vitamix is really powerful. It has two or three horsepower, so it’ll grind up anything. I own two or three Vitamixes; I have one in each place I live. This Drink Machine Advance model is the one I like the most. Mine’s at least ten years old and I use it every single day. I mostly make smoothies in the morning, but occasionally I’ll make veggie soups in it. If you use the Vitamix to blend vegetables into a purée, it’ll actually get hot due to centrifugal force: The friction of the blade on the vegetables over a ten-minute period of time will actually heat the purée up, so you can literally pour it straight out of there into a bowl.
Gosh, I’ve probably been watching UFC for about 15 years. I got really into it around 2005 or 2006. I was in Japan, and I had been friends with Royce and Rickson Gracie for a bit, and I ran into Royce in the street. He was like, “My brother Royler is fighting tomorrow, you have to come.” I had a flight to leave that day, but he told me to change it, so I did and I went. Unfortunately Royler got knocked out by Kid Yamamoto, but the fight was when MMA was really starting to come into its own. After that, I started watching a lot of fights and going to them, too. Now, there are almost no fights I miss. I know the guys in UFC really well — I know their names and their skills, so as a fan, it’s really fun because I can understand exactly what I’m watching and what their strengths are. A lot of them actually surf, too — a lot of surfers do Jiu Jitsu and a lot of Jiu Jitsu fighters surf. Would I consider fighting myself? I mean, yeah, maybe! I actually trained in martial arts for about a year when I was eight-years-old. I did Tae Kwon Do and got into sparring, but I kicked this kid in the butt really hard and he started crying. I felt really bad, so I quit after that. I didn’t want to hurt anybody.
I don’t drink matcha every day, but I drink it a lot, like multiple times a week. My friend introduced it to me — he would make it for me at his house. Then I started making it on my own because I really like the health benefits of green tea. This matcha is really high quality. It’s a little bit bitter, but I’ve grown to like it.
I have a Gibson. I have Martin. I have a couple of Fenders. I’ve even had some guitars custom made over the years. But my Cole Clark is just the best. It plays really well. Through the surf world, I made a friend who worked at the Cole Clark store in Australia, and they gifted me a couple of guitars a few years ago. So I’ve just really gotten into the brand. I love the size of the neck — whenever I pick it up, the size of the neck just fits me perfectly. And when I pick it up, it’s almost like a song just comes out of it. I’ll play in front of people on occasion, and I make videos sometimes — I actually did an album years ago with some friends. But it’s really just for me to use as a release of some sort. It’s just a pastime, an expression.
I use this pretty much every day for smoothies — I’m a chocolate and bananas kind of guy. I’ve been using this for years. The protein gives me a little bit of energy and if you’re working out, obviously, it’s good for building muscle, so that’s why it’s a part of my morning routine. Organic products are also important to me and I really believe in this brand’s message. Practically everything is being sprayed with glyphosate now, which is something everyone should be concerned about. The more unprocessed and pure you go, the more you’re avoiding potential health hazards.
This is my brand’s performance trunk. It’s nothing spectacular — but that’s the beauty of it to me. When I’m surfing, I need something that’s not going to get in my way and when I wear these, I almost don’t notice that they’re there. The seams are ironed together, so the shorts are basically seamless. They have a little bit of a slimmer cut and are a little bit shorter, so they don’t ever catch on your knees. For a while in the surf world, trunks got kind of long and they would almost hang over your knees. But that can be irritating, and your knees can also get stuck in them while you’re trying to move. We went through a lot of trial and error with the materials for the trunks, and this material won’t cause any type of rash, no matter how long you surf in them. We have a lot of different colors, too.
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