Success, with GT

What’s your picture of success? For me it’s a bikinied ass in my face and a northern corner facing the setting summer sun. For you, it might be an aloof model with brown tits and a car by the Germans. Greg Tomlinson, the king of the post-heat interview at Billabong WCTs and co-founder of VonZipper, ain’t chasing Porsches. “The people I went to school with, they got consumed by Porsches and coke and big houses and all I ever wanted to do was surf, snow, skate, play rock n roll music and screw around. And, I see those guys now and they’re all bald and fat and they’re all shitty. And they tell me, dude, you haven’t changed. I haven’t changed because I stayed in that lifestyle where they all got consumed by shit.” You would’ve seen GT in action on the event webcasts. Deftly, he scoops up heat winners before they disappear to their various caves. His combination of good looks, professionalism as well as a nod to contemporary fashion, as interpreted by southern California, infuriates the trolls who inhabit online forums. Forum commentators agree that he is a shallow homosexual and possibly even a pederast. “Oh fuck! The people in the box probably get tired of reading the hateful mail about me,” says GT. “My outfit, my hairdo, whether I’m gay. Okay. I’m far from gay (he has seeded three boys, all of whom rip on guitar, not that it matters). But, if that makes people feel better, because I got a different hairdo to what they wear? Don’t worry. I probably wore your hairdo 15 years ago. Is it because I don’t wear the same baggy fricken sweat pants?