Michael Peterson

Sydney, Australia, 1975

I’ll never be a has-been. I’ll just drop off undefeated.

Tracks editor Phil Jarratt interviewed Michael Peterson not long after the 23-year-old failed to defend his title in the 1974 Coca-Cola Surfabout.

 *  *  *

How did it feel when you didn’t win the Coke contest?

I wasn’t really depressed or anything. I got some information that if I’d [won the] contest I would have had to give half to the taxation department, so I didn’t really try my hardest.

You were thinking about that right through the contest?

Yeah, it was in the back of my head all along....