Sterling Spencer

http://encyclopediaofsurfing.com/entries/spencer-sterling

Bespectacled pro surfer and comedic surf blogger from Florida’s Gulf Coast. Spencer was born (1988) in Pensacola, Florida, and raised in nearby Gulf Breeze, the son of Yancy Spencer III, a longtime surfshop magnate and pioneering Gulf Coast ripper. Spencer began surfing with his father as a toddler, showed great talent early on, and by age eight was signed to a Billabong sponsorship deal. He enjoyed a successful amateur competitive career in the early 2000s, racking up four NSSA East Coast championship titles.

The air-boosting regularfooter made a brief run at qualifying for the world pro tour, but didn't make the cut and soon turned his attention tos starring in video clips and going on sponsor-backed photo jaunts.

In 2008 Spencer launched PinchMySalt, an absurdist and often hilarious website that featured skits (often involving Spencer dressed up as a centaur), short clips of high-performance surfing starring Spencer and his pro surfer buddies, and general mockery of some of the surf industry’s biggest names. Tow-in surf hero Laird Hamilton came in for a lot of good-natured abuse, though PinchMySalt’s most cherished clip was of French pro Jeremy Flores rebuffing a young fan’s attempt to get his autograph at a contest, with Spencer providing the anguished kid’s voiceover. Flores was enraged, but PinchMySalt rode the publicity to take Surfer magazine’s 2011 Battle of the Blogs crown.