Available to book
Andrew Cotton
Team Building
Resilience
Communication
Andrew Cotton helps organisations build resilience, high-performance teamwork, and risk management confidence. A big wave leadership speaker, Andrew draws on world-record surfing achievements at Nazaré and Billabong XXL Award recognition to deliver transformative insights for teams navigating pressure and disruption.
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Andrew Cotton has spent his career chasing some of the largest waves ever surfed, building expertise in risk, resilience, and high-performance teamwork through extreme conditions.
A nominee for the Billabong XXL Awards, Andrew towed Garrett McNamara into a world-record 78-foot wave at Portugal's Nazaré in 2011. His work in big wave surfing has been covered by major international media, and he regularly speaks to organisations on performance under pressure.
Andrew draws directly from his experience riding waves up to 80 feet tall to show how teams can function at their best when conditions are unpredictable. His approach is grounded in real decisions made in real danger, making his frameworks for communication, trust, and risk assessment immediately relevant to business environments facing disruption or rapid change.
Audiences leave with a clearer model for building trust within teams before pressure hits, not during it. They gain practical tools for assessing risk without paralysis, and a more honest understanding of how setbacks, including Andrew's own serious wipeouts, can become the foundation for stronger performance rather than reasons to retreat.
Book Andrew Cotton to give your team a perspective on challenge and collaboration that no boardroom exercise can replicate.
Andrew Cotton's real-world credibility runs deep here, having towed Garrett McNamara into a world-record wave at Nazaré and built his entire framework around decisions made under genuine physical risk. For a team navigating disruption or high-stakes change, his approach to pre-built trust and risk assessment without paralysis is directly transferable and grounded in lived experience rather than theory.
frequently asked questions
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Email andrew.cotton@getapeptalk.com or call PepTalk on +44 20 3835 2929 (UK) or +1 737 888 5112 (US), and one of our speaker agents will contact you within hours to confirm Andrew's availability and fees. If you can, please include your budget upfront – it helps us fast-track your request. It’s also helpful to know the date, format (virtual or in-person), location, and a bit about your audience.
Andrew Cotton draws directly from first-hand experience in big wave surfing — including riding waves up to 80 feet at Nazaré — to build frameworks around risk assessment, team communication, and trust. He uses his own wipeouts and recoveries as concrete reference points to illustrate how setbacks function as performance data rather than failure.
Andrew Cotton speaks on risk assessment, resilience under pressure, and high-performance teamwork in unpredictable conditions. He towed Garrett McNamara into a world-record 78-foot wave at Nazaré in 2011, a feat recognised by a Billabong XXL Awards nomination.
No. PepTalk adds no booking fee, so you pay the speaker's fee and nothing beyond it. The service, from shortlist through to contracts and event-day logistics, is included. For repeat or multi-event bookings, PepTalk can agree preferential rates with your procurement team.
Share your event date, audience, format, objectives and budget, and PepTalk sends a hand-picked shortlist within 24 hours. Each suggestion comes with a profile, a fee and a recommendation on the strongest fit. Once you choose, PepTalk handles contracts, travel and logistics through to event day.
The typical fee range is the speaker's standard in-person fee in their home market, shown in their local currency. It moves with format, location, date and session length: virtual sessions and shorter slots usually cost less, while international travel and peak dates cost more. Send your brief to PepTalk and the team will confirm the exact fee in your currency.
Not all of them, and it makes no difference to your booking. PepTalk's network of 15,000+ speakers covers talent the team works with directly alongside speakers represented by agents and agencies worldwide. PepTalk approaches the speaker, negotiates the fee and handles contracting either way.
Three to six months ahead is comfortable for most events, and 12 months is better for large conferences, peak-season dates or one specific in-demand speaker. Shorter timelines are workable, and PepTalk regularly fills last-minute and replacement bookings within days. Availability is the constraint, so get in touch as soon as you have a date.
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