"Don't try to copy
what people do,
learn how to do it
yourself. That's
the key. You've got
to think for your-
self on all of your
tricks."
This is an out-take from the photo session for the
April, 1981 cover of THRASHER, shot at Colton.
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out like a kind of rivalry and ended up a
game.
Could you elaborate on the whole Vari-
bot premise?
When skateboarding became "tricks" in-
stead of "style" we were some of the in-
novators of all the "tricks."
O.K., rattle off a bunch of tricks credited
to the Varibots.
Fakle ollies, lien airs, Elguerials, lien to
tail...
Who came up with what trick?
Lien to tail-I did, fakie ollie-I did, lien
air-Eddie did...see Eddie and I skated
together, so any trick he did, I did. Any trick
I did, he did. He was the pro and I was the
nobody amateur so he'd get the coverage
for my tricks and I used to hate that. It used
to piss me off.
Which tricks?
Fakie Ollie. He scored the sequence at
Winchester and it pissed me off. I did them
there too, and it just pisses me off. Lien to
tail, I invented and Christian got the se-
quence...what else? There's a lot of tricks,
it was so many years ago.
What was your attitude, and/or point of
view on things at this time?
I was kind of a brat, and being a brat I
saw both sides. I kinda said "fuck this," and
had a real shitty attitude when I was young.
It's something you've got to grow out of. I
could approach people that saw me in
magazines and knew all the Variflex hype
who would say, "Here comes the little rich
kid Allen fuckin' Robotic one. "When I'd walk
up they'd have a totally biased opinion of
me, so when I'd talk to them they'd treat
me a certain way. But then there were open-
minded people who'd say, "Hey, how ya'
doin'?" and get to know me before judging
VanFLEX
me. I learned about that type of shit real
young because I had so much of it coming
my way.
You got to grow up fast.
Yup. Then I went on tour.
The Variflex tour?
Yeah, one in '80 and one in '81.
Explain the Variflex tour.
My dad put it together. He had it all
planned out in advance. If you'll recall, there
were skateparks all over the country. We'd
drive to one park and stay there a couple
of days, then to another park for a couple
of days. They were only about eight to ten
hours apart. Our longest drive was twenty-
two hours.
What skateparks do you remember vis-
iting during the course of those two
tours?
We went through Boulder, CO, to Apple
and Colombus (Ohio), Endless Summer
and U.S.A. (Mich.), Cherry Hill (New Jer
sey), went to a park in Crofton, (Maryland).
We went to three parks in Texas the first
year. Rainbow Wave (Tampa, FL) Sensa-
tion Basin (Gainsville, FL) one in Ft. Lauder-
dale (FL) and the one in Jacksonville (FL).
Then we went to Mobile and Huntsville
(Alabama). Huntsville had a pool that was
a lot like the Upland pool, except it was
milder with smaller coping. But it was
bitchin' it was fast and hot for progressing.
They had a little clover-bowl, almost vertical
with no coping but grindable edges. It was
cool, you could fly over the hips. They also
had a little tiny pool, about five feet deep
with tile and coping and half a foot of vert.
It was kinda weird...oh yeah, Wisconsin.
There's a park that is still there. It's under-
neath a strip joint now. That is a bitchin'
park. It's probably the best park I've ever
skated in my life. It has the best little bowl
I've ever rode.
Relate your reasons for being into skat-
ing for this length of time in the present
capacity of which you are now involved.
What the hell is it?
As I mentioned earlier, when I started
skating it was in the backyard with my
brother. As was then as it is now with me,
I skate the most and the best when I'm
alone or with a few friends on backyard
ramps. You're not worried about anything,
you're just having a personal good time.
That's when it's the best.
What's the attraction that makes you
keep doing it, why don't you stop?
I like to skate. It's my favorite thing in the
whole world, there's nothing else that I'd
rather do for personal enjoyment.
What's there that satisfies you?
Because with skateboarding you are in
control. It's you and the ramp. You're just
skating and having your own fun. Nobody
else is having fun for you, It's a personal
kind of thing. Sometimes you throw yourself
to where you can pull off the things that
you shouldn't even be doing.
What was your first satisfying moment
in skateboarding?
Probably that first frontside grind on cop-
ing. Then from then on it was just a series
of achievements. The first time I did a real
high air. One day for the first time I saw a
guy do an invert. By that night, I could do
them.
So you're saying, one day you saw a
guy doing something that you never
saw before...?
Yeah.
...and by the end of that day you were
doing it too?
Yeah. It was a good feeling. After trying
to do it so many times and then finally you
do it. Then there's the adrenaline rush. But
you know what is radical? Smith is radical.
Tell a bit about Mike Smith.
Smith shreds and he's from my age.
People don't understand his skating. He'll
throw a mean little lapover hang-up grind
or something and have to grab the tail to
get in, and people don't understand. He's
an individual skateboarder.
Were you predominantly nurtured in
skateparks.
All I lived in were skateparks. I always
skated parks so I always saw tricks. I went
and saw my first pro contest at Lakewood,
with Steve Alba and Dave Andrecht battling
it out. Peralta was skating and Shogo Kubo.
That was a big thing in my life.
Do you miss those kind of contests?
Yeah. Contests aren't like that anymore.
What would be a good example of some
of the most radical things you saw back
then?
Steve Alba did a big frontside air in the
big pipe at the bottom of Lakewood's
halfpipe. Two feet high and about four feet
long. It was just the most bio thing.
What year was that?
Probably about 1978.
What's your interpretation of the up and
down period of skateboarding?
When it was up, everybody was into it.
A real competitive, aggressive sport. Then
it died out and just the few hung on. It be-
came more of a friendship thing. All the
pros were, pretty much, friends because
they'd been skating together for so many
years. At present we're out there skating
and doing what we do and having our fun.
Now that it (skateboarding) is coming back
up again, it has a more positive input.
Competition is really very radical. I
thought Tony Hawk at Houston was great.
He's radical in a different way
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