It's the spiciest thing
in my life. It's what makes me
wake up in the morning.
I dream skating.
would knock my head off. I was spinnin' and
gassin' so hard.
When did your competitive aspect in
skateboarding begin?
I was picked up by the Whirlin' Wheels
Park team. (This is when ASPO first
began-Association of Skate Park Owners.)
Tearing it up back then were Dean Calvert,
who was a heavy influence on me because
he was the ripper in the area at the time,
and a little blonde kid from Poway named
Darren Allrad, who had the style of Mike
Smith and the fluidity of Bert Lamar. I got
on the team by winning my age group at one
of their first try-out contests. That was a vic-
tory for me.
What sort of run did you have?
I was riding a Caster "Inouye," of course,
at the time and Indy 109's. I carved around
the bowl a lot, backside and frontside carve
grind forevers. Just before that, I learned to
figure-eight carve. Then I did it in my run
and I was stoked. I got all these hoots and
hollers from the older guys, which was hot
too. My line was comprised of a lot of carves,
hip slides, rockwalks, backside tail taps
(sliding down the tiles, because it was a foot-
long tile) and backside airs, grabbing in front
of the foot rather than in back. I was doin'
those just barely out. I wasn't too good at
edgers, really. I was kind of scared of them.
I did frontside grinds, frontside potato slide
things (frontside grind to fakie and slide
down). Laybacks were pretty much on my
list of tricks back then.
After a while I was fortunate enough to
have my mom drive me to the park twice
a week and pick me up at, like, eleven
o'clock in the evening. That was cool. With
all that skating, I began winning all these
local contests, a couple of Vans contests at
Oasis skatepark and Del Mar skatepark,
held by Everett Rosecrans, who was a Vans
rep then. That's when I started getting.
noticed by small-time sponsors.
Who were some of the more notable
skaters in the North San Diego County
area at the time?
Marty Smith, Steve Archer, Tom Inouye,
Chris Strople, Kyle Jensen, Mitch Long,
Dean Calvert, Vince Parsenees.
in fact,
at that point, those guys were becoming old-
timers, and we're talkin' about the late
seventies. That was when airs and inverts
were startin' to come into play. It was
basically the young guys who were really
ripping. The Allen bro-
thers did a lot of slides,
Danny and Duane. In my mind they were
the best trick skaters, they had style and
were probably influenced by Stacy Peralta.
There was Teddy Morales, who was like,
"Esco-Alva." These guys all had big hair
too, which was funny. Back then, everyone
had jumbo-sized hair.
Media skaters Micke Alba, Bert Lamar
and Jay Smith were the all-stars, as far as
I was concerned. I felt I was a long-time pro-
tege of Inouye, but as he sort of faded into
the sunset, Micke, Bert and Jay started fill-
ing my mind. I'd look at a page in a
magazine and see Jay Smith doin' a gnarly
hip grind, or a backside-carve-edger over
the death box with his hair flailing all over
the place and his skinny bones just workin'
and tweakin.
It wasn't worship. It was just...relating.
It's a real esoteric feeling you can't really.
share with somebody through talking about
it unless you're really verbally colorful. The
feeling is bewildering.
What individuals would you say have
been principally responsible for the pro-
gression of the sport?
The Tony Hawks, the Eric Dressens and
the Jesse Martinez's. Take wall riding.
That's riding a 90° transition-a completely
new dimension of skating. The downhill
slide was another new dimension. ►
GATOR
Dropping off the hip, Santee, CA.
I was playing football and baseball in
about the seventh grade, and then I just
decided I couldn't make it to practice
anymore because I wanted to skate and do
my homework. My brother was kinda
bummed then, but he respected my
individuality.
After all the guys who skated around my
neighborhood started fading out, the
skatepark by my house (Whirling Wheels,
in Escondido) was built. That was still in '77.
I became a local very quickly. I either took
the bus or skated four miles to get there.
There, I'd dink around in the pool, on the
moguls and in the banked freestyle area
mostly, and the half-pipe. There was a
bridge going over the half-pipe called
"Stoka Boka Pass." In fact, there were lit-
tle signs in front of every run. The six moguls
were called "Hot Ass Hills." The pool was
in the shape of a woman's bra, and it was
called the "42D Bowl." It was officially
named that from day one.
I went there the first day. It was pro day,
of course. Wally Inouye was there. Well,
that's the first guy that comes to mind,
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because he was a
god to me back
then, totally. He
was sparking all-
over the place, lift-
ing the coping out
of it's place.
grinding so hard
that you couldn't
keep a smile on your face.
Did that day make a big impression on
you, as far as seeing that caliber of riding
there in your own territory?
Yeah, I could identify with it because it
was local. They were portraying such
energy, such aggression and such
determination-it was at a level that I'd
never seen before. Up to then all I'd been
exposed to is skating with my friends in the
street and in ditches and stuff. These guys
were so into it, having such a good time,
sweatin' and laughin' and crackin' jokes and
just snakin' each other. It was a full soul ses-
sion, everybody was just shralpin' it up.
When they went into the bowl, their expres
sions changed to a "going into battle" ex-
pression, going for it, no holds barred.
When they popped out of the bowl, they'd
get a smile on their faces and yelp and
chime. It was hot.
Pretty much, that was the day that com-
pelled me to start skating seriously. Shortly
after, I became a park local. I didn't skate
the pool that day, but after that I'd go two
times a week and I'd do backside carves,
tiles. As the days progressed, I started hit-
ting coping. I was riding a G&S Parkrider
with Bennett Vectors, two green 60mm
Kryptonics, and two blue ones.
My first big accomplishment was a
backside grind, face wall. First hit, drop in,
backside grind. CRUNCH! That's kickturn
grind. Backside carve grind came second.
I would sketch so hard, because by then I
had gotten Trackers, and the big kingpins
would stick way out. I'd drop in and spark-it
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