style. Was that something you were con-
scious of when you started skating?
I would look at the pictures of Tony and Jay
and those guys and try to emulate their style.
I thought they were the best skateboarders,
and I wanted to skate just like them. It came
from looking at magazines. When I was a lit-
tle kid, if I wasn't skateboarding I was look
ing at the pictures in Skateboarder.
When you were ten years old, there
weren't really a lot of ten-year-old skaters.
The park circuit was more 16- to 20-year-
olds. Now there are a lot of 10-year-old
skaters. Do you think they're in the same
situation you were at ten.
It's a totally different type of skateboarding
now than it was then. Back then it was banks
and style skateboarding. I guess we didn't
even consider it style skateboarding; that was
just how we skated. Now everyone's more
into streetstyle. Some of the kids I see are
really good and have a lot of potential, but
what I'd like to see is more vert skating. Kids
don't go out and look for pools. We were
always looking for pools when I was younger.
What about parks?
The first park I skated was Concrete Wave
in Anaheim. One day I went to Montebello
skateboard park. They wouldn't let me skate
because I didn't have a parent for the
signature thing. I was hanging out all day and
this one dude took us to a pool that was right
nearby. It was the first time I got wheelers
and grinders in a pool. That was a rad thing.
Which park were you saddest to see go?
I quit skating when the parks were still
around. When they tore down Marina, that
bummed me out. I wasn't skating, but Marina.
was the raddest place.
Bowman and all the guys they let skate the
Dogbowl. Going to Lakewood before it
opened.
When you say, "that they let ride the
Dogbowl," do you mean the skaters or the
management?
The skaters. Because it was such a snake
session all the time. If anyone went up there
to try and skate, they'd probably never get
rides. When I was eleven, me and my dad
moved to Brentwood. That's the upper Santa
Monica area. That's when I got on Alva. We
were skating this cement half-pipe in this
How would you design a park for modern kid's backyard. I skated a lot of pools in Brent-1
skating?
It'd be like all of Marina, and I'd have the
Cloverleaf pool from Big O, the freestyle area
from Del Mar.
Recently, I was watching some of the old
videos, and I saw those places. Back then
they didn't skate the way they do now.
Skaters today could rip on them.
Any other park sessions that you can
remember?
I just remember skating Marina a lot with Jay
Adams, Kent Senatore, Jerry Valdez, Brad
wood. I even skated Barney Miller's pool.
Barney Miller, who's that?
The guy that plays Barney Miller on the TV.
show. We skated his pool. We skated a lot
of rad pools.
Okay, describe your competitive history.
My first contest was Steve's South Bay; I▸
Cool, calm and collecting cash. Eric makes an
ollie to 50/50 rail grind look smooth and easy at
Big Surf in Tempe, AZ.
Opposite Page: Tearing all terrain, Eric looks right
at home in Gonzo's pool ripping a wicked
frontside slash over the death box.
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