been skating pools with Dun-
can, Presley (B.P.) and Pickett
for 10 years. We grew up as
typical skater kids (for the
day), studying mags, skating
and surfing Duncan skated
with the TRT Boys (Tierra-
Clockwise from Above: Pineapple
gets tubed at School W. Stale or bail,
McGill hooks a big one at his park (a
former catfish farm). No stranger to
North County, Upland boy Chris
Strople strokes the Avo bowl. Original
razor Owen Nieder on the edge at
Ground Zero Plank to bank, Chris
Cochran at the VA hospital. Mario
Rubalcaba and Mark Hostetter sam
ple a ditch near the Mexican border
santa Rocker Team). They
even had TRT membership)
cards with pictures. He came to my quarter-
pipe and tore grinds and did long nose i
wheelies down the street. He was skating
with Santee's finest at the time: Pat Hood,
Jeff Howe, Mario Z. Anderson, Scott Staf
ford. That was definitely a turning point.
Skating was going through all these
changes at that time, 79-80. There were a
couple of slow points back then, but we
always skated. All through high school we
had our spots. Mike's blue ramp, Pickett's
ramp, Lakeside Rez, Jamul Pool, Char Bowl,
Insurance Pool, Spring Valley, Lamesa.
Oasis, Moving On, El Cajon, Lemon Grove.
Ditch, Frog-Bowl and Black Bottom, to name
a few. And, of course, Tidy Bowl, the pool
a lot of people started in. We started calling
our clan FrogTown. There were all the S.D.
pro's around Pineapple, Andrecht, Cathey,
Gosnell whoever-but we knew who really
influenced us: Dogtown. The harsh side with
style. My main influences were Adams, Alva,
both Hacketts, Muir, Lake, etc. We were into
being FrogTown. I always knew pools were
the baddest and best things to skate. Jay
is my favorite influence of all, but as far as
other ones: Tatum, Buttons, Kong and W.
Lynch on the surf side. We started just
following the rise of skateboarding again and
had the terrain to ride. Con-
nections are everything.
Other people can ride all
the ramps and we'll stay
happy riding the pools, plus
anything else that comest
along. There are rad
skaters in San Diego-it
has produced greats. I
wouldn't want to live.
anywhere else, really. You
could say the scene is alive
and well. Things do change
fast, but you get the picture.
The current rippers in San
Diego pools are B.P., Quinn, Ruel, Duncan,
Joe, Jodie, Guf, Cherry, Halliday, Hostetter,
Pickett, Hasler, Randy. Partain and a list
of unknowns.
HENRY HESTER
The early slalom and racing at LaCosta
days were great. We'd go up and everyone
would chip in five dollars. Well, it was five
dollars at first, then it changed to three
dollars after we started winning all the
money. We'd get about fifty dollars in the
jackpot. Thirty would go the first place guy,
twenty to the second place or whatever. We'd
all take a couple runs on the slalom course.
To us that was full pro. Winning money at
LaCosta was a lot more prestigious than win-
ning money at Long Beach arena. Winning)
money at Long Beach was pretty cool, but
to win a Sunday at LaCosta, you had to be
skating. You were going against everyone
who was good and you had to be skating
pretty fast. The same thing held for Long
Beach, but everyone was used to LaCosta
and everyone had familiar turf there.
You always had the Logan guys hanging
around. They didn't race a lot of slalom. You
had some of the freestyle guys hanging
around at the top of the hill-Steve Cathey,
Pineapple. Those guys wouldn't take very
many slalom runs, if any. It was sort of a
group thing where everyone would hang out
You know how skaters like to get together
There's still a lot of hanging, incidents and
skating that goes unnoticed in San Diego