Now that the ramp scene in LA is right in his own
backyard, Christian Hosoi is settling into a groove
after a decade of dominating all terrains.
How's the ramp doing?
It's doing really well. The coping needs fixing, but that's all that's wrong
with it.
What's the ryday crew looking like over at the house?
The focals resually Remy Stratton, Eric Dressen, Ray Rocke
Rodriguez, Reategui Salba. Some recent new guys are Bod Boyle Soren
Abby, Mike pussefpor
low is it skating with ose guys?
Nove it when unbelievable skaten some aver and skate my ramp
because it drives me to progress, and we push each other. When there's
someone there thas excited with you, then you get this whole good vibe
that makes you wan in lean and want to make it
What are some of the tricks you've been working on?
A lot kohe one-footed salt. Backside ollie on feated, backside tail
rab one oters, frontside arab one-footers m working on different
tricks that people normally wouldn't see me doing in conte, like slob
airs, fastplant want to cam revert tricks, som practicing the I'd
like to learn ealesh-revert but without everting just ndg
backwards
What's the difference between landing a staleft backwards and
something like a backside or method airo-fakie?
Landing backward takes a lot of body movement, but when you revert
it you just slide into t. Going to revert is a lot easier ha landing'
backwards because you just land it however you want and side it back
in. Landing backwards, you have to position yourself at kas kind of
straight to pull it off.
What do you think is the key to body movement in some of the new
tricks?
It has a lot to do with your arms and hip vot movement. You've got o
be able to switch your hips and then your ms have to be in the right
place or you're going to look ind of sketchy, flowing. You might
make it, but it's not fluid.
Describe your line on the ramp
I drop in on the small side an oll up to grind on the big side, then I
allie down off the big side to the small side, then I ollie up to lipslide.
Those are the fun lines, from low to high, and I like doing frontside rock
and roll slides. Ollie tail grabs, straight up and down frontside is one of
my favorites. Ollie backside tail grabs. But a line would not really be
pulled out unless there's another skater there. I usually work on tricks
when I'm skating alone. I've noticed that whenever I go to skate and
somebody's there, we don't usually work on our old tricks like backside
air, one-footed backside air, airwalk, rocket air, 540-1 don't really bust
out a line like that. I practice singular tricks mostly. I've been getting into
body jars a lot lately. I can do those one-footed and real high. One-
footed judo to tail as high as I can go. So I'm going for a lot of different
tricks than I used to. Ollie tail grabs to fakie and ollies to fakie.
Is this with contest skating in mind?
Some of it's for personal push, like ollie tail grabs straight up and down.
That's something I do for fun, it's not something I would really do in a
contest-unless the ramp felt good to do so, because usually the ramps
aren't like my ramp, so you tend to express different types of maneuvers
in different ways. Like maybe I'll want to do a frontside ollie tail grab
drifting instead of going straight up and down because the ramp is better
for that. Or a backside ollie tail grab is better alley ooping than going
straight up and down on some ramps. But it all depends on the ramp.
You're almost ten years pro now. After all these years do you find that,
no matter what you do, there are some tricks that just don't get
judged as high?
Yeah. I've had that problem many times before, but that's why
skateboarding has changed and that's why I'm doing different maneuvers,
like lip tricks and more technical stuff rather than all blasting airs going
as fast as I can. When guys who are technical do trick to trick to trick, it's
68 THRASHER MACAZINE
all four feet out or below. That is intense in a different way. You're
watching him flip his board around and one footed ollie-to-fakie or
whatever, which is a lot different than say Chris Miller or me or Losi.
Losi has a different style than either of us. lip trick skater and he
does high airs. He's very powerful, tricky, and he's got style, covering all
grounds. It gives him an ra plus. Chris Miller has ways been one of
the top skaters to me he flies, and now he's learned the 540°. In
competion he h tendey to go overbod. Instead of staying a bit
conservative right her he's done his gnarly tricks, he ends to get even
gnarl which is good, when you make it, but rategic. I'm
more conservative skater when I skate competions. Ion't just go
all out There have been times when, because made the oor gotten.
good rst run, go all out on mead run. If happen to make it, it's
an unbelievable run because we just put my energy into it without
thinking about falling, not aring was going to fal It's like ping a
demo or practicing, I can go higher an I wou in a contest because
I'm not worrying about falling. Falling frustrating but ou can't me
yourse, you've got o laugh at it. That's what I do when make those
kinds of mistakes, agh myself. You've got to do to make yourself
come back from it. fke a tumble.
What the daily routine like these days
been ang home, relaxingetting res skang two sessionsay
I been getting up a lo carer. I havent been going out as much, I've
instead of one. I used to go to sleep at four and et up at twelor one,
cat breakast awo. Put on the pad play some pool go out and skate
from abou foto about seven. But now I'm starting to get two sessions.
one to read then four-thirty to six-thirty or seven. It's a lot more
productive. My body is lot more warmed up for the second session.
And I like to eat between skating, which gives me energy.
What is your favorite terrain lately?
e ram at my pad is kind of like my home ground. It's fun, but when
I go somewhere else after riding this for a year, I tend to have more fun
because it's new. But if you took my ramp away, it would be another
story. I've been travelling, so I haven't been able to skate other ramps in
my neighborhood. I never street skate at home because I'm just not
motivated to. I'm not into the new tricks yet, and I do want to get into
street skating, but it's hard. You've got to practice almost every day to be
able to get comfortable with the tricks they're doing. It has a lot to do
with freestyle, so you have to do a lot on the flat ground. And when
we're sitting here blasting over all of these things and going really fast
and high, it's hard to conform to a real technical way. Right now I've
been focusing on vertical.
How about contests?
I don't worry about my contest placings like I used to when I was more
of a rookie. I used to want to be in the top three or five spots to make the
final jam, but now they're doing single jams and it's no big deal. They
finally figured out how to cut the skating better than they used to. Plus,
there are fewer skaters at these vertical contests than there used to be.
Now there are a lot more street skaters, and they're kind of putting
vertical aside. A lot of the guys who are street skating could be good
vertical guys but they lost interest because street skating is a whole other
category of skateboarding.
Do you think that in the long run skaters are eventually drawn back to
vertical? Do you think it will come back around to that?
Of course it will. It's always going to come back around. Because the
excitement is there, the vert skaters will always be there. Street skating is
just another form. A street skater is more urban, more street rat,
underground. He's not the kind of guy who, like a vertical skater, would
go do demos. For little demos street skating is better, but big time
there. I think the competition will be coming back, because the vert
concert shows you need a big vert ramp. Vertical is always going to be
skating is getting so radical these days. I watched Hawk a while ago and
he's doing all kinds of weird tricks. Danny Way is doing some funky new
ones. I think the people who are on mini-ramps and street will eventually
get bored with it and start vert skating.
Who are the new guys who you think are going to be the big
competition now?
Well, the main top guys are the main top guys. They're the strongest
right now. I haven't really seen any new breed of younger (Can be s