Confined Era Contrastial Synapsis
THE LIFE & TIMES OF TOD SWANK
The man (top) and his
current quiver. Chris Johanson and crew
(opposite top) in their sludge buggy. Nose dive
Indy air (opposite middle) in Sweden. Neil Blender
and Chris Miller (opposite bottom) double up. Stretched
invert (above) at Del Mar's infamous keyhole.
It's so weird to think that I've been skate-
boarding for over sixteen unexpected years.
That's over half my life. It sounds like such a
long time, but seems to be only a fraction of
actual actuality. "Tod, I think it's time you
stop skateboarding and become an archi
tect like you said you always wanted to," I
remember my mom demanding after gradu
ating from high school. Fat chance to that to
my unbeknownst self. I have vividly livid
memories of going to Del Mar skatepark
(which, by the way, was scientifically proven
to be the point the entire universal galaxy
was centered upon) and getting my first real
skateboard set-up. I was just tall enough to
rest my chin on the counter as I watched
Grant Brittain drill mounting holes in a cus-
tom homemade board my friend's dad made
(back then a lot of boards came without
mounting holes, and a crazy contraption.
that resembled some kind of torture device
was commonplace at local shops for this pur-
pose). Grant recommended the standard
black tape, but I selfishly wanted "pizza grip"
for better grip, of course. I was then thirteen-
years-old. I knew what I wanted, and I only
wanted the best-nothing less, and no one
could tell me any different. I was the typical
idiot kid that didn't know shit from crap,
including that pizza grip was a hideous form
of griptape that could easily tear huge
chunks of flesh off your body in one fatal
swoop... From that moment on, I remember
I consciously began to discover my own per-
sonal inadequacies and attributes. Also, the
commonly preached farces of a socially cor-
rupt and benign society began to unfold,
choking and gagging upon themselves in
their quest for the destruction of truth and
spirit-this all contrary to my established.
ideas of what was just and right. Skate-
boarding became the active ingredient for
education and experience in my primitive
little life. The beginning of the whole can of
worms unknowingly spilled out before me as
I fakied back and forth for hours and hours
nonstop in the reservoir till my small child
legs were fully exasperated, and the last
glimmers of daylight petered out into night. I
grew up with skateboarding, learning more
than carves and grinds. With my dad far away
In Arizona, and my mom working full-time to
support me and my sister, I truly have come
to believe that skateboarding was the savior
of my wild childhood. A deep and eccentric.
maybe even profound statement. I know, but
what the hell, I'm twenty-nine. I have many-a-
times shuddered at the thought of my life's
direction if skateboarding didn't grasp me in
its clutches and inspire the realities and
distortions of humanity to which so many
are unfortunately deluded. It's funny how
obscure skateboarding is. It's probably better
that way, anyways.
My initiation into skateboarding was begotten
at a skatepark rather than at the local ledge,
curbs or stair sets. Del Mar Skateboard Ranch in
San Diego, California: pools, bowls, banks and a
hundred-foot wide halfpipe with no flat bottom;
cement and more cement; curving, crawling,
ominous and impending-a sea of cardiovascu-
lar contingency. Vertical riding was, at the time,
at the forefront of skateboarding, with street
riding only a slint in the future's dissertations.
This is where I met the friends of my youth.
Friendships, many of which have extended to
this day. Del Mar was home to a contingent of
extraordinary pros of another era and future
eras, alike. I was lucky that fate dealt me such a
golden card. Icon veterans like Billy Ruff, Eric
Grisham, Neil Blender, Allen Losi, Mark "Gator"
Rogowski and the still amazing Steve
Caballero were all commanding the
cement structures like no one before.
The skatepark was also host to many
of today's contemporaries, Tony Hawk
was scrawny and frail, yet was so over-
whelmingly advanced for his time. It
got so far that he was harassed and
ridiculed for his innovative abilities
that are the basis of standards of
today. We all know about Tony--no ifs,
ands or buts about it. Danny Way was
cocky, whiny and ultra-competitive.
and today is one of my most respect-
ed and favorite pro skateboarders. His
command of achievement and ability
to master all terrains so extensively
leave me in utter awe. Then there
were the local bros: the crew that was
there everyday, riding all day and
night, playing games like hand-board
add-on in the Kona shallow end, hav-
ing after-hours padless "toe" jam
contests where the winner won cases
of beer that Dave Swift would snag from Vons,
and endless rituals of malarkey. All different lev
els of ability, yet all friends. Leigh Parkin, Owen
Nieder, Dave Eckles, Dave Swift, Reese Simp-
son, Bruno Herzog, Tom and Sean Donnely, the
Weez, Josh Nelson, Cory Federman, Graeme
Stanners, Adrian Demain plus a host of others-
an endless list that quadruple multiplies when
you add all the temporary, traveling-through
locals. Nor-Cal, Texas, Midwest, East and the
Europeans all made Del Mar their home at one
time or another. Every time I see one of the
many, there is always a feeling of common bond
and appreciation, even more so after all these
years. At one time or another, all the skateboard
scenes from around the world would converge
to this skatepark for a contest. Skateboarders
from all over the world would just show up and
camp in their cars or sleep in the pools, all with
the same objective-to ride and have fun. It was
a dark day when the 'dozers finally rolled
through. Bruno Herzog rode the last runs of one
of the last cement skateparks in the United
States. With 'dozers coming in from all direc
tions, and security (including asshole of the
world, "Mike Not") closing in. I watched Bruno
grind the Kona Bowl for the last time. I remem
ber thinking that day, "What am I gonna do.
now? What is everyone gonna do now?"
Travel, that's what. My skatepark, our
skatepark, now became everywhere and any-
where, with vert still being the focus. We
would go on these crazy trips. Just pile into
someone's car with minimal money (Sponsors)
chipping in? Yeah, right, maybe an extra board
or two, whoa) and go across the country or the
other side of the world to skate a ramp, a pool,
a full pipe or maybe a bank, or, if we were lucky,
a rare deserted cement skatepark. Just traveling
for the sake of going somewhere new to skate
and hang out with friends, sometimes to con-
verge at a given spot for a backyard contest or
jam session. Hotels were usually not in the pic-
ture. And if we were lucky enough to get one, it
was jam-packed with everyone that could fit and
wreaked of pad rot and flagellation fumes.
Sleep was next to impossible with mischief
abounding, unless you wanted to get humor-
ously victimized by drunken calamity. Whether it
was in the next town or on the other side of the.
planet, whenever
you would cross
paths with anoth
er skateboarder,
you would feel at
home. It was just,
"Hey look, there's
another skate-
boarder, cool!"
You would always have floor space to sleep on
and maybe a meal, and a sure session some-
where. I went to Europe three times for two or
three months at a time, riding trains to new
spots and taking in worldly sites. One of the
best places I ever skated in the world was the
Eiffel Tower banks. It was a serious dream spot.
The banks went on forever: different sizes and
shapes of hips and bowls that you carve and
ollie with endless abandon. And the beautiful
French la femme fatales all around; warm sum
mer sun rays mingling with the mega-metal-