Words and photos

by Zach Malfa-Kowalski

I'd been in San Francisco for about a week and a half, waiting for it to stop raining; it’d been pouring almost every day since I'd arrived from LA. Endless hours in the house, sleeping way too much… Basically just waiting for a dry day so we could hit the streets. Finally, a stretch of three nice days came. We hit the warm-up, then headed out to this spot off of California Street. We'd been there the day before and got kicked out almost immediately, so this time we knew we'd have to barge it and try to get the trick super quick.

The crew was Brian, Mike Poore (the filmer), Dustin Eggeling (homie), and me. Dela went to work: 50/50 the ledge once or twice, and then straight to the nosegrind. First try, grinded and almost landed it. Mike and I switched spots (shooting fish-eye) so we could get better angles. Next try, Brian goes for the nosegrind and sticks. The board bounces off the ledge straight into Mike's skull. He must have gotten hit with the axle or kingpin, because it went through his hat and left a pretty large hole in his head—with a decent amount of blood flow.

We all hopped in Mike's car, and Dela sped to the hospital. An hour or two later, Mike appeared from the emergency room with a grin on his face. He’d received seven staples to his dome. We decided to get lunch before Mike drove us back home, figured we'd do something to make up for earlier in the day. After some fish tacos Mike decided his head didn't really hurt much, and he made Brian go back to the spot to get the trick—but this time we shot long-lens…