running into pros

[silhouette]

I already mentioned this years ago but Pontus Alv rules. I met him at Ultrabowl in 2012 when In search of the miraculous was still recent video and polar was starting and it was the OG team which I preferred.
I had a friend shooting a photo of me with him. Then me and my friends went home (Monty Burns appartment lol) and watched that video again, it was their first time and they were mindblown. We wanted to get physical copies so we mailed him, he gave us his mobile and we went to the polar HQ. It was crazy going there, he showed us some clips from a recent gothenburg trip that were going to the edits he did after. We thanked and said goodbye and went to ICA to buy some food. As we were eating chicken outside of the store he saw us while driving his OG turquoise VW polo/golf and waved at us and honked. We replied 'oh yeah oh yeah oh yeeeah'. I know it's nothing special but it was so fucking sick for us.

Edit: I want to smoke pot and listen to 67 with Lucien Clarke once in my life. He's the boss.

i met pontus in malmo around the same time frame too. super rad dude, he was still running polar out of his apartment when i did though. long story short i had just been buying bulks of his artwork (photo prints, his hellozine book 'social structures for the asocial type', the in search of the miraculous deck... etc.) through his old in search of the miraculous website as a way to say thanks for finally completing & releasing a sequel to the strongest of the strange (my favorite video ever at the time - although i really didn't feel like in search of the miraculous was as spontaneous, authentic & magical). eventually i told him i was going to copenhagen for a few days with my girlfriend and he told me we should meet up. girlfriend & i ended up staying in malmo for 3 days and he was super chill the whole time. drove us around, took us to indian restaurants, bars, smoothie places - we even went to some fancy 5-star hotel just to order cheap beers from their bar because apparently, that was a joke he liked to pull. kept doodling shit on little notes the whole time and giving them to us saying 'this is money'. had coffee at his place with his girlfriend's collection of headless dolls sitting on the heater and that patio he had built himself, we discussed many things skating from DIY to old videos etc. he had like 3 copies of minuit laying around. he also brought us to bryggeriet, and we went on a street session around malmo with nils svensson (i filmed the no-comply lipslide pontus did at TBS that he shot, pontus sold the print of it on his site for a while, i actually ended up buying one later), and oski when he was still 'little oski' and pontus was still mentoring him. also went to the then-unskatable steppe side. i had a brand new complete i had just bought in copenhagen and couldn't adjust to the trucks so my skating sucked the whole time. pontus also tried to have me film lines of him fisheye with his vx at TBS but gave up on the idea ten minutes later because it didn't look the way he intended and i was 'shaky as fuck'.

recently got to catch up with him over facetime to interview him for a french mag. was rad getting in touch again because we hadn't talked much ever since polar became so legit (and time-consuming). we ended up shooting the shit about old videos again, european pros from the early 90's and the movie thrashin' / skate gang. 200% passion-driven skate rat

[shit_for_brains]

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I was at a wedding when Jamie Thomas jumped off of a patio in my direction and I had a few seconds to decide whether to catch him, possibly risking my internet career, or let him fall and possibly risk his skate career. I kind of caught him.

[close]

Who are you, dude? You grow up skating with Ryan Nix and Danny Renaud. At a party, Bobby Puleo fucks your girlfriend. Now, you go to the same weddings as Jaime Thomas. Your whole life is a revolving door of encounters with pro skaters.

What's next? Nate Broussard is gonna pull up in his UPS truck and deliver a package to your apartment?

Tried. He tried to fuck my girlfriend. I'm just a super cool man of mystery there's no reason to be upset about it.

[Makaveli]

Expand Quote

Expand Quote

I was at a wedding when Jamie Thomas jumped off of a patio in my direction and I had a few seconds to decide whether to catch him, possibly risking my internet career, or let him fall and possibly risk his skate career. I kind of caught him.

[close]

Who are you, dude? You grow up skating with Ryan Nix and Danny Renaud. At a party, Bobby Puleo fucks your girlfriend. Now, you go to the same weddings as Jaime Thomas. Your whole life is a revolving door of encounters with pro skaters.

What's next? Nate Broussard is gonna pull up in his UPS truck and deliver a package to your apartment?

[close]

Tried. He tried to fuck my girlfriend. I'm just a super cool man of mystery there's no reason to be upset about it.

I'm not upset, I think you're tight, dude.

[shit_for_brains]

Expand Quote

Expand Quote

Expand Quote

I was at a wedding when Jamie Thomas jumped off of a patio in my direction and I had a few seconds to decide whether to catch him, possibly risking my internet career, or let him fall and possibly risk his skate career. I kind of caught him.

[close]

Who are you, dude? You grow up skating with Ryan Nix and Danny Renaud. At a party, Bobby Puleo fucks your girlfriend. Now, you go to the same weddings as Jaime Thomas. Your whole life is a revolving door of encounters with pro skaters.

What's next? Nate Broussard is gonna pull up in his UPS truck and deliver a package to your apartment?

[close]

Tried. He tried to fuck my girlfriend. I'm just a super cool man of mystery there's no reason to be upset about it.

[close]

I'm not upset, I think you're tight, dude.

Aw hey I think you're tight too.

[Mark Renton]

Expand Quote

I was at a wedding when Jamie Thomas jumped off of a patio in my direction and I had a few seconds to decide whether to catch him, possibly risking my internet career, or let him fall and possibly risk his skate career. I kind of caught him.

[close]

Who are you, dude? You grow up skating with Ryan Nix and Danny Renaud. At a party, Bobby Puleo fucks your girlfriend. Now, you go to the same weddings as Jaime Thomas. Your whole life is a revolving door of encounters with pro skaters.

What's next? Nate Broussard is gonna pull up in his UPS truck and deliver a package to your apartment?

Popping molly with Sinner at Coachella?
SoundCloud rap with J Rogers?
Butt chug with Jaws?
Jail time with Andy Roy?

There's a bunch of fun ones.

[Jza]

Seen a few heads at Burnside around 02-03 ish; like the Grind King team or somethin lol. Met Matt Beach at the Portland waterfront. There was a demo goin on and he kept trying a dark slide.

[Mark Renton]

I'm at the E&A because I stepped on a nail at work so here's my pic with Pontus.
Also, major shoutout to Monty Burns for hosting 3 complete strangers at his house for 2 weeks, with only me being the one he known (only here on slap). Gnar him if you see his posts, nicest guy, I reminisce the most about this trip. Happy days.

[SamW]

I've seen Dan Lu, Jon Dickson, Blake Carpenter, Squints, Marc Johnson, Rick Howard, Ryan Reyes, David Gravette, Antwuan Dixon, Lizard King, Ed Templeton, and Jamie Thomas at skateparks by my house.

There's a few more but those are the ones i can remember.

[Nosferatu]

I've seen Dan Lu, Jon Dickson, Blake Carpenter, Squints, Marc Johnson, Rick Howard, Ryan Reyes, David Gravette, Antwuan Dixon, Lizard King, Ed Templeton, and Jamie Thomas at skateparks by my house.

There's a few more but those are the ones i can remember.

Thanks for taking the time to create an account for this.

[Affirmative Axion]

Late 90's to mid/late 2000's; pretty sure I am missing a few:

- Danny Castillo with his girlfriend at Six Flags.

- Warner Ave crew at HB High a few times; on one occasion was skating the manual pads inside the school when Rowley showed up to skate them by himself.

- Vans Park sightings: Anthony Carney, Patrick Melcher, talked to a photographer shooting someone in the combi pool; turned out to be Theo Hand.

- Arto at Mother's Kitchen. I was looking down and saw black eS accels with white paint spots and was not surprised to see that it was him.

- Tom Penny and his wife at Best Buy.

- Chet Thomas at his shop, Aftermath. They had several locations over the years but the first one was right next to Murdy park.

- Lance Mountain filming the intro/outro to 411VM 44 at the mall. The filmer pointed the camera at me since they saw me watching but I didn't make the final cut. Also saw Lance and Rodrigo TX at Carl's Jr.

- Jonas Wray at a bar in downtown HB.

- Dave Bachinsky while he was staying with a filmer from Maine that went to my college.


In terms of recent sightings (within the last few years):

- Rowley at a firing range in HB.

- Muska held the door for me while he was leaving / I was entering Real Food Daily in LA. Also saw Steve-O eating there once.

- Fairfax sightings: Scott Johnston, Tino, Thom Yorke with his son at the Diamond store

- I thought I had ran into Atiba in West Hollywood, but it was his brother Ako.

- Dill outside of his usual coffee spot on Fairfax. Talked a bit about his OC days and old spots, namely the Mile Square ledges where he had an opening line in a 411 chaos that he obviously didn't remember but I brought up anyways.

[planman]

Talked to Dan Lu and Gilbert Crockett tonight at House of Vans. Daniel really is as nice as everyone said he is, even said he liked my shirt (I was wearing my Toy Machine shirt). Gilbert was cool as well, told him I was a big fan of his Life Splicing part and shit. Chaz Ortiz also showed up and laid waste to the mini ramp. Saw a lot of the rest of Vans team too but didn't talk to them unfortunately.

[Silent Bob.]

I'm old now, started skating in a time when there weren't so many skaters and you got hassle in the street for skating. There was no money in it, few parks and "known" spots but the streets were ours - no skatestoppers or public awareness. Because of this skaters from all over pretty much just got along (with a few exceptions) regardless of how good anyone was - loving skating was a common bond. So I've plenty of stories from back in the day.

Penny was a little skate rat from the next town when I first met him. He was good friends with my friend- they would skate all day then sleep in dumpsters behind clothing shops at night to start again the next day. Seeing them made me immediately realise skating would just be a fun thing for me - I would never get close to being as naturally good as either of them. So many stories- I remember once we were in danger of
Missing our last train home - he told us to wait and came back with a stolen bike for each of us so we
Could make the train. He always hated one of my friends because he once stole his sweets

Did a trip round Europe with Tas and Renton. Both were nice but Tas was probably the most intense person I've ever met. Renton (Miller) is a straight up great guy. So chilled but so talented.

Same trip (I think) Anthony Claravelle had all his gear in the back of my friends car (ended up being 411 Europe footy) my friends had a massive bust up and the friend with the car and all our stuff disappeared. This was before mobile phones so we couldn't just call him. We ended up winging it sneaking from Germany to Holland with no money or passports on a train. Poor Anthony was understandably losing it. We ended up randomly going to the big skatepark in (?) Utrecht and after a day my friend totally randomly shows up. 411 saved!

Was lucky enough to skate Bristol a lot when that scene was blowing up - so much innovation there; we didn't realise at the time. There are lots of pros from around there- every one of them are nice, chilled, good people. Some of the best times of my life.

Lived near Marseille for a while and first saw Bastien when he was tiny and ripping. Then bumped into him years later in his home town and spent the day chilling with him and filming him a bit. Massive ego (he was hated on a bit for that) but he was unbelievably good. He was straight clowning Penny even back then for reasons I won't go into but are more obvious now

Saw Pat Duffy at Marseilles bowl in 94 when he was a straight legend. A lot of other pros were cool guying it but he came over chatted a bit all friendly then rolled off and 360 flipped into the bowl. Just cemented his legend status in my eyes

Been (understandably) told off by Tony Hawk for smoking out on the deck of Dortmund vert ramp at the comp, but he didn't dare stop Sheffey's bong session!!

Had Omar Hassan and Jesse Fritch in the back of our car being such arrogant dicks we kicked them out on some random German street

Chilled with Javier sometimes- cool as and the best ledge skater I've ever seen.

Many, many more - almost all positive experiences of good people sharing a love for skating
 

[corto]

He was straight clowning Penny even back then for reasons I won't go into but are more obvious now

Please elaborate

[Silent Bob.]

I won't cross the line into personal stuff, not my place. Some of Penny's well known issues were already starting to surface and affecting his skating. Bastien was very young, competitive and cocky. We asked after Tom as we knew him back in the day and bastien had just about got on flip. B wasn't particularly complimentary

[corto]

Ah okay, thanks. I think I can guess what you are referring to. That stuff has always been an integral part of Penny.

[Stu]

Was couch surfing with a mate in Chicago who happened to be dating the sister of Berra's partner/kid's mum. Met up with them at Shake and Shack briefly, because my mate knows I skate and got a burger with Berra, Dompierre, Dashawn Jordan and Alex Midler. Dashawn was tight and surprisingly down to joke with a random third wheel. Pretty surreal as an Australian to casually encounter three and a half big names like that, not through skating, especially those ones.

[natenola forever]

went to pick up a friend from DC that now lives in new orleans for a trip to Houston, he tells me he'll be ready in a second cuz his friend Bob crashed at his house last night and he was loading all his gear on his bike to meet us in Houston, his friend walks out the house while im waiting and its Bobby Worrest.

[wheelies]

No, but a homie lives across the street from 9th wonder, I seen murph sometimes and served mike éclair a bagel. Plus I met the local weather channel guy, dudes cool.

[Esquivel]

Expand Quote

Expand Quote

I was at a wedding when Jamie Thomas jumped off of a patio in my direction and I had a few seconds to decide whether to catch him, possibly risking my internet career, or let him fall and possibly risk his skate career. I kind of caught him.

[close]

Who are you, dude? You grow up skating with Ryan Nix and Danny Renaud. At a party, Bobby Puleo fucks your girlfriend. Now, you go to the same weddings as Jaime Thomas. Your whole life is a revolving door of encounters with pro skaters.

What's next? Nate Broussard is gonna pull up in his UPS truck and deliver a package to your apartment?

[close]

Popping molly with Sinner at Coachella?
SoundCloud rap with J Rogers?
Butt chug with Jaws?
Jail time with Andy Roy?

There's a bunch of fun ones.

prawn hunting with SP

[hartpijn]

Was skating alone around Tribeca on a family trip to NYC and ran into Wade and Dane Vaughn. They were filming for the Quartersnacks collab vid a couple years ago. Had a little chat with Wade and after they were done at the spot he asked me if i wanted to join the sesh. Had nothing to do so I ended up skating with them for the entire day. Also saw Cyrus at blubba and said hi but he didn't respond.

Not a pro but I saw Glen Fox at the train station in Rotterdam with a girl. I was just drinking a coffee by myself and he came up to me and introduced himself. Ended up exchanging phone numbers and went skating a couple weeks after.

Oh and at the latest Bombaklats premiere a friend of Daan van der Linden asked if i'd borrow him my board to let Daan do a fucked up drop in. He was wasted tho and kept on rambling about getting kicked out and needing a ride home.

[Cuban_Lynx]

Talked to Dan Lu and Gilbert Crockett tonight at House of Vans. Daniel really is as nice as everyone said he is, even said he liked my shirt (I was wearing my Toy Machine shirt). Gilbert was cool as well, told him I was a big fan of his Life Splicing part and shit. Chaz Ortiz also showed up and laid waste to the mini ramp. Saw a lot of the rest of Vans team too but didn't talk to them unfortunately.

Shit. I wanted to go, I live right around the corner. Wife's out of town so I was stuck home with our little kids. :-(

[SodaJerk]

Was skating alone around Tribeca on a family trip to NYC and ran into Wade and Dane Vaughn. They were filming for the Quartersnacks collab vid a couple years ago. Had a little chat with Wade and after they were done at the spot he asked me if i wanted to join the sesh. Had nothing to do so I ended up skating with them for the entire day. Also saw Cyrus at blubba and said hi but he didn't respond.

Not a pro but I saw Glen Fox at the train station in Rotterdam with a girl. I was just drinking a coffee by myself and he came up to me and introduced himself. Ended up exchanging phone numbers and went skating a couple weeks after.

Oh and at the latest Bombaklats premiere a friend of Daan van der Linden asked if i'd borrow him my board to let Daan do a fucked up drop in. He was wasted tho and kept on rambling about getting kicked out and needing a ride home.

I can only imagine they would become a fire hazard later that day with Glen aggressively dry humping her the way he skates.

[Nora9]

i sucked chris coles dicc

[Nora9]

and yes the rumors are true

[SodaJerk]

and yes the rumors are true

It's shaped like this?

[Nora9]

no almost as big tho

[wheelies]

no almost as big tho

If you post your vaginis or weenis or boipussy with slap on in sharpie I will 2

I'm back on dem bars yer fuckin faggits step up POOHSAY!

[Maggie]

I think I saw Reynolds at the Ft. Lauderdale airport back in 2002, I was so fascinated by his gear, probably the first pro I had ever encountered, he had black hair and was wearing some sort of army surplus jacket.. went to Island water sports and bought a mike Carroll deck and some autobahn wheels, one of the worst boards I've skated, was probably too big, I was  13 at the time, they gave me a copy of their most recent shop video 'scumbag'

[wheelies]

ya Geoff Rowley asked me a question 3 times when I was younlike 8, he asked the same question 3 times. I just said yes the third time cause I couldn't understand  his fuckin accent

[Vert Reynolds]

I once saw Chris Miller at Wahoo's....He's a little dood. best Vert Style.
I also ran into Justin Strubing at Delerium in SF...I was drunk 7 gave him props, he was busy with a Bird & gave me a weird look.

My Claim to Fame, Back in the mid to late 90's we were in with the Firm because K. Gruber was in our SK8 crew. He drove me & my homie to a CASL Contest in Temecula & we sk8ed and hung out with Lance, Ray Barbee & the rest of the Firm Team. I felt cool because everyone was obviously looking at them. I felt like I was Pro for a Day. they were there because Weston Correa was entering the Factory Division. Prolly aroudn 94-95-ish. James Craig, JP Jadeed, Joey Brezinski were in the same Shop Sponsored Class as me.