i think shoes did just suck back then compared to now. wheels were ass. trucks mostly sucked.
even skaters were shit. Carlsberg gap is like a 12-14 stair distance at most (maybe even less than that, i think its actually shorter than the 11 set thats beside it). no one could backside flip that thing for years, it took tons of pros out (jeremy wray bs heelflipped it in the 90s though). surely reynolds, greco, tons of top pros must have been to it... then, my man Chris Lambert handled it, only for it to be buried in Ryan Gallants shared part section of the DC Video.
People started backside flipping HUGE shit after that, Reynolds did Wallenberg, Dee did Hollywood High. tons of other insane ones have went down from tyshawn and sheckler as well. cody mc had some beast ones too. it is actually insane how much better people are now than they were when i started skating when you really think about it. there was just a few guys like daewon that had already sort of figured shit out. there was a MASSIVE skill gap in pro skaters.