O.D.G.

What we have here is Dylan Gardner with a beastly kickflip over a handrail in Southern California (Ventura High School I believe). I went to High School with Dylan in Santa Barbara and just recall seeing him skating around, always ahead of the game.

After reading the recent Sal Barbier Interview on the Chrome Ball Incident, (which is fantastic by the way), and also perusing the recent Thrasher Magazine article  on skateboarding in the Olympics, I became curious as to what the proposed format is going to be like. Being that there have historically been many different competitive formats in skateboarding's long history (street, vert, mega ramp, luge, freestyle, etc. etc.), I couldn't help but be curious. After pondering the different possibilities I was able to track down someone from the International Olympic Committee (IOC)  who had some answers. First how did the International Olympic Committee (IOC) come to the decision to include skateboarding? Was it someone on the committee who proposed it or if it was brought forth by a third party? The addition of Skateboarding to the Olympic programme in the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 resulted from an 18-month process called the OCOG Proposal, where the host city (in th...

  Repost from.. I don't know, few years ago I guess. Early Cardiel stuff really had an impact on me. Dude just went for it so hard.  Crazy that I live in the same town as him now and have come across him a few times.. My buddy that I go skate with all the time did physical therapy with him after being shot head in the head twice (yes, you read that correctly). Trip out on that..

All of the Election controversy reminded me of another recent upset. The highly contested passing over of Guy Mariano for David Gonzalez as S.O.T.Y. I saw this recently which was a reminder of how much great footage Guy put out in recent years. Have there been any new developments in the board company him and Eric have been working on? I haven't heard anything.. also, vert is dead has some great retro girl/chocolate stuff going on right now. Check it out .

Feeling a bit heavy after that last post... so taking a slight detour. Great flick of the legendary Tom Penny by the equally talented Arto Saari. And Alex Olson...well, not quite sure what to say about this ollie. It doesn't make sense how someone could be capable of ollieing that high.  Hopefully I will have the chance to go skate this weekend. My friend from Brazil Dan is in town. Such a character.. apparently he's been working on a fishing boat in Alaska for the last few months. He calls me up put of the blue and first thing he says is "hey, do you have socks and a shoestring I can borrow?" I meet him at the skatepark, he's in borrowed clothes, board, and shoes.. and it's apparent that he hasn't lost a step in what he's able to do on a skateboard. Nice ,(but also intimidating), to be around someone so talented, it pushes you to try harder. 

  Man, this sucks.. . RIP Dylan

  Another vert skater that I don't know too much about.. Ray seemed to come into the spotlight as street was becoming more popular in the very early 90's. This is one of only two Powell Peralta pro model boards that I am aware of that he had. I always found the religious symbolism intriguing. RIP..