Speaker 1: Welcome to you Stuff you should know from house stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Speaker 1: Josh Clark and Charles W. Chuck Bryant's with me, so
Speaker 1: stuff you should know. And Jerry of course is here,
Speaker 1: who just celebrated a birthday. Yeah, happy birthday, Jerry in
Speaker 1: Valentine's Day. Run our Indian sweat lodge that we call
Speaker 1: a recording booth. Yeah, man, that's hot. Yeah. Part of
Speaker 1: it's this thing. You want to turn this off, just
Speaker 1: this It really does put out a tremendous amount of heat. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Josh's we have a lamp on our table that we
Speaker 1: used to see. Well we can't see any longer. Oh
Speaker 1: well blin'd blind. Yeah, that did make it like three
Speaker 1: cooler immediately. Yeah, it's that lamp. It's the lamp. And
Speaker 1: then like you know, just people generating heating here. Yeah,
Speaker 1: podcasters were a ball me bunch, the blusters, a herd
Speaker 1: of oxen in the corner. And it doesn't help. It's
Speaker 1: been the best intro ever I think. Do you think that?
Speaker 1: I think so you're not being facetious. No, you know
Speaker 1: the word facetious. What do you got for me? Well,
Speaker 1: when I was younger, I knew the word facetious. It
Speaker 1: was a word that my dad used a lot, so
Speaker 1: I used it in like regular conversation correct yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: but I've never seen it written out, or so I thought.
Speaker 1: And then finally one day I ran across in a
Speaker 1: book again this word I kept coming up on, and
Speaker 1: I was like, what is that word fastidious? Facidious, facious?
Speaker 1: And I was like, that's facetious. I don't know that
Speaker 1: I've seen it spelled either. Yeah, it looks like factious,
Speaker 1: you know, it looks like facet like a facet of
Speaker 1: a jewel or something. And then E s I O
Speaker 1: U S. Yeah, there's no I would have so bombed
Speaker 1: the spelling of that, right. But the thing is, it's
Speaker 1: like I was using it correctly in conversation, and I
Speaker 1: had seen it in books. I just never put the
Speaker 1: two together until finally one day it clicked and you
Speaker 1: had to get your tattoo changed. Facetious across the back
Speaker 1: of your neck in the heart, all right. So um skateboarding. Yeah,
Speaker 1: about the same time that I realized the word facetious
Speaker 1: when it was correctly spelled, as I was skateboarding at
Speaker 1: the time. So that's how it ties in that was
Speaker 1: a little skateboarder for a long time. Yeah, I was too.
Speaker 1: I Um, I did not. I'm not old enough to
Speaker 1: where I saw all the different waves of skateboarding. Of
Speaker 1: the four, but the first two I saw, I didn't
Speaker 1: see the first one. That's pretty funny. That would mean
Speaker 1: I'm dead now. There's plenty of old boarders out there, sure, yeah,
Speaker 1: but I was of the age where I definitely had
Speaker 1: the um small sort of plastic board with the single
Speaker 1: little tail on the back only and clay wheels. No, no, yeah,
Speaker 1: clay wheels. It seems to me like that the skateboards
Speaker 1: from from biblical times. Clay wheels. That's what I think
Speaker 1: of when I see clay wheels. What do they even
Speaker 1: look like? Uh? Just brown? Were they super dangerous? Well? Yeah,
Speaker 1: And if you've seen the great documentary um Dogtown and
Speaker 1: z Boys they go over. It's a really good doc
Speaker 1: by the way, like amazing footage that they have and
Speaker 1: good music and highly recommended over the movie version. The
Speaker 1: Lords of Dogtown was Val Kilmer in that, No, Heath
Speaker 1: Ledger was. He played the the mentor. I can't remember
Speaker 1: his name. Skip the Zephyr Crew, yes, skip skip Skip
Speaker 1: went on to found Santa Monic Airline Skateboards. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: he was. He stayed on. It's like a big influence
Speaker 1: in skateboarding's good. So anyway, I just wanted to point
Speaker 1: out that I have branched a few different Like I
Speaker 1: started with a little clay one, and then in high
Speaker 1: school is when I got the big, huge fat skateboard
Speaker 1: when they were super obnoxious. Yeah, let's see, that's when
Speaker 1: I came into skating. Four had like a nice Lance Mountain. Um,
Speaker 1: it was my first board. My first board, remember the
Speaker 1: Nash tough tops there was it was blank on the bottom,
Speaker 1: there were no graphics, but on the top cut out
Speaker 1: in the grip tape was like a star that looked
Speaker 1: kind of like a saw blade circular saw blade. And
Speaker 1: then the big difference was the different colors of the
Speaker 1: board underneath blue or pink or yellow or what it
Speaker 1: was like neon green. Yeah, you're a big fat one.
Speaker 1: Yeah and looking back like kind of corny. And I
Speaker 1: think after that is when like true skater started being like,
Speaker 1: you know, we don't really care that much about like
Speaker 1: awesome graphics, Like we just want a good board, good board.
Speaker 1: You wanted some rib bones, on the side. You remember
Speaker 1: those underneath. Yeah, yeah, but I don't think people like
Speaker 1: those now either. Oh no, not anymore skaters. No, that
Speaker 1: that the whole point of those. I think it was,
Speaker 1: you know, to let you rail slide or whatever easier.
Speaker 1: But I think it was also to protect those graphics too.
Speaker 1: They told he was because I had a little big
Speaker 1: plastic bumper under the tailpiece too, which is counterintuitive to
Speaker 1: the tricks. Yeah, but I mean, like, who cares about
Speaker 1: protecting the tail It's weird. Yeah. I was also a
Speaker 1: nosebone too. That was not never very good. Oh I
Speaker 1: wasn't either. I don't mean to give that. I mean
Speaker 1: I spent a lot of our skating and I never
Speaker 1: got very good. I think I pulled off one kick
Speaker 1: flip once, really once. That's good. I thought it was
Speaker 1: pretty good too. That is the trick that you most
Speaker 1: often see kids not landing driving down the street. If
Speaker 1: you ever see a kid like I, rarely see a
Speaker 1: successful kickflip just on the sidewalk. Oh yeah. If you
Speaker 1: see somebody who pulls off a kick flip, the chances
Speaker 1: are there somebody filming them because they know that they're
Speaker 1: going to be able to pull off the kickflip in
Speaker 1: l A. Actually I would see more, you know, obviously
Speaker 1: better skaters out there in New York. Yeah, all right, skateboarding.
Speaker 1: Should we get going with a little history. Yeah, let's
Speaker 1: talk about the history of this. This this is so
Speaker 1: close to my heart. Man, I fell down the rabbit
Speaker 1: hole to day watching like old skate videos and like
Speaker 1: checking out old Powell Peralta boards. That was my dam
Speaker 1: was Powell. Well, we mentioned that there have been four
Speaker 1: distinct waves of skateboarding starting in UH ninety nine, and
Speaker 1: each new wave like it's it's just waned in popularity
Speaker 1: here and there and then come back strong or in
Speaker 1: stronger due to either UH advances mainly in like skateboard
Speaker 1: technology right and trickery, yes, and um parental acceptance. Because
Speaker 1: it never really goes away. Skateboarding is either ever since
Speaker 1: its inception, it's either been mainstream or else forced underground
Speaker 1: and like practiced by juvenile delinquents who kind of kept
Speaker 1: it going and advanced it quietly until it came back
Speaker 1: into the mainstream and parents were like, Okay, you guys
Speaker 1: can skate again. But the true origin of the skateboard,
Speaker 1: the first one that came out, the first commercial produced
Speaker 1: when it was in nineteen fifty nine. It's called the
Speaker 1: roller derbry skate. Yeah. And before that, you know, if
Speaker 1: you've seen the movie Back to the Future when Martin
Speaker 1: might Fly rips the little milk crate off the front
Speaker 1: of the homemade wooden scooter, that was where skateboards really
Speaker 1: came from. You just you know, it was a sort
Speaker 1: of a homemade deal with like a peach crate as
Speaker 1: the front of your scooter, a couple of handles. Yes,
Speaker 1: steal wheels from roller skates, yeah, and that was super dangerous, right,
Speaker 1: But like you say, if you take the peach crate
Speaker 1: off and take the handles off, you have that two
Speaker 1: by four with the roller skate wheels. And they don't
Speaker 1: know exactly who did it. They think actually several people
Speaker 1: probably did it simultaneously Marty right in the forties. They
Speaker 1: think surfers in California did it. There are kids in
Speaker 1: France that were seen doing it in the forties, so
Speaker 1: it kind of spread. It happened, it arose independently around
Speaker 1: the world at about the same time. That's called the zeitgeist.
Speaker 1: That is my friend. So now we're in the nineties,
Speaker 1: early nineteen sixties and it was I mean it really
Speaker 1: took off like a rocket in the first few years
Speaker 1: of the nineteen sixties. Like fifty million skateboards were sold
Speaker 1: in those first three years and it was everywhere. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was like the hot new craze. Well it was
Speaker 1: like also like hula hoops and things like that, Like
Speaker 1: it was America was in a crazy mood, a craze mood,
Speaker 1: like whatever the big thing was, Yeah, and skateboard fell
Speaker 1: into that big time. The problem is, uh, they were
Speaker 1: pretty dangerous. There wasn't a lot you could do with
Speaker 1: them now they because again there's steel wheels there. It's
Speaker 1: basically two by four on steel wheels, ride down the
Speaker 1: street and you could fall off of it exactly. That
Speaker 1: was so and I think because of the safety concerns
Speaker 1: overnight skateboarding just went away in like nineteen sixty five.
Speaker 1: It was over, but it's still kind of stayed somewhat
Speaker 1: popular as a thing to do among surfers. When the
Speaker 1: waves weren't breaking, Um, they would just kind of sidewalk
Speaker 1: surface what they called it, And they never really saw
Speaker 1: it as anything bigger than a supplement to surfing. It
Speaker 1: was just kind of like it wasn't its own thing
Speaker 1: until uh the sixties, the late sixties or the early seventies,
Speaker 1: when clay wheels came about. You could do a little
Speaker 1: more stuff. I think, Well, clay was better than the
Speaker 1: steel wheels, but still bad. And that's hit a rock
Speaker 1: in the road your toast, and like that's when people
Speaker 1: started dying from skateboards, which kind of led to its
Speaker 1: decline again. Sure, and then some surfers, the Zephyr Crew
Speaker 1: are the ones who like broke skateboarding out once and
Speaker 1: for all. Well, yeah, thanks to uh Frank Nasworthy's invention
Speaker 1: of the Eurothane wheel in nineteen seventy two. Uh he
Speaker 1: founded Cadillac Wheels, and all of a sudden, it was
Speaker 1: like a smooth, like steady, silent experience on a skateboard
Speaker 1: for the first time. And then you changed everything it
Speaker 1: did because it could grip. Um, it wasn't just that
Speaker 1: it was it rumbly any longer like that. You're a
Speaker 1: thing could grip like concrete or pavement. Yeah, instead of
Speaker 1: just stopping and um, yeah, all of a sudden, there
Speaker 1: were way more surfaces that could be skated. And that
Speaker 1: plus the invention of the truck, yeah, which is basically
Speaker 1: an axle for your wheels that not only allows the
Speaker 1: wheels to revolve more smoothly, especially when you add a
Speaker 1: set of bearings, but it also allows you to maneuver
Speaker 1: to the left or the right, which is a big deal.
Speaker 1: Kind of opens things up there, twisty. And then the
Speaker 1: kicktail also changed everything. All these kind of came together
Speaker 1: at about the same time. Yeah, and you mentioned the
Speaker 1: Zephyr Crew in ve that held the first um uh
Speaker 1: basically competition in Delmark, California, and that's when and if
Speaker 1: you've seen the documentary, it's pretty great. I mean they
Speaker 1: had sort of the holdovers from the sixties doing like
Speaker 1: handstands and all these sort of square, antiquated moves, and
Speaker 1: then these little punks came in there and just like
Speaker 1: toward the place up and like the judges didn't know
Speaker 1: how to judge them at the time because they've never
Speaker 1: seen anything like it. Yeah, it's pretty cool. It was
Speaker 1: a pool. They were skating in pools right well at least, Yeah,
Speaker 1: the pool thing came a little later because they um
Speaker 1: there was a big drought in the mid seventies in
Speaker 1: southern California and water was actually in short supply. So
Speaker 1: people would drain their pools or not refill them or
Speaker 1: whatever for the new summer. And so they started busting
Speaker 1: in the backyards and skating in pools. Yeah, and they
Speaker 1: would bring their own pumps and hoses to drain like
Speaker 1: all the muck out entirely and then just like skate
Speaker 1: that pool. And there was um at one of those pools,
Speaker 1: a kid named Tony Alva who was in that Zephyr crew.
Speaker 1: It was Tony Alva, j Adams, and Stacy Perelta, yeah,
Speaker 1: among others. Right, but those are like the big three.
Speaker 1: Tony I was your guy, right, Stacy Perelta, Oh, I
Speaker 1: thought you were like a huge Tony Alba dude. Okay, No,
Speaker 1: I respect for Tony album, but no, I was always
Speaker 1: pal par Alta. Um. But Tony Alva at one of
Speaker 1: those pools kept going and going and pushing himself harder
Speaker 1: and harder, and then one day he cleared the coping
Speaker 1: of the pool and like caught air, yeah with his
Speaker 1: hand at first, Oh, he did like a hand plant. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was how that originally came about. But he did
Speaker 1: leave contact with the pool, and no one had ever
Speaker 1: done that, and everyone's like, and that was like the
Speaker 1: creation of vertue style skateboarding. UM and Alva went on
Speaker 1: at like age nineteen and found his own skateboarding company.
Speaker 1: He was the first one to use some Canadian maple Veneers,
Speaker 1: which we'll talk about UM. And it was like really innovative,
Speaker 1: especially for a nineteen year old skate punk from southern California. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they all were. Yeah, it's pretty amazing, like this collection
Speaker 1: of kids were. And it most of them ended up
Speaker 1: being like very savvy, like wealthy businessmen like yeah. And
Speaker 1: and right after the del Mar competition, the Zephyr crew
Speaker 1: kind of scattered to the wind and went in and
Speaker 1: found purchase and and expanded skateboarding as a sport and
Speaker 1: as a theme. And one of the things that they
Speaker 1: brought with them from having been part of a crew
Speaker 1: is to form their own crews um of people that
Speaker 1: they sponsored, which made those people pros. And those pros
Speaker 1: would go on tour. And when those pros went on tour,
Speaker 1: they were skating say palm Pearl to skateboards and showing
Speaker 1: local kids what could be done with the skateboard. And
Speaker 1: those kids would go buy pal Pearl to skateboards and
Speaker 1: go out and skate. And it that whole idea of
Speaker 1: doing demos on tour with pros who are sponsored by
Speaker 1: skateboarding companies really helped expand skateboarding in the eighties and
Speaker 1: and created that third wave where skateboarding just became it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it was big in California and Florida. Like
Speaker 1: my cousins were way into it in Florida early on.
Speaker 1: But it really took off when kids like me and
Speaker 1: Georgia and you and Ohio we're skiing, you know, skiing
Speaker 1: skating up my like steep driveway and trying to do
Speaker 1: a little one eight turns going back down like it
Speaker 1: was a wave, and I was, you know, it was
Speaker 1: one of those silly little kids, like was so caught
Speaker 1: up in it at first. Well, I had a kid
Speaker 1: who lived across the tracks from me who had a
Speaker 1: half pipe, like a good half pipe that his dad
Speaker 1: built him UM, and that was part of that rise
Speaker 1: in nineteen three. I think that third wave where UM
Speaker 1: because I should say we didn't really mention UM in
Speaker 1: the late seventies, after Alva Skateboards was founded and and
Speaker 1: pau Perelta was founded and all that, UM, skateboarding took
Speaker 1: a hit mainstream wise, and it became associated with punks
Speaker 1: and like just like like just punk kids, bad kid
Speaker 1: yeah yeah, the bad kids and who literally gave skateboarding
Speaker 1: a bad name. Um. And so it was kind of
Speaker 1: driven underground again. And then in the early eighties that
Speaker 1: experienced their rise and its image kind of changed a
Speaker 1: little bit thanks to the pal Peralta team, the Bones Brigade,
Speaker 1: who were actually like they were all young kids and
Speaker 1: they were skateboarders and all they cared about was skating.
Speaker 1: But they were also like kind of clean cut as
Speaker 1: far as um as far as skateboarders went, and like
Speaker 1: they didn't do drugs, at least they didn't publicly do drugs.
Speaker 1: Stay was a good kid, yeah um. And so the
Speaker 1: kids that he sponsored, like Tony Hawk, Mike McGill, Steve Caballero,
Speaker 1: Christian Hassoi, all those kids were good kids too, and
Speaker 1: they had a tremendous amount of influence on the the
Speaker 1: skaters who were into them, and so it kind of
Speaker 1: changed skating's image a little bit too. It went from
Speaker 1: like being something that like punk kids were into to
Speaker 1: something all kids were into. Yeah it um. It did
Speaker 1: go into another four year lull towards the end of
Speaker 1: the seventies before it started coming back in the mid
Speaker 1: eighties and BMX had a lot to do with it.
Speaker 1: That became more popular and um, you know some skateboarder
Speaker 1: magazine shut down or change names to a different you
Speaker 1: know title, and it just like you said, it never
Speaker 1: went away to the adherents of like like the true
Speaker 1: underground skateboarders, right, it's always there's always somebody who's been
Speaker 1: skating at some point ever since the ninety nine. But
Speaker 1: in the mid eighties is when it definitely came back
Speaker 1: to the big time mainstream. Yeah. And I can't tell
Speaker 1: if it's just nostalgia on my part or else if
Speaker 1: that was when it like really exploded, but like that
Speaker 1: was when that was my wheelhouse. Remember the videos man,
Speaker 1: Bones Brigade videos. Yeah, and that was another thing too.
Speaker 1: One of the reasons why UM skateboarding was able to
Speaker 1: spread as a sport or recreation or whatever UM was
Speaker 1: in part the access to cheap VHS players because the
Speaker 1: Bones Brigade made videos and people bought them, Like you
Speaker 1: could go to your local skate shop and buy like
Speaker 1: a Bones Brigade VHS tape for like twenty five or
Speaker 1: thirty bucks. You kind of had to if you wanted
Speaker 1: to learn the cool tricks. Right, It's like the only
Speaker 1: place you could see him at the time. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: then they were produced in a way like you'd want
Speaker 1: to watch him again and again, like they think the
Speaker 1: fourth one, the Search for Animal Chin, actually had like
Speaker 1: a plot and everything. Yeah, so you would watch these
Speaker 1: things again and again. These guys became like your heroes.
Speaker 1: And not only were you watching them do their tricks
Speaker 1: and and you know, watching their videos, but like you
Speaker 1: also wore their t shirts, like you got their deck
Speaker 1: and it said a lot Like I had a Mike
Speaker 1: McGill deck. I really was into Mike McGill. I had
Speaker 1: a Lance Mountain deck. Was really into Lance Mountain, and
Speaker 1: I like Tony Hawk and everything, but I never had
Speaker 1: a Tony Hawk deck like that. You identify with the
Speaker 1: skater based on your personality type of yeah, and your style. Yeah,
Speaker 1: style had a lot to do with it for sure. Uh.
Speaker 1: Then there was another law in the early nineties because
Speaker 1: um of the recession is what everyone seems to blame
Speaker 1: it on. And I don't know, I thought it was weird.
Speaker 1: I don't remember that happening, But now that I think back,
Speaker 1: late high school early college that there wasn't a lot
Speaker 1: of like skate stuff going on in the world, and
Speaker 1: I wasn't skating in the time, but I was still
Speaker 1: just young enough to pick up on that fourth wave
Speaker 1: in the early mid nineties. Well, thanks to the X games,
Speaker 1: that's what really brought it back big time. Antony Hawk too, Yeah,
Speaker 1: he kept it going. His video games definitely helped spread
Speaker 1: that fourth waves too. Um, and I guess it's never
Speaker 1: really gone away. He's bigger than ever skating. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: another thing I think that helped is that eighties nostalgic craze. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know that how the eighties inform everything today. Part
Speaker 1: of that was that the I guess re exploring that
Speaker 1: third wave of um skateboarding. So like if you're go
Speaker 1: into a band store, they're all like old Powell decks
Speaker 1: are old like UM Vision Vision street wear decks. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and slimeballs. Yeah. I have and I still have a
Speaker 1: pair of Vans Old Schools the black and white checker No, no, no,
Speaker 1: those were this, I can't remember the name of those.
Speaker 1: The slip ons. Yeah, the Old Schools are the black.
Speaker 1: They have the low top in the high top that
Speaker 1: has the little sort of white wave on the side.
Speaker 1: But um, yeah, I still wear those shoes. Ye. So uh,
Speaker 1: I think we should talk about the skateboard itself. Um,
Speaker 1: right after this message break, So CHUCKO, we're going to
Speaker 1: talk about the skateboard itself. You promised. Yes. Um. There
Speaker 1: are three main parts. You have the deck, you have
Speaker 1: the trucks, and you have the wheels. And like we said,
Speaker 1: the trucks connect the wheels to the deck and they
Speaker 1: service the the axles on the front and the back
Speaker 1: a little T shaped thing. Um. And I remember definitely
Speaker 1: like taking a lot of time to get your trucks
Speaker 1: the way you wanted. Some people like them really loose
Speaker 1: and some people like them a little tighter. If they're looser,
Speaker 1: you can turn more aggressively. Yeah, but you also get
Speaker 1: wobble wheel and you get wheel. But um, yeah, I
Speaker 1: like my little tighter too, Like you want to be
Speaker 1: able to turn, but you also I like the stability
Speaker 1: of a tighter truck. Um. You've also got your wheels,
Speaker 1: which have a set of bearings. Yeah. And the wheels
Speaker 1: haven't changed too much. They're still polyurethane. They've changed in
Speaker 1: size a little bit, but it's the same basic concept
Speaker 1: and again, it still depends on your preference. Like you
Speaker 1: can buy a pre made skateboard that's all put together.
Speaker 1: But as you know, any skate worth its salt buys,
Speaker 1: the deck buys the trucks, buys the wheels that they want,
Speaker 1: puts it all together. You might as well just go
Speaker 1: to like a department store and by your skateboard, if
Speaker 1: you're just gonna buy it all together. Yeah, with a
Speaker 1: little outfit that comes with it. One out yeah. Um.
Speaker 1: So the last part arguably the most important part, well
Speaker 1: one of three most important parts, is it the deck? Yeah,
Speaker 1: and the deck has evolved over time. We talked about
Speaker 1: how the tail kicked up in the early seventies and yeah,
Speaker 1: that allowed a lot of like tricks. Um. And the
Speaker 1: if you look at a skateboard from the top or
Speaker 1: the bottom were you're looking at the outline, that's called
Speaker 1: the plan. And then if you look at how the
Speaker 1: tail or the nose is kicked up and then the
Speaker 1: concave to the interior of the skateboard which allows more
Speaker 1: control and stability. Um, that's called the concave. So you
Speaker 1: get the plan in the concave, and those are part
Speaker 1: of the deck. They informed the shape and size of
Speaker 1: the deck and um, then on top of that deck
Speaker 1: you have the grip tape, which I thought that would
Speaker 1: have been a recent innovation. Apparently grip tape was invented
Speaker 1: all the way back in for scooters. They get it
Speaker 1: back then, and a guy named Ferdinand's switz Offer invented it. Nice. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and they changed the name from switz Offer tape to
Speaker 1: grip tape. Um. Yeah. And in the eighties too that
Speaker 1: the thing now is your whole board is covered with
Speaker 1: grip tape. In the mid eighties, I remember, I just
Speaker 1: had like there were graphics on tops said tape at
Speaker 1: the front and the back, and it really didn't make
Speaker 1: any sense, like you the whole thing should be grippy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but I mean, like again, the Powell graphics are pretty awesome.
Speaker 1: Steve Cavalilero had that your dragon or like at least
Speaker 1: you had the bones guy. Uh. The decks are not
Speaker 1: a solid piece of wood. It's actually thin layers of
Speaker 1: veneer and they are laminated and then you spread adhesive
Speaker 1: and you just you know, like with a lot of furniture,
Speaker 1: it is just many layers of thin wood compressed together
Speaker 1: into a mold. And it's a hydraulic press that just
Speaker 1: smashes it all together until you've got your really solid
Speaker 1: piece of wood. Yeah, and it's definitely a lot stronger
Speaker 1: than just the sum of its parts. Yeah, for sure
Speaker 1: from being molded plywood. Um. And then you cut that
Speaker 1: plan out, uh. And then after that you spray it
Speaker 1: with some sealing because you don't want to accidentally alli
Speaker 1: into a puddle or a fountain or something like that
Speaker 1: and have your boardwarp or purposefully allie into a fountain.
Speaker 1: And then the graphics are put on, and then the
Speaker 1: grip tape. I get a sense that graphics aren't like
Speaker 1: super cool anymore? Am I wrong? That it's sort of
Speaker 1: like I think it's a matter of preference. It definitely
Speaker 1: isn't like in the mid eighties it was like they
Speaker 1: were so obnoxious. Oh yeah, remember the Gator one. It
Speaker 1: was like, um, kind of like, uh, I guess a
Speaker 1: vertigo thing, but it was made out of different spikes.
Speaker 1: You would recognize it immediately. Yeah. I definitely had the
Speaker 1: stickers on my car and like it was a thing.
Speaker 1: We had a shop in a Stone mountain called surfs
Speaker 1: up in Stone Mountains, their Stone Mountain that was obviously
Speaker 1: open for like, you know, four and a half years,
Speaker 1: and they had like skate gear in surper gear and
Speaker 1: for all of us, like you know, in in inland
Speaker 1: living people. Yeah, it was like you used to have
Speaker 1: to initially at the early wave in the early eighties,
Speaker 1: like you had to go to like a ski shop.
Speaker 1: Skiing was already established, and then like they'd open up
Speaker 1: a little section for skateboards and then eventually got a
Speaker 1: little bigger and then all of a sudden there were
Speaker 1: actual skate shops. All right. So that is the actual
Speaker 1: uh skateboard in all its three parts. Um, and I
Speaker 1: guess we need to talk about how to ride this thing, um, yeah,
Speaker 1: because the fourth part is you. That's right. Although it
Speaker 1: looks cool just hanging on your wall. If you want
Speaker 1: to impress the ladies, sure, like check out my skateboard. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was all into that. Um. But it is like surfing,
Speaker 1: And the reason they compare it to surfing is that
Speaker 1: it's sort of it's like a smaller version. You have
Speaker 1: the side stands, just like on the surfboard. And if
Speaker 1: you heard our surfing podcast, you heard us talk about
Speaker 1: regular foot and Goofy foot is their mongo foot on
Speaker 1: surfing tea. No, because you're not pushing off of it. Um,
Speaker 1: regular foot is your left foot forward, and uh, you're
Speaker 1: using your right foot to push goofy foot is the
Speaker 1: opposite of that, your right foot forwards. You're pushing with
Speaker 1: your left just does not feel right. No, And I
Speaker 1: was a mango foot and I never knew it until
Speaker 1: I looked this up. Um, that is when your left
Speaker 1: foot is forward. I'm sorry, your your right foot is
Speaker 1: on the board, but you're using your left foot to push,
Speaker 1: and your foot is at the rear not the front. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I just that just feels supernatural to me. But um,
Speaker 1: not supernatural, but very natural. But um, apparently mango foot
Speaker 1: is is I think you're sort of frowned upon as
Speaker 1: a person, but by real skaters if your mom like
Speaker 1: lay off, I've watched you. You can't even kick flip,
Speaker 1: so you pay attention to how you stand. That's what
Speaker 1: you say to people if they give you guff about
Speaker 1: being mango foot. Well, the problem with mango foot is
Speaker 1: you have to shift your feet a little bit once
Speaker 1: both are back on the board. And uh, I guess
Speaker 1: you can't like bust a move immediately with a trick, uh,
Speaker 1: which matters if you're like competing for half a million dollars,
Speaker 1: but not if you're like on your way down to
Speaker 1: the seven eleven. Yeah, if you've never skated before and
Speaker 1: you want to try it, um, I would advise to
Speaker 1: not start with mango foot at all if you don't
Speaker 1: know any better, because you know you won't be made
Speaker 1: fun of. You know, maybe is that what kept you back?
Speaker 1: Maybe you'd be like, right now, that's what it was.
Speaker 1: But I've never seen this before. It makes sense if
Speaker 1: they if you don't know which foot you're prominent with,
Speaker 1: although I would say if you're right footage, you're probably
Speaker 1: gonna be a regular foot, and if you're goofy foot footed,
Speaker 1: you might be goofy foot. I think it has to
Speaker 1: do with handedness. So like, if you're right handed, your
Speaker 1: left foot is gonna be ford, You're gonna push with
Speaker 1: your right foot. If you're left handed, you're gonna be
Speaker 1: goofy foot. Where your right foots forward you push with
Speaker 1: your left foot. I think you push with your foot
Speaker 1: in the rear of the dominant hand side or foot
Speaker 1: side right, Yeah, but I think your dominant hand is
Speaker 1: typically your dominant foot as well. Yeah, it seems right.
Speaker 1: And then if if, if you if somebody came up
Speaker 1: and pushed you, Yeah, that's the test. The foot you
Speaker 1: put back to steady yourself, that the one you want
Speaker 1: to use to push with before you crow hop and
Speaker 1: punch him in the head. Right, what what the h man? Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I've never heard that. That's a little trick you
Speaker 1: can do. And I guess you're not. Maybe surprise somebody,
Speaker 1: because if you think about it too much, like all right,
Speaker 1: push me, you try to put both feet back at
Speaker 1: once and you end up just hopping. Uh. So there
Speaker 1: are a few different quite a few different things you
Speaker 1: can do. Back in the day, it was all about
Speaker 1: like the downhill slalom, which is boring, I mean, super
Speaker 1: speed is not boring. Scary, she said. I I suffered
Speaker 1: a pretty decent head injury once. Really. Yeah, I got
Speaker 1: the wobble wheel going downhill and I was like, I
Speaker 1: got a bail out, and right before I went to
Speaker 1: go jump on the grass, the board went and I
Speaker 1: went forward and landed on my head and skidded on
Speaker 1: my head entirely. Tell it at all right, No, yes,
Speaker 1: it's like right, and uh yeah it was it was something. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I remember I have not been the same since. Its
Speaker 1: neighborhoods have one hill you know that you don't dare
Speaker 1: go down. And my best friend his name was Chuck
Speaker 1: actually at the time, and then in high school, he
Speaker 1: had a hill like that and I remember standing at
Speaker 1: the top of it and thinking there's no way I
Speaker 1: should be doing this, and getting on the skateboard and
Speaker 1: trying to go down, and like you said, bailing out
Speaker 1: into the grass was always Uh, if you're in the neighborhood,
Speaker 1: a nice way to go about things. Is that what
Speaker 1: you did? Uh? I think I went all the way
Speaker 1: down actually, but yeah, it's a little scary, you know,
Speaker 1: no way I do that now. I remember a car
Speaker 1: was driving past and stopped and went, oh my god,
Speaker 1: are you okay? I was like, wow, is that bad? Huh?
Speaker 1: And they finished their beer and drove on. So you
Speaker 1: also have freestyle, which is um doing tricks and things
Speaker 1: on a flat surface. Um, And we're gonna get into
Speaker 1: the tricks a little bit in a minute, which if
Speaker 1: you are like, what's free style, it sounds stupid. Look
Speaker 1: up Rodney Mullen or pare Wellinder on YouTube. Check out
Speaker 1: some of their especially their eighties stuff. The early mid eighties,
Speaker 1: they were doing some pretty cool stuff. And some of
Speaker 1: it is like that stuff that you were saying the
Speaker 1: California dudes doing like handstands on making skateboard or just
Speaker 1: the three sixties, like standing in one place with a
Speaker 1: nose in the air. But then they would take their
Speaker 1: hands and like flip their board three sixty degrees eight
Speaker 1: times and land on it. They're pretty good, pretty great stuff,
Speaker 1: and its for sure, it's definitely like choreography and a skateboard. Well,
Speaker 1: I have the feeling you're about to say vert skating.
Speaker 1: I wasn't, but I will. Are you ready? They didn't
Speaker 1: give rise to vert skating SKA well, vert skating, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it kind of that came out of those Dogtown guys
Speaker 1: in the swing pools. Yeah, because a pool is considered
Speaker 1: vert skating. Vert is short for vertical, right, because you're
Speaker 1: skating on vertical services like a pool or a bowl
Speaker 1: or a half pipe or a quarter pipe or whatever.
Speaker 1: Or if you're like me, to milk crates in a
Speaker 1: piece of plywood, did you do that? Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: Josh pipe it was not that stable. Uh, it's a
Speaker 1: vertical is when people started leaving and catching air leaving
Speaker 1: the side of whatever surface they were on, which was
Speaker 1: really exciting at the time. Yeah, I can't imagine having
Speaker 1: been there, and it's only gone open up since then,
Speaker 1: you know. Uh. And then you got street skating, which,
Speaker 1: um is if you've seen h ladies and dudes on
Speaker 1: the street like jumping up the air onto a park
Speaker 1: bench and grinding that park bench or a railing, or
Speaker 1: smashing themselves trying to grind a railing, that is uh
Speaker 1: street skating. Or if you've ever played the Tony Hawk
Speaker 1: video game. Did you ever play that? Yeah, the first one. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if you play that enough, people who played that enough?
Speaker 1: Now I'm talking about you start walking around in life
Speaker 1: and everything you see. Oh man, I could grind that
Speaker 1: so hard if I could really skate. Yeah, not in
Speaker 1: real life, um, but yeah, so so street skating kind of.
Speaker 1: I guess you could say it combines freestyle with obstacles,
Speaker 1: using obstacles in the um built environment. That's street skating. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that's the stuff that usually you'll see like frowned
Speaker 1: upon by businesses and people thinking like these hooliguns are
Speaker 1: out there right, which skateboarding is not a crime man, Nope,
Speaker 1: Although if you use the skate go to jail. But
Speaker 1: to combat all that crime stuff, a lot of cities
Speaker 1: built skate parks in the seventies. And what they didn't
Speaker 1: realize is that, um, when those kids fell and cracked
Speaker 1: their heads, their parents were gonna sue. And so all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, the insurance premiums four skate parks went
Speaker 1: through the roof and all the cities shut them down
Speaker 1: and they went away for a very long time. And
Speaker 1: then I guess there was some changes in liability laws
Speaker 1: that allowed skate parks to come back. And so now
Speaker 1: skate parks are back, but they're very frequently put up
Speaker 1: by cities. They're like, we'll build a skate park, and
Speaker 1: they don't ask the skaters how to build a skate park.
Speaker 1: So they build like a terrible skatepark and the skaters
Speaker 1: don't use it, and the cities are like, use skate
Speaker 1: punk kids use the skatepark, and they're like, your skate
Speaker 1: park sucks, and they're like, no, it doesn't, and yes
Speaker 1: it does in the skateaway um, or they do it
Speaker 1: well and it's too crowded. Well, if there's one thing
Speaker 1: I know is that for every skate park in any
Speaker 1: city there will be a group of skaters saying this
Speaker 1: place sucks. I remember when we shot at a skate park.
Speaker 1: Remember these local kids and it was a new skate park.
Speaker 1: One of them, that one kid was pretty good. Yeah
Speaker 1: he's all right, but U I s him. I was
Speaker 1: like this this is great, right, this is new and
Speaker 1: it's indicator and like the sucks. Yeah. Well then that
Speaker 1: one kid lied. He said he lived from like a
Speaker 1: seedier part of Atlanta. Hit us up for bus fair
Speaker 1: and somebody. Yeah, one of the crew saw him, like
Speaker 1: go into his house a block away and it's a
Speaker 1: very nice neighborhood Decatur and hide his skateboard in his backyard. Um,
Speaker 1: if you and they can be different, they can be
Speaker 1: like uh smaller half pipes and ramps and rails and
Speaker 1: things and obstacles. To my recommendation if you ever visit
Speaker 1: l A is to go to Venice Beach to their
Speaker 1: newish skate park there, and it is like the Cument Bowl.
Speaker 1: It's like a huge series of connected swimming pools. And
Speaker 1: this is where you'll see some like you'll see the
Speaker 1: old school guys that aren't leaving the bowl that are
Speaker 1: just like carving it up. Is like sweet as pudding.
Speaker 1: And uh, then you've got guys that really know what
Speaker 1: they're doing, like catching air and doing you know, three sixties.
Speaker 1: And and there's a bulldog that rides a skateboard there too,
Speaker 1: I've heard of that. You should see him. It's quite amazing.
Speaker 1: I'm for sure it is like you can't catch air
Speaker 1: or whatever, but just the fact that a dog is
Speaker 1: using a skateboard is pretty awesome. So should we talk
Speaker 1: about some tricks. Let's well, almost every trick on earth
Speaker 1: is based on the Ali the trick named after Alan
Speaker 1: Alie gelfand he invented it in the early nineteen seventies,
Speaker 1: mid nineteen seventies, and that is basically when you jump
Speaker 1: up in the air. And if you've seen skateboarders do it,
Speaker 1: you might wonder, how on earth do they jump up
Speaker 1: in the air and have that skateboard seemingly attached to
Speaker 1: their feet. I never was very good at it, I
Speaker 1: really no, I could all be pretty good. I was
Speaker 1: more of a sidewalk surfer than like a trick aerial guy.
Speaker 1: You know. Well, I wasn't a trick aerial guy either,
Speaker 1: but I could Allie, you know, well, explain the Alie
Speaker 1: oh well, okay. So the ALIE is let's say you're
Speaker 1: on your board and you're on a flat surface. You
Speaker 1: kick your the tail of the skateboard down really hard
Speaker 1: against the ground and uh, what this does is this
Speaker 1: um exerted force allows you to overcome the force of gravity.
Speaker 1: And since you're jumped ing at the same time you
Speaker 1: jump into the air, um, you're taking off your own
Speaker 1: downward pressure on the board. So the front of the board,
Speaker 1: the nose, goes up high in the air and the
Speaker 1: fact that you've slapped the tail against the ground means
Speaker 1: the tail comes up into the air until it's even
Speaker 1: with the nose and the boards flat in the air,
Speaker 1: and it looks like it's attached to your feet if
Speaker 1: you do it right, and all of a sudden you
Speaker 1: and the board are four feet into the air and
Speaker 1: then you come back down and you landed. That's an ALI.
Speaker 1: It's funny you mentioned four feet The world record Danny
Speaker 1: Wainwright of h I think he's from England, Uh, recorded
Speaker 1: at forty four and a half inch ALI. Well, it's
Speaker 1: pretty amazing, yeah, but was that like standing still? No,
Speaker 1: you know, it's like, you know, they just set up
Speaker 1: something to jump over. You keep adding layers until you
Speaker 1: know you can't jump any higher, and then you've got like,
Speaker 1: you know, ten feet to get going, and then just
Speaker 1: pop up and it looks like it's attached to his feet.
Speaker 1: And the allie is so integral this so many other um,
Speaker 1: so many other tricks that it's it's almost not a
Speaker 1: trick any longer in and of itself. It's like the
Speaker 1: basic mechanic of whatever other trick that follows. But like
Speaker 1: you pretty much can't do anything without ali ing. And
Speaker 1: that's how those those guys originally caught air convert skating
Speaker 1: was to ali off of the coping the top and
Speaker 1: then you would catch some serious air because you already
Speaker 1: had that extra momentum behind you as well. All Right,
Speaker 1: So we'll talk about a few of the terms here
Speaker 1: in a minute that if you watch the X Games
Speaker 1: and you're not familiar and you hear these words, we're
Speaker 1: going to clear it up for you right after this message. Okay,
Speaker 1: we're back, Chuck. We're gonna talk about the names of tricks,
Speaker 1: different types of tricks. All right. So, if you've ever
Speaker 1: watched the X Games and you hear the uh sort
Speaker 1: of annoying announcers admittedly talk using all these words you've
Speaker 1: never heard. We're gonna explain what some of these words
Speaker 1: mean just to help you follow along a little bit.
Speaker 1: That's right. Um, you might hear speak out front side
Speaker 1: there or whatever. Front side is when you're facing the
Speaker 1: obstacle and performing a trick as opposed to backside, when
Speaker 1: you're back is to the obstacle. Yeah, Like you're basically
Speaker 1: going backwards on the skateboard. That's right. Yeah. Um. One
Speaker 1: eight is pretty basic trick. But it's um, well, it's
Speaker 1: where you ali and you and the board turn eight
Speaker 1: degrees to face in the opposite direction. Yeah, Like you
Speaker 1: go up the ramp and then you turn the mid
Speaker 1: air and you come right back down. You can also
Speaker 1: do it on a flat surface, or you could one
Speaker 1: eighty onto like a park bench or something and trained
Speaker 1: it whatever. Um, but the one eighty also kind of
Speaker 1: forms a basis for a lot of other tricks, especially
Speaker 1: vert tricks like three sixties and five forties all the
Speaker 1: way up to ten eighties, and you can grab the
Speaker 1: side of your board and just do all sorts of
Speaker 1: cool stuff. Tony Hawk famously completed the first nine hundred
Speaker 1: degree turn and for many years they thought that was
Speaker 1: it until a twelve year old named Tom Shar in
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve pulled off the first ten eighty and uh,
Speaker 1: they filmed that it wasn't in competition. The first one
Speaker 1: in competition was a guy named Mitch Brusco. He did
Speaker 1: at the X Games. And that is three full rotations
Speaker 1: in the air. Uh. And obviously you have to land
Speaker 1: successfully for it to count and to live and live.
Speaker 1: And uh, it's amazing, man, three full rotations in the air.
Speaker 1: These dudes are getting up super super high. Now. Uh,
Speaker 1: have you ever heard the word fakey? I have? Fakey
Speaker 1: is um basically where you remain in your regular stance,
Speaker 1: but you're going backwards, so you're doing like, um, you're
Speaker 1: going into a backside trick. That's right. Uh. Pop shove
Speaker 1: it is when you do an ali with the one eight,
Speaker 1: but your body isn't moving. You're just uh popping up
Speaker 1: in the air and flipping the skateboard around underneath you
Speaker 1: and then landing on it. And then we talked about grinding. Um,
Speaker 1: there's a couple of ways you can grind. A true
Speaker 1: grind is when you're on the actual axles, so you've
Speaker 1: got to be going forward, or you can go sideways
Speaker 1: and grind on your board and it's called a board
Speaker 1: slide or a rail slide. And then the kick flip,
Speaker 1: of course, is the one that you see people busting
Speaker 1: butt on which I've pulled off once. That's right, the
Speaker 1: famous Josh kick flip. And then, of course, Chuck, there's
Speaker 1: the manual, which is another way to say a wheelie.
Speaker 1: I was good at those front side manual backside manual
Speaker 1: I could do, like I was not good. I think
Speaker 1: that's becoming clear. Like I thought it was cool if
Speaker 1: I could do a little wheelie and do a little
Speaker 1: one a D turn on the ground. Yeah, no, I'm
Speaker 1: with you, man, I understand I wasn't very good either,
Speaker 1: But Chuck, I had years of enjoyment. Twice third Wave
Speaker 1: and fourth Wave loved skateboarding, love it like I just
Speaker 1: love skateboarding. I think everybody should go out on skateboard
Speaker 1: all the time. She's never gonna be one of those
Speaker 1: old men that's like, quit grinding my rail. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean if I had a nice rail out trying,
Speaker 1: I'd be like, hit the hell off of my rail,
Speaker 1: but I I would Still, it's not like a hate
Speaker 1: skateboarding in general, but you would chip in and help
Speaker 1: build a half pipe in your neighborhood, maybe away from
Speaker 1: my really nice rail. Right, that's a good idea if
Speaker 1: you do want to try skateboarding. Obviously these days, with
Speaker 1: the safety consciousness of people, you should get a helmet
Speaker 1: and some kneepads and elbow pads and if you're smart,
Speaker 1: maybe some risk guards, although that might not be cool.
Speaker 1: Well no, actually, like there's a that's another reason skate
Speaker 1: parks off and go and use is because there's local
Speaker 1: ordinances that say you have to wear a helmet and pads,
Speaker 1: and of course skaters are like that sucks. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: the risk guards. That's a common injury because you'll you'll
Speaker 1: often go to brace yourself with your arms when you fall,
Speaker 1: and they say to try and follow in your fleshy
Speaker 1: parts of your body, but you're really kind of at
Speaker 1: the whim of where gravity takes you. At think at
Speaker 1: that point, well, you know, that was another reason I
Speaker 1: think I wasn't ever that good, just because back when
Speaker 1: I was a kid, they were all fleshy parts. It's
Speaker 1: hard to get air. We should have been safe. It was, uh,
Speaker 1: you got anything else? No, man, that's it. Uh, skateboarding.
Speaker 1: If you want to know more about it, you should
Speaker 1: type skateboarding into the word search bar at how stuff
Speaker 1: works dot com. That's the first thing you should do.
Speaker 1: You should follow that up by watching skate videos and
Speaker 1: going to buy a skateboard and go skating. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: I want to get along board now? Oh yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the old man style. Yeah, just cruising. Get on
Speaker 1: a flat surface and use it a carving the concrete
Speaker 1: way a mode of transportation. Yeah. Are you gonna learn
Speaker 1: to do handstands on it? Uh? Let's see. Since I
Speaker 1: said handstands and then laugh, that means it's time for
Speaker 1: listener mail. I'm gonna call this Josh, what are you hiding?
Speaker 1: And I'm glad to get this email because I knew
Speaker 1: I wasn't crazy. So let's just get into this, you know.
Speaker 1: Can I say I don't even remember this most recent reference?
Speaker 1: All right, well, let's just explain here what's going on.
Speaker 1: This is from Ben Ben says, Hey, guys, I've been
Speaker 1: living like a trog globitic trug bloodt for the past
Speaker 1: six years because I just discovered your amazing podcast a
Speaker 1: few weeks ago. As penance I've been listening to UH
Speaker 1: several per day and have since gone to over one hundred.
Speaker 1: So he's binging, he said, just noticed something in UH.
Speaker 1: During the can Cats Scuba dive episode not one of
Speaker 1: our best on August twelve, two eight, Josh goes into
Speaker 1: detail about he was a certified scuba diver and at
Speaker 1: the one time he was in open water, he not
Speaker 1: only got sea sick, but also got a slight case
Speaker 1: of the bens due to surfacing too quickly. Then UH.
Speaker 1: In two thousand thirteen and the Diving Bell episode, Chuck says,
Speaker 1: I thought I remembered many months ago you mentioned something
Speaker 1: about getting the bends, and Josh quickly and confidently retorted,
Speaker 1: I've never had the bends. So I know this is
Speaker 1: almost five years later, but it begs the question, what
Speaker 1: are you trying to hide? Josh? You have answered some
Speaker 1: of the greatest, long lasting questions in history, but this
Speaker 1: is one of the few times where you simply added
Speaker 1: another mystery into the pile of the enigma and conspiracy
Speaker 1: that is our world. So UH, have you ever had
Speaker 1: the BENSU? So uh in I was skating down the
Speaker 1: hill and I fell in in my head. Uh. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I would call it a mild case of the bens. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you just don't remember denying you had the bends? Okay,
Speaker 1: all right, well there's your answer. Yeah, well I not
Speaker 1: only do I not remember denying having the bends. When
Speaker 1: I denied having the bends, I had forgotten that I'd
Speaker 1: had the bends before. And again, this is a very
Speaker 1: mild case. But it wasn't just seasickness. It was directly
Speaker 1: related to having just bent half an hour under water,
Speaker 1: you know. Alright, So I would call that the case
Speaker 1: of the ben. I think that clears it up. Then
Speaker 1: that is from Ben Helms from Mount Shasta, California. I'm
Speaker 1: sure Ben will be unsatisfied with your explanation of Ben.
Speaker 1: I just forgot. That's pretty much it. Yeah, let's see.
Speaker 1: If you want to get in touch with Chuck and I,
Speaker 1: you can tweet to us at s Y s K podcast.
Speaker 1: You can join us on Facebook dot com slash stuff.
Speaker 1: You should know. You can see us on our YouTube channel.
Speaker 1: Just look up Josh and Chuck on YouTube. Tons of
Speaker 1: fun there, uh and send us an email stuff Podcast
Speaker 1: to Discovery dot com and really and join us at
Speaker 1: our home on the web. Stuff You should Know dot
Speaker 1: com for more on this and thousands of other topics.
Speaker 1: Is it how stuff Works? Dot com