Riley Hawk #3.

This was Riley's welcome to the team ad for Lakai. He was still an am and riding for Birdhouse at the time. He turned pro for Baker in 2013. I'm glad Hudson continues to ride for the Flare.

No. 2997.

I triple checked all the numbers and it appears the counter will hit 3,000 on Thursday.

Note: This advertisement ran as a two page spread in Thrasher. I kind of like the condensed one page version better and not just because it required less scan work.

Transworld - December 2010 Volume 28 Number 12

Don "Nuge" Nguyen #4.

"Our band is the LSDemons and our first show was a gnarly Skate Rock tour in Australia. The first show four people knocked themselves out in the mosh pit. Jake Phelps was like, 'You've got more stretchers than fans.' Dustin Dollin killed it as a singer. Well, except for one show where he pulled an Axl Rose on us."

Oklahoma's finest big gap jumper and hill bomber recounts his band's tour experience in the land down under. The Nuge rips.

Circa Combat was a spinoff of Circa Footwear during the 2010s. The team consisted of Abdias Rivera, Peter Ramondetta, Frank Gerwer, and Sheldon Meleshinski. The brand was only around for a few years and the riders split for other companies at some point. I think they used regular Circa shoe models with different color schemes. I probably should do additional research on the topic, but that's what I recall. Can't be very far off.

Random Odds & Ends

I guess we're in the home stretch for Thrasher's SOTY award. I'm personally leaning towards Mason Silva, but I could see Franky Villani winning it. Somebody different should end up with the award this year.

I liked the newish video parts from Raney Beres and Ethan Loy.

The weather has been unseasonably mild so I've been able to get in plenty of skateboarding after work and before it gets dark. The mild weather kind of crapped out to start the week, although it is back for now. My Mike Carroll reissues are on their last legs, but holding up with duct tape. They wore out a little faster than I expected. Otherwise Lakai made a good shoe and I already have a second pair waiting to go.

I've been browsing through the early issues of The Skateboard Mag for content lately and plan to include more from them in the future. It's a shame that magazine came to an end.

Sound Zone: The Dead C have a new album called Unknowns that features more of their harsh and scraping guitar skuzz stylings. The long standing weirdo noise merchants at Skin Graft have reissued a pair of AIDS Wolf LPs that only saw a limited release first time around. I already had the records, but it is nice to have Ma vie banale avant-garde and Very Friendly on CD as well. The new tape from Ordet reminds me of early U.S. Girls, but darker and spookier.

Vert Is Dead will be back on Monday, November 30th.

It will be more stuff from 2010 as the countdown to 3,000 continues. Hope everybody has a happy and safe holiday week.

For the quote: The Skateboard Mag - August 2011 Issue 89

Thrasher - April 2010 Volume 30 Number 4

Bryan Herman #5.

Happy hour.

This was Bryan's ender in Stay Gold. It's a seriously huge amount of real estate to hardflip down, but after rewatching the part, he's got the trick on command. I still don't fully understand how you bring yourself to launch down such huge gaps. It doesn't seem physically possible.

The Skateboard Mag - December 2010 Issue 81

Pedro Barros.

Don't fall.

Pedro is from Florianópolis, Brazil. He rides for Vans and Independent. I am not sure if he has a board sponsor. Pedro was riding Real and Anti-Hero boards in his most recent Thrasher interview. Some of his favorite skaters include Leo Kakinho, John Cardiel, Tony Trujillo, Heath Kirchart, and Nilton Neves. He's one of those folks who totally rips at ramp and park skating. A couple of the guys from the shop here went out to SF at the start of the year and got to witness Pedro skate in person. They said he is on a whole other level of good.

The layout reminds me of a Dogtown ad from 1990.

Mason Silva for SOTY? The dude is ridiculously great at riding a skateboard. Have enough years passed since somebody on Deluxe last won the award so it won't look like Thrasher is playing favorites?

The photo is by MRZ.

Thrasher - January 2010 Volume 30 Number 1

Brandon Westgate #4.

Exploding into the sky.

Did you know that Brandon owns a boat?

Skateboarder - November 2010 Volume 20 Number 3

Guru Khalsa.

Black Moth Super Rainbow.

Guru split time growing up between Houston, Texas, and Punjab, India. He was sponsored by Habitat, Elwood, Satori Wheels, Habitat Footwear, and Venture. Guru turned pro in 2010. For his part in Habitat's Origin video, he skated a variety of ledges, hubbas, and ditches while the Black Moth Super Rainbow played. His style is on the mellow side and everything is done smoothly. Guru hit up a lot of long, flat rails in the tradition of Kerry Getz. There's a half cab to 5-0 on handrail, a couple ride on 50-50s, big spins, and nollies. I think he still skates, but not for Habitat. Guru is or was running companies that make soap and incense.

It's going to be a bunch of 2010 stuff for the next few of weeks to get us to the 3,000th post and beyond. I'm only going to do two weeks of the older stuff at the end of December instead of the full month. I wasn't feeling it this year and I've been scanning a lot of 2000s content.

Skateboarder - June 2010 Volume 19 Number 10

Anthony Pappalardo #9.

"John Cardiel is definitely one of my favorites. Tony Trujillo is sick, too. I never got to skate tranny until like three years ago, but seeing those guys skate just gets me hyped - even though I won't go hit up some gnarly cement park or something. It pumps me up to skate street or whatever. It's just raw skating."

Pops was on fire in 2002. I couldn't decide which ad to use so I went with both. The nollie frontside noseslide is sick. After rewatching his parts in Mosaic and Transworld's I.E. video yesterday, it is easy to see how he draws inspiration from Cards and TNT.

The Match Guy graphic is a nice tip of the hat to Duane Pitre's Flame Man graphic from 1992.

The switch frontside boardslide sequence is by Ben Colen. The nollie frontside noseslide sequence is by Shawn "Frankie" Brodsky. The background photo is by Jon McGrath.

For the quote: Skateboarder - December 2002 Volume 12 Number 4

Switch front board: Transworld - February 2002 Volume 20 Number 2

Nollie front nose: Transworld - October 2002 Volume 20 Number 10

Pitre Flame Man: Transworld - February 1993 Volume 11 Number 2

Jason Dill #17.

"Here comes Dill with another pair of sunglasses. The dash of the car is usually a shrine made from truck stop paraphernalia. He won't hesitate to show up at the car with a pen that looks like a finger, and when you pull on it a roaring fart noise comes out. I remember at the end of most trips, when we'd stop by Alien Workshop, he'd give Chris Carter the most random stuff he had bought on the trip." - Bill Strobeck

Dill has got a good ollie, especially off flat. He's popped over more than a few big things during the course of his career. The quote is from a trip Jason went on with Bill in Florida during the filming of Skate More at the tail end of 2004.

Congrats to O on scoring a pro board from Foundation.

Mike O'Meally took the photos of Jason and Jon McGrath contributed the Day Dream picture.

For the quote: The Skateboard Mag - June 2005 Issue 15

Transworld - September 2002 Volume 20 Number 9

Anthony Van Engelen #8.

"Oh, my kickflip sucks. 'Cause, you know, when Salman Agah happened I was just, 'Oh, I need to start skating switch.' And that's all I did and that just kind of threw all of the regular tricks in the trash. So I kept doing that and then now I can't kickflip. I used to have one when I was younger, actually. I try them now and they're all rocket and messed up."

AVE breaks down the process behind all of his switch skills.

The photo sequence is by Lance Dawes photos. The graphics are by Don Pendleton.

For the quote: Thrasher - March 2015 Volume 36 Number 3

Transworld - July 2002 Volume 20 Number 7

Steve Berra & Heath Kirchart.

Dual Sponsorship.

Over the years, Steve and Heath rode for the same company a few times. They both were on Birdhouse Projects in the early 1990s. Eventually each wandered over to Foundation for the mid 1990s. The duo then headed back to the Birdhouse in 1997. The final joint sponsorship change occurred in 2002 when the two joined up with the Alien Workshop. This was celebrated with a couple ads and a shared part in Habitat's Mosaic video from 2003.

Fun fact: Heath's photo is reversed. He's goofy footed. This was the hubba he stuck on in his part in This Is Skateboarding. The photograph is of the make, which happened in daylight.

Atiba Jefferson documented Steve's 50-50, Jaya Bonderov snapped Heath's 50-50, and Jon McGrath shot the gas mask.

Steve: Transworld - May 2002 Volume 20 Number 5

Heath: Transworld - August 2002 Volume 20 Number 8

Josh Kalis #9.

A Philadelphia owl takes flight across a safety barrier with the help of a natural launch ramp.

The photo is by Shawn "Frankie" Brodsky.

Transworld - October 2001 Volume 19 Number 10

Peter Ramondetta #4.

The Custom Series.

I got a request for this board series a while back. Check out the sizes on the boards. Most of them are fairly skinny and short, with Max having the only 8" x 32". The skinny widths I understand, but three are under 31.5" in length, which seems too short. I vaguely remember how it was a little difficult to find larger boards back in the early 2000s, but I didn't recall boards this small as the norm.

Notes: A picture taken from a slightly different angle of Peter's kickflip was used in a Circa ad. The double letter e in Keith's name occurred in the catalog with how the bleed and the binding interacted. I did piece together two scans, but that one isn't on me.

The kickflip photo is by Gabe Morford.

Boards: Deluxe Spring 2003 Catalog

Pete's Geo: Thrasher - April 2003 Volume 23 Number 4

Frank Gerwer & Julien Stranger.

Remember the time these two drove to Benicia to skate with Cardiel?

Thrasher - May 2002 Volume 22 Number 5

Dennis Busenitz #7.

"When Dennis came into our lives he had led a sheltered existence, mostly skating in a barn in the Kansas countryside. He was also a German immigrant, and although he spoke English just fine, we liked to pretend that he couldn’t and would translate for him in ridiculous German accents. “Dennis! We are go for make EATING!” we’d tell him. Nate Jones and I used to tell him about these two skaters—Ducky Dunsworth and Gary Headlock. They were cousins. We’d tell Dennis all the amazing tricks Ducky and Gary had performed. We’d tell him Headlock did a back 360 to overcrook nosegrind down a nine-stair rail. You could see the wheels in his head spinning as he tried to picture it. “I need to see the footage!” he’d demand. “Not everybody films everything, Dennis,” we’d explain. Soon enough he realized we were lying. ‘Til this day he still doesn’t believe a word I say. I stopped lying to him years ago but he never believes me. “Bullshit!” he always replies." - Frank Gerwer

Reject success.

Frank's People I've Known article from the August issue of Thrasher was hilarious and yielded a whole lot of funny stories.

Dennis blasts a street ollie that was seen in his part for Real's Seeing Double video from 2002.

For the quote: Thrasher - August 2020 Volume 41 Number 8

Thrasher - December 2002 Volume 22 Number 12

Dan Vellucci.

Dan was the filmer for assorted Real videos that included Recipe For Disaster, Seeing Double, and Roll Forever. I wonder if he made it out alive?

I rechecked the numbers and this thing hits the 3,000 mark in early December.

The photo is by Gabe Morford.

Thrasher - March 2003 Volume 23 Number 3

Frank Gerwer #6.

This was the cover to the Deluxe Fall 2003 catalog. The original cover concept called for smashing up a car, but that didn't turn out so hot and a second option was needed. Frank is tossing his board and shoes in the air so Gabe Morford would have a test point to focus his camera on for Darrell Stanton's nollie down the stairs. This ends up being a much better idea and photo in the end.

I think that is Nate Jones and Damian Bravo also standing on the top of the stairs. I'm not sure who the long haired kid is.

I couldn't find Darrell's nollie photo, but the trick was in his part in Transworld's Free Your Mind video. I imagine I'll find it sooner or later. It might have run as Vans or Volcom ad in Skateboarder or someplace I didn't think to check. There was a small thumbnail of it in this catalog so I know it exists.

I was going to do more catalog stuff, but I got confused with how to organize it and gave up. I'll revisit the idea in the future.

The photo is by Gabe Morford.

Deluxe Fall 2003 Catalog