August - November 2007
France, Germany, NYC, NC, L.A., SF
I spent my last summer days hanging out with the kids and killing myself for “The Beginning” (new Birdhouse video). The due date crept up on me quickly and I was out of time before I knew it. There were still a couple of hammers on my list, but the alley-oop backside ollie over a 20’ channel was my favorite trick that happened spontaneously. I even managed a day at Bob’s for an obligatory MegaRamp shot. The premiere happened less than a week after I got my last few tricks. The most exciting aspect of the video for me is that Riley has his own legitimate part and his stuff is GOOD. Shaun Gregoire is going to surprise a lot of people with his part as well. The Beginning was a huge relief to get finished; it has been 9 years since our last video was released. Thanks to the Cold War Kids for playing our premiere with such short notice
Alley-oop ollie over the 20. This took so long I almost gave up.
Here are some other key events from the past few months:
-> • The X Games. I was commentating the Big Air event live when Jake went down. I thought he was dead, or certainly paralyzed. It was a miracle that he walked away and I don’t blame the paramedics for letting him get up; he was going to do it whether they liked it or not, and it gave the packed Staples Center crowd a collective sigh of relief. He’s already back skating a bit… Jake Brown is gnarly.
-> • I was on Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader. The questions seem so easy at home, but it's WAY more intimidating when everyone is staring at you waiting for you to respond. I still have pangs of humiliation from claiming 121 is a prime number, but I find comfort in knowing that most of my friends told me that they wouldn't have answered the Olympic question correctly. All I can say is THANK YOU NATHAN for saving my ass. Even if I had figured out that 121 is 11 squared (duh), I couldn't have gone any further once the literature and history questions came up. $175,000 towards public skateparks for answering elementary school questions? In the words of Ice Cube: I got to say it was a good day.
-> • I went to France to be a “celebrity” judge at the Hawk European Am Finals and then straight to Germany for a demo at a videogame tradeshow. The am finals were a blast. It was raining, so they held the comp at an indoor skatepark in Biarritz. I did a street demo with the rest of the Hawk Clothing team and it felt like the days of ESPN Gigantic Skatepark Tour. A dusty, overcrowded warehouse with ramps, rails and ledges in every corner. The Euro spectators especially like 540’s on street courses. I had way more fun skating the cramped park than riding the shoddy German vert ramp the next day with 3000 people watching me get used to the kinks. It’s a living.
Leipswich, Germany crowd.
-> • Adio “Supersession” at Active in Orange. The entire Adio street team was there, but we scrambled to get vert skaters. It was our first time putting up our "new" wider demo ramp and there were some glitches setting up the top deck pieces. It was getting late, so we just went with what we could…half of the ramp had no decks and I forgot how scary that can be. Zach Miller pulled his 2nd 540 of his life, so I guess we got used to it.
Frontblunt on the sparse deck at Adio Supersession.
-> • 4th annual Stand Up For Skateparks. We raised a million dollars! Well, $1,000,025.00 to be exact. It was by far our best event (not just financially) and we raised $60k in a matter of minutes specifically for a park in Compton. Me First and the Gimme Gimme’s are awesome and Shaun White is really, really good. He tried his first ever 900 after our vert demo ended. The demo was an A-list straight out of the X Games: Andy Macdonald, Bob Burnquist, Jean Postec, Kevin Robinson, and Mat Hoffman. And the list of guests was straight out of Us Magazine: Lance Armstrong, Shaun White, Jamie Lee Curtis, Sean "P Diddy" Combs, Leeza Gibbons, Jon Favreau, David Spade, Ed Helms, Russell Simmons, Michael Rapaport, Holly Robinson Peete, Kathy Ireland, Stefan Lessard, Arsenio Hall, Chris “Big Black” Boykin, Chuck Liddell, and Rashad Evans. My kids were nonplussed by the celebrity factor, but most impressed [once again] with the Lego activity tent.
My favorite image from SUFS. Sylvester, Staab and Tweety.
-> • Proving Ground release. It’s officially our 9th game (not counting THDJ) and our best by far. The new consoles are amazing vessels of technology. I love Nail The Grab best out of all the new features.
Tony Hawk's Proving Ground TV commercial shoot... pigeonhead.
Ryan didn't know anything about the pigeon concept until he arrived,
but he played along.
Bam didn't care either way.
Rodney thought it was fun.
-> • Days and days in NYC. Over the course of 10 days, I traveled to NYC twice to do a ménage of television shows and appearances. TRL, MSNBC, Fox & Friends, ESPN, Yahoo, Fuse, The Naked Brothers Band, a Laureus dinner, and an appearance for Steiner Sports. At least there is plenty of good food in Manhattan to enjoy between obligations.
-> • Birdhouse demos / video premieres. I joined the Birdhouse video premiere tour at their stop in Cincinnati and it was huge. Another packed park, only this time there was plenty of room for the 2500 people in attendance. They have an excellent vert ramp so I didn’t feel too humiliated after bailing so many kickflips during the street demo. We did a similar demo/premiere in Wilmington in Eastern Skate Supply’s private park. Just when I thought I could focus my skating only on vert, I got thrown into a bowl demo. I guess you gotta ride everything if you want to attend video premieres. It was a blast in NC, as the motivating factor was to visit the Underhill's. Thanks to Reggie Barnes for making it happen.
Riley warms up in the Wilmington, NC bowl before the masses were let in.
-> • I introduced Duran Duran at the American Music Awards. This was a huge honor until I said hello to Simon just before I took the stage… he was aloof and unfriendly. How does Duran Duran qualify as American Music anyway? It would have all been okay if they played View To A Kill, but no. It was fun to see Lenny Kravitz play though.
-> • We launched www.shredordie.com thanks to the amazing folks at www.funnyordie.com. We have been compiling a ton of original content and video clips over the last 6 months, and I am proud to finally have it out there. I have also been doing interviews with various celebrities recently, all of which will be uploaded in the coming months. Please check it out and post your own stuff… it’s our video community for action sports. You vote SHRED or DIE for each clip, so the best stuff goes to the top and the lame stuff goes away. Plenty of extreme gnar-dog footy for your viewing pleasure.
Still here, still skating, still feeling young,
Tony
Here are even more recent photos to check out:
Cab came over too and threw back smiths in the deep end.
Another day in the life of Keegan.
Our prized auction item from SUFS: a 3400-piece Eiffel Tower set.
It took Spencer, Lhotse and me 2 days to assemble.
Flowrider barrel, no straps.
This is what I get for using a board WITH straps on the Flowrider and
then trying a backflip for a tv crew.
Bones Brigade pride...for life. Interbike tradeshow attendee.
Shaun came over to skate my backyard, so. I took my little ones for
rides in his Lambo while he rode the new tombstone.
Spencer likes his TailDevil, mostly at night.
10/22/07 - SD was burning (notice background glow) so I skated the
backyard just in case we had to evacuate (we never did).
My nephew and I went on our own unique sightseeing trip in NYC...
to Flight of the Conchord shooting locations.
Our one hour of sunlight in Biarritz. It poured for three days straight.
And this is how the Hawk Family spent Thanksgiving:
We hired a boat to check out Maverick's, which was breaking thanks to a rare swell . Our skipper put us a little too close to the action...for real. We drifted near the lineup during one of the best sets of the day, setting us up on the shoulder of the last wave of the set.
It felt like we dropped 40' on the way down the back. All of the cameras in the water and on the jetty turned their attention to us on this particular wave. My mom was on the tip of the bow, she thought it was fun.
Here are some pics:
We were so far over that dudes were paddling around the OUTSIDE of our boat.
Photo: Don Montgomery/www.mavsurfer.com
I swear it didn't seem that close at the time, but it was exciting.
Photo: Don Montgomery/www.mavsurfer.com
The "front" view: My wife is the one on the side yelling ecstatically. My mom is at the very front and she thought it was fun. I am next to her looking mildly concerned.
Photo: Frank Quirarte/www.mavsurfer.com
The aftermath. Check out the back of the wave that we just went over.
My mom wanted to do it again. Thanks to www.mavsurfer.com for the photos.
Photo: Frank Quirarte/www.mavsurfer.com
The calm after the storm: Riley, Will, Lhotse and Cameron relive the excitement on the
ride back to shore..
