Hi, this is Bohane Yang here, and if you're as excited as I am about the upcoming fourth season of Search Party on Biomax, then you'll want to tune in to Search Party the podcast. In each episode, I go behind the scenes with the writers and actors of the disturbingly dark comedy and chat favorite moments and things with special guest celebrity fans.

Search Party Season four comes to Biomax on January 14th, eight seasons one through three available now. Meanwhile, subscribe and listen to Search Party, the podcast on the radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

It's been 30 years since the first episode of Beverly Hills, Nido, A. 30 years since we walk the halls of West Beverly High and since we all hung out at the Peach Pit, relive it all with Jennie Garth and Tori Spelling on their new podcast, Niono, two a.m.. We get to tell the fans all of the behind the scenes stories that actually happened. Join them as they watch every episode of the beloved 90s TV show. From the very beginning, listen to Nyarota and OMD on the I Heart radio app or wherever you get your podcasts.

All right, folks, this is Chuck, it is in Selex time, March 11th, 2014, that's what we're throwing back to today, because I picked out how skateboarding works. Boy, this is a great one. This is sort of vintage stuff you should know all about skateboarding full of stories about our own skateboarding adventures as young posers that we both were. And it's good stuff. We talk about the history we talk all about. And, you know, of course, it's about a thing that some people are experts in.

So we get a lot wrong, but we get it mostly right. And it was a good episode.

So please do enjoy how skateboards work right now.

Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of NPR Radio's HowStuffWorks. Hey, and welcome to the podcast, I'm Josh Clark in Charleston, which brings with me so obviously no injury, of course, is here. Who just celebrated a birthday? Yeah. Happy birthday to you. And Valentine's Day run our Indian sweat lodge that we call a recording booth. Yeah, man, it's hot. Yeah. Part of it's this thing you want to turn this off because it really does put a tremendous amount of heat.

Yeah. Josh, we have a lamp on our table that we used to see what we can't see any longer.

Oh, well, flying blind. Yeah. That did make it like three percent cooler immediately.

Yeah, it's that lamp. It's the lamp.

And then like, you know, just people generating heat in here. Yeah.

Podcasters were a balmy bunch. Plus there's a herd of oxen in the corner and it doesn't help. No.

It's been the best intro ever, I think. Do you think so? I think so. You're not being facetious.

No. You know the word facetious. What do you got for me? Well, when I was younger, I knew the word facetious. There was a word that my dad used a lot. So I used it in, like, regular conversation correctly.

Yeah, OK. But I'd never seen it written out or so I thought.

And then finally, one day I ran across in a book again, this word I kept coming up on.

And I was like, what is that word best Citius Varsity's first? And I was like, That's facetious. I don't know that I've seen it spelled either. Yeah, it looks like fastidious.

No, it looks like Fassett like a facet of a jewel or something. And then it's IOUs. Yeah.

There's no I was so bombed the spelling of that. Right.

But the thing is, it's like I was using it correctly in conversation and I had seen it in books. I just never put the two together until finally one day it clicked.

You had to get your tattoo changed or facetious across the back of your neck. Yeah, in the heart. That's right. All right.

So skateboarding. Yeah. About the same time that I realized the word facetious when it was correctly spelled. S Yeah. I was skateboarding at the time. So that's how it ties in you. I was a little skateboarder for a long time. Yeah.

I was too I. Did not I'm not old enough to where I saw all the different waves of skateboarding of the four, but you saw the first two I saw I didn't see the first one.

That's pretty funny. That would mean I'm dead now.

There's plenty of old boarders out there. Sure. Yeah. But I was of the age where I definitely had the small sort of plastic board with the single little tail on the back only. And clay wheels.

No. Oh yeah. No. Yeah. Clay wheels. It seems to me like that those with the skateboards from from biblical times like clay wheels.

That's what I think of when I see clay wheels. What do they even look like.

Uh, just brown, you know, really super dangerous. Well, yeah.

And if you've seen the great documentary Dogtown and Z Boys, they go over. It's a really good dock, by the way. Yeah. Like amazing footage that they have and good music and highly recommended over the movie version.

The Lords of Dogtown was Val Kilmer in the.

No, Heath Ledger was, uh, he played the the mentor I can't remember his name. Skip the Zephyr crew. Yeah.

Skip, Skip, Skip went on to found Santa Monica Airline skateboards. Oh yeah. Yeah, he, he was he stayed on. It's like a big influence in skateboarding.

Oh that's good. So anyway, I just wanted to point out that I have branched a few different like I start out with a little clay one and then in high school is when I got the big huge fat skateboard when they were super obnoxious.

Yeah, that's see that's when I came into skating. Yeah. Nineteen eighty three. Eighty four. Yeah. I had like a nice Lance Mountain. It was my first born, my first board. Remember the tough tops. Now there it was blank on the bottom. There are no graphics but on the top. Yeah. Cut out in the grip. Tape was like a star that looked kind of like a saw blade. Yeah. Circular saw blade and then the big difference was the different colors of the board underneath.

Yeah. Blue or pink or yellow or what was like neon green. Yeah.

Your big fat one. Yeah. Looking back like kind of corny and I think after that is when like true skaters started being like, you know, we don't really care that much about like awesome graphics, like we just want a good board. Good board.

You wanted some rib bones on the side. You remember those underneath. Yeah. Yeah.

But I don't think people like those now either. Oh no, not anymore. Real skaters know the whole the point of those I think it was, you know, to let you slide or whatever. Yeah. Easier. But I think it was also to protect those graphics too. It totally was, because I had a little big plastic bumper under the tailpiece too, which is counterintuitive to the tricks. Yeah.

Yeah. But I mean like who cares about protecting the the tail. It's weird. Yeah. I was also a nose bone too. I was never very good. Oh I wasn't either. I don't mean to give that.

I mean I spent a lot of hours skating and I never got very good.

I think I pulled off one kickflip once.

Really once. That's good. I thought it was pretty good too. That is the trick that you most often see kids not landing. You are driving down the street. Yeah. If you ever see a kid like I rarely see a successful kickflip just on the sidewalk.

Oh yeah.

If you see somebody who pulls off a kickflip, the chances are there's somebody filming them. Right, because they know that they're going to be able to pull off the kickflip in L.A..

Actually, I would see more, you know, obviously better skaters out there. Sure. In New York. Yeah, true.

All right. So people keyboarding. Should we get going with a little history?

Yeah. Let's talk about the history of this. This this is so close to my heart, man. I fell down the rabbit hole the day watching, like, old skate videos and like checking out old pal Peralta boards. That was my jam. Was Powell?

Well, we mentioned that there have been four distinct waves of skateboarding starting in nineteen fifty nine. Yeah. And each new wave like it's just waned in popularity here and there and then come back strong. Yeah. And stronger due to either uh advances mainly in like skateboard technology.

Right. And trickery.

Yes. And parental acceptance. Yeah. It never really goes away. Skateboarding is either ever since its inception it's either been mainstream or else forced underground and like practiced by juvenile delinquents who kind of kept it going in advance, sit quietly until it came back into the mainstream and parents were like, OK, total, you guys can skate again. Yeah, but the true origin of the skate were the first one that came out first commercially produced ones in nineteen fifty nine.

It's called the roller derby skate.

Yeah. And before that, you know, if you've seen the movie Back to the Future, when Marty McFly rips the little milk crate off the front of the the homemade wooden scooter. Yeah that was weird. Skateboards really came from you just you know, it was sort of a homemade deal with like a peach crate. Right. Is the front of your scooter.

Couple of handles. Steel wheels from roller skates, yeah, and that was super dangerous, right? But like you say, if you take the peach crate off and take the handles off, you have that two by four with the roller skate wheels. Yeah. And they don't know exactly who did it. They think actually several people probably did it simultaneously. Marty McFly in the right in the 40s. They think surfers in California did it. There are kids in France that were seen doing it in the 40s.

So, yeah, it kind of spread. It happened. It arose independently around the world at about the same time. That's called the zeitgeist.

That is my friend. So now we're in the 19th, early 1960s. And it was I mean, it really took off like a rocket in the first few years of the 1960s. Like 50 million skateboards were sold in those first three years.

And it was everywhere. Yeah, it was like the hot new craze. Well, it was like also like hula hoops and things like that. Like it was America was in a crazy mood, a crazy mood.

Right. Like whatever the big thing was. Yeah. And skateboard fell into that big time. The problem is they were pretty dangerous. Yeah.

There was a lot you could do with them now because again, there's steel wheels there. It's basically two by four on steel wheels. Yeah.

Right down the street. And you could fall off of it. Exactly. That was the two. Most of it. So and I think because of the safety concerns overnight, skateboarding just went away in nineteen sixty five it was over. Yeah.

But it's still kind of stayed somewhat popular as a thing to do among surfers when the waves weren't breaking. Right. They would just kind of sidewalk surf is what they called it, and they never really saw it as anything bigger than a supplement to surfing. Right. It was just kind of like it wasn't its own thing.

Right, until the 60s, the late 60s or the early 70s when clay wheels came about, you could do a little more stuff, I think, while Clay was better than the steel wheels.

Right. But still bad. Right. And that's put a rock in the road.

You're toast. And like, that's when people started dying from skateboards. Yeah. Which kind of led to its decline again. Sure. And then some surfers, the Zephyr crew are the ones who broke skateboarding out once and for all.

Well, yeah. Thanks to Frank Natsuo Worthy's invention of the urethane wheel in 1972. Yeah, he founded Cadillac Wheels and all of a sudden it was like a smooth, like steady silent experience on a skateboard for the first time. Right.

And then you changed everything it did because it could grip. It wasn't just that it wasn't rumbly any longer. Yeah. Like the urethane could grip like concrete or you could go over Repeller pavement. Yeah. Instead of just stopping. Exactly. Yeah.

And yeah.

All of a sudden there were way more surfaces that could be skated and that plus the invention of the truck. Yeah.

Which is basically an axle for your wheels that not only allows the wheels to revolve more smoothly, especially when you add a set of bearings. Yeah. But it also allows you to maneuver to the left or the right, which is a big deal. Yeah. Kind of opens things up there. Twisty. Yeah.

And then the kick tail also changed everything. All these kind of came together at about the same time. Yeah.

And you mentioned the Zephyr crew in nineteen seventy five. They held the first basically competition in Del Mar, California. And that's when if you've seen the documentary, it's pretty great. I mean they had sort of the holdovers from the sixties doing like handstands and all these sort of square antiquated moves. Right. And then these little punks came in there and just like tore the place up and like the judges didn't know how to judge them at the time. Right.

Because they'd never seen anything like it. Yeah, it's pretty cool.

It was a pool. They were skating in pools. Right. Or at least.

Yeah, the pool thing came a little later because they there was a big drought in the mid seventies in Southern California and water was actually in short supply. So people would drain their pools or not refill them or whatever for the summer. Right. And so they started busting in backyards and skating and pools. Yeah.

And they would bring their own pumps and hoses to drain all the muck out entirely. Yeah. And then just like skate that pool. And there was well at one of those pools, a kid named Tony Alva who was in that Zephyr crew was Tony Alva, Jay Adams and Stacy Peralta. Yeah. Among others. Yeah. Right. But those were like the big three. Tony. I was your guy, right? Stacy Peralta.

Oh, I thought you were like a huge Tony Alva dude. OK, no, I respect. Oh sure. For Tony. I know. I was always Powell Peralta, OK, but Tony Alva at one of those pools kept going and going and pushing himself harder and harder.

And then one day he cleared the coping of the pool. Yeah. And like er. Yeah, with his hand at first. Oh he did like a hand plant. Yeah. That was how that original. It came about, but he did leave contact with the pool, right, and no one had ever done that. And everyone's like, whoa. And that was like the creation of style skateboarding. Yeah. And Alvo went on like age 19 to found his own skateboarding company.

Yeah. He was the first one to use Canadian maple veneers, which we'll talk about. And he was like really innovative. Sure. Especially for a 19 year old skate punk from Southern California.

Yeah, they all were. Yeah, it's pretty amazing. Like this collection of kids was were and most of them ended up being like very savvy, like wealthy businessmen like. Yeah. And right after the Delmark competition, the Zephyr crew kind of scattered to the wind and went in and found purchase. Yeah. And expanded skateboarding as a sport and as a theme. And one of the things that they brought with them from having been part of a crew is to form their own crews of people that they sponsored, which made those people pros.

Right in those pros would go on tour. Yeah. And when those pros went on tour, they were skating so powerful to skateboards and showing local kids what could be done with the skateboard. Yeah. And those kids would go by Powell Peralta Skateboards and go out and skate.

And it that whole idea of doing demos on tour with pros who are sponsored by skateboarding companies really helped expand skateboarding in the 80s and created that third wave where skateboarding just became it. Yeah, I mean, it was big in California and Florida, like my cousins were way into it in Florida early on. But it really took off when kids like me in Georgia and you and Ohio were skiing, you know, skiing, skating up my, like, steep driveway and trying to do a little 180 turns, going back down like it was a wave.

Right.

And I was, you know, was one of those silly little kids. Yeah. Like, I was so caught up in it at first.

I had a kid who lived across the tracks for me who had a half pipe like a good half pipe that his dad built him. And that was part of that rise in 1983, I think.

That third wave. Yeah. Where because I should say we didn't really mention in the late 70s after Alva Skateboards was founded and Powell Peralta was founded and all that skateboarding took a hit mainstream wise.

Yeah. And it became associated with punks and like just like like just punk kid bad kids. Yeah. Yeah. The bad kids.

And who literally gave skateboarding a bad name. Yeah. And so it was kind of driven underground again. And then in the early 80s it experienced another rise and its image kind of changed a little bit thanks to the Powell Peralta team. The Bones Brigade. Yeah. Who were actually like they were all young kids and they were skateboarders and all they cared about was skating. But they were also like kind of clean cut as far as as far as skateboarders went.

And like they didn't do drugs, at least they didn't publicly do drugs. Yeah, Stacy Peralta was a good kid. Yeah. And so the kids that he sponsored, like Tony Hawk, Mike McGill, Steve Caballero, Christian Hosoi, all those kids were good kids, too. And they had a tremendous amount of influence on the the skaters who were into them. Yeah. And so it kind of changed skating's image a little bit, too. It went from like being something that like punk kids were into to something all kids were into.

Yeah, it it did go into another four year lull toward the end of the seventies before it started coming back in the mid eighties. And BMX had a lot to do with it. Oh yeah. That became more popular. And you know, some skateboarder magazine shut down or change names to a different, you know, title. And it just like you said, it never went away to the.

Adherents of like like the true underground skateboarders, right? It's always there's always somebody who's been skating at some point ever since 1959, but in the mid 80s is when it definitely came back to the big time mainstream. Yeah.

And I can't tell if it's just nostalgia on my part or else if that was when it really exploded. But that wasn't it. That was my wheelhouse.

Now remember the videos, man. Oh yeah. Bones Brigade videos. Yeah. And that was another thing too. The one of the reasons why skateboarding was able to spread as a sport or recreation or whatever was in part the access to cheap VHS players.

Yeah, because the Bones Brigade made videos and people bought them, like you could go to your local skate shop and buy like Bones Brigade VHS tape for like 25 or 30 bucks.

You kind of had to if you wanted to learn the cool tricks. Right. That's like the only place you could see him at the time. Yeah.

And then they were produced in a way like you'd want to watch them again and again, like they think the fourth one, the search for Animal Chinh, actually had like a plot.

Never really. Yeah. So you would watch these things again and again. These guys became like your heroes. And not only were you watching them do their tricks and, you know, watching their videos. Yeah. But like you also were there t so like you got their deck and it said a lot like I had a Mike McGill deck. I really was into Mike McGill. Yeah, I had a Lance Mountain deck was really into Lance Mountain and I like Tony Hawk and everything, but I never had a Tony Hawk deck like that.

You identify with the skater based on your personality type. Yeah.

And your style. Yeah. Style had a lot to do with it for sure. Sure. Then there was another lull in the early 90s because of the recession is what everyone seems to blame it on.

And I know. I know. I thought it was weird. I don't remember that happening.

But now that I think back late high school, early college, there wasn't a lot of, like, skate stuff going on in that world.

And I wasn't skating at the time, but I was still just young enough to pick up on that fourth wave in the early mid 90s. Well, thanks to the X Games, that's what really brought it back big time. And Tony Hawk, too. Yeah, he kept it going. His video games definitely helped spread that fourth wave to, um. And I guess it's never really gone away now. It's bigger than ever.

Skating. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, another thing I think that helped is that eighties nostalgia craze. Yeah. You know how the eighties inform everything today? Part of that was that the I guess, reexperiencing that third wave of, um, skateboarding.

So like, if you go into a band store, they're all like old power decks are all like, um, visions.

Visions street where. Decs visions where. Yeah. Yeah. And slimeballs.

Yeah I have. And I still have a pair of Vann's old schools, the black and white checker. No, no, no. Those were this. I can't remember the name of those. The slip ons. Yeah. The old schools or the black. They had the low top in the high top uh that has the little sort of white wave on the so. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah I still wear those shoes.

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Nearly 600 years after the invention of the printing press, the most important book in the history of the world has arrived.

There might be overstating things, stuff you should know, an incomplete compendium of mostly interesting things. It will change your life forever.

Well, that's not necessarily true. Most scientists agree that stuff you should know an incomplete compendium of mostly interesting things is proof that time travel is possible because that is the only way to explain how a book this impressive was possibly made. Why that stuff you should know. An incomplete compendium of mostly interesting things will regrow hair quite in your teeth and improve your love life.

That's just not at all. Right.

Well, the love life part, maybe if you find someone who thinks smart is sexy stuff, you should know an incomplete compendium of mostly interesting things available now at stuff you should know dotcom and everywhere you buy books.

Now, that is true. So, Chuck, we're going to talk about the skateboard itself you promised. Yes, there are three main parts. You have the deck, you have the trucks and the other wheels. Yeah. And like we said, the the trucks connect the wheels to the deck and they service the axles on the front in the back seat shaped thing. Right. And I remember definitely like. Taking a lot of time to get your trucks the way you wanted, oh, yeah, some people like them really loose.

Yeah, I did. And some people liked him a little tighter. If they're looser, you can turn more aggressively.

Yeah, but you also get a wobble. Will you get a series of double wheels.

Yeah, but yeah, I like my little tighter too. Yeah. Like you want to be able to turn but you also I like the stability of a tighter truck.

Yeah. You've also got your wheels which have a set of bearings. Yeah. And the wheels haven't changed too much.

They're still polyurethane. Yeah. They've changed in size a little bit but it's the same basic concept. Right. And again, it still depends on your preference. Like you can buy a premade skateboard that's all put together. But as you know, any skater worth its salt, it's the deck rides the truck.

Right. Buys the wheels that they want, puts it all together.

You might as well just go to like a department store and buy your skateboard if you're just going to buy it all together. Yeah.

With a little outfit that comes with it or skater one on one. Yeah.

So the last part, arguably the most important part. Well one of three most important parts is the deck.

Yeah. And the deck has evolved over time. We talked about how the tail kicked up in the early 70s, not just in the rear. Yeah. That allows a lot of like tricks. Yeah. And the if you look at a skateboard from the top or the bottom where you're looking at the outline, that's called the plan. Yeah. And then if you look at how the tail or the nose is kicked up and then the concave to the interior of the skateboard, which allows more control and stability.

Yeah, that's called the concave. So you get the plan in the concave. Yes.

And those are part of the deck. They inform the shape and size of the deck.

And then on top of that deck you have the grip tape, which I thought that would have been a recent innovation. Apparently good tape was invented all the way back in 1948 for scooters. Oh, really? Yeah, they did it back then.

And a guy named Ferdinand Switz Hoffer invented it.

Nice. Yeah. And they changed the name from Switzler for tape the group.

Right. Yeah. And in the 80s to the thing now is your whole board is covered with grip tape in the mid eighties. I remember I just had like there were graphics on top so I'd tape at the front in the back. Yeah. And it really didn't make any sense. Like the whole thing should be grippy. Yeah.

But I mean like again the Powell graphics are pretty awesome. Yeah. Steve Cavaleiro had that dragon or like at least he had the bones guy.

The decks are not a solid piece of wood. It's actually thin layers of veneer and they are laminated. And then he spread adhesive and you just, you know, like with a lot of furniture, it's just many layers of thin wood compressed together into a mold. And it's a hydraulic press that just smashes it all together.

And so you've got your a really solid piece of wood.

Yeah. And it's definitely a lot stronger than just the sum of its parts. Yeah. For sure. From being molded plywood. And then you cut that plan out. Yeah. And then after that you spray it with some sealant because you don't want to accidentally Ali into a puddle or a fountain or something like that and have your board walk or purposefully. Right Ali, into a fountain and then the graphics are put on and then the grip tape I get a sense of graphics aren't like super cool anymore.

Am I wrong? It's sort of like it's a matter of fact, the basic thing, I think it's a matter of preference. It definitely isn't like in the mid 80s, it was like they were so obnoxious. Oh, yeah.

Remember the gator one know, it was like kind of like, I guess a vertigo thing, but it was made out of different spikes. You would recognize it immediately. Really saw. Yeah, yeah.

I definitely had the stickers on my car and like it was a thing. We had a shop in Stone Mountain called Surf's Up in Stone Mountain there. Stone Mountain. Yeah.

That was obviously open for like, you know, four and a half years. And they had like skate gear and surfer gear.

And for all of us, like, you know, in inland living people, yeah, it was funny. They were cool like you used to have to initially at that early wave in the early 80s, like you had to go to like a ski shop.

Skiing was already established. And then they'd open up a little section for skateboard totally. And then eventually it got a little bigger and then all of a sudden there were actual skate shops. Yeah.

All right. So that is the actual skateboard in all its three parts. Right. And I guess we need to talk about how to ride this thing. Yeah.

Because the fourth part is you. That's right. Uh, although it looks cool just hanging on your wall. Yeah. If you want to impress the ladies. Sure. Like check out my skateboard. Yeah. I was all into that.

But it is like surfing in the reason they compare it to surfing is that it's sort of just like a smaller version. You have the side stance just like on a surfboard. Right. And if you heard our surfing podcast, you heard us talk about regular foot and goofy foot.

Is there a Mongo foot on? Surfing, you know, because you're not pushing off of it. Oh, yeah, yeah, regular foot is your left foot forward. Yeah. And you're using your right foot to push. Goofy foot is the opposite of that. You're right foot forwards. You're pushing with your left, which does not feel right now.

And I was Monga Foot and I never knew it until I looked this up. Yeah. That is when your left foot is forward. I'm sorry, your your right foot is on the board, but you're using your left foot to push and your foot is at the rear, not the front.

Yeah. And I just that just feels supernatural to me. But not supernatural but very natural.

There's ghosts but apparently Monga Foot is I think you're sort of frowned upon as a person, but no real skaters, if you like.

Lay-off, I've watched you. You can't even kickflip. So you pay attention to how you stand. That's what you say to people if they give you guff about being Mongo foot.

Well, the problem with Monga foot is you have to shift your feet a little bit once both are back on the board. Right. And I guess you can't, like, bust a move immediately with a trick.

Right. Which matters if you're, like, competing for half a million dollars, not if you're like on your way down to the 7-Eleven. Yeah.

If you've never skated before and you want to try it, um, I would advise to not start with Mongul foot at all. If you don't know any better, because you know you won't be made fun of, you know, maybe. Is that what kept you back?

Maybe you'd be like, all right, now that was what it was. But I've never seen this before. So it makes sense if they if you don't know which foot you're prominent with, although I would say if you're right footed, you're going to be a regular foot. And if you're goofy footed, you might be goofy.

But I think it has to do with handedness. So, like, if you're right handed your left foot, it's going to be forward. You're going to push with your right foot. If you're left handed, you're going to be goofy foot where your right foot forward. You push with your left foot. I think you push with your foot in the rear of the the dominant hand side or foot side. Right? Yeah, but I think your dominant hand is typically your dominant foot as well.

Yeah. It seems right.

Yeah. And then if, if you, if somebody came up and pushed you. Yeah. That's the test. The, the foot you put back to steady yourself, that's the one you want to use to push with before you curl up and punch him in the face.

Right with the H man. Yeah. So I'd never heard that. That's a little trick you can do. Yeah. And I guess you're not maybe surprised somebody because if you think about it too much. Right.

Like all right, push me then you try to put both feet back at once and just hopping.

Uh, so there are a few different, quite a few different things you can do.

Back in the day, it was all about like the downhill slalom, which is boring. I mean, super speed is not boring, scary.

It is a little scary places that I suffered a pretty decent head injury once. Really? Yeah. I got the wobble wheel going downhill and I was like, I got a bail out right before I went to go jump on the grass. The ball went up. Yeah. And I went forward and landed on my head and skidded on my head entirely.

No helmet at all right. No. Yes.

Like nineteen ninety. Right. And yeah it was, it was something. Yeah. I remember I wound up in the same. Most neighborhoods have one hill you know that you don't dare go down.

And my best friend, his name was Chuck actually at the time in the mid high school very you know he had a hill like that and I remember standing at the top of it and thinking, there's no way I should be doing this. Yeah. And getting on the skateboard and trying to go down. And like you said, bailing out into the grass was always a if you're in a neighborhood, a nice way to go about things. Is that what you did?

Uh, I think I went all the way down, actually, but yeah, it's scary, you know, and it's no way I do that now.

I remember a car was driving past and stopped and went, oh, my God, are you okay?

I was like, wow, is that bad, huh?

And they finish their beer and drove on right through their Kaname. So you also have freestyle, which is doing tricks and things on a flat surface.

Um, and we're going to get into the tracks a little bit in a minute, which if you like what's freestyle, it sounds stupid. Look up Rodney Molen or Paravel in there.

Yeah. On YouTube. Check out some of their especially their eighties stuff. The early mid eighties. Yeah. They were doing some pretty cool stuff in. Some of it is like that stuff that you were saying, the California dudes doing like handstands on a skateboard or just the three sixties, like standing in one place with their nose in the air.

But then they would take their hands in, like flip their board. Three hundred sixty degrees, eight times and mind on it. They're pretty good. Yeah, pretty great stuff. And it takes creativity, you know for sure. It's definitely like choreography and a skateboard.

Yeah. Uh, well, I have a feeling you're about to say vert skating. I wasn't, but I will be ready. They didn't give rise to skating or skating well worth skating.

Yeah, it kind of. That came out of those Dogtown guys. Yeah. In the swimming pools. Yeah.

Because a pool is considered skating is short for vertical. Right. Because you're skating on vertical surfaces like a pool or a bowl or a half pipe or a quarter pipe or whatever. Right.

Or if you're like me to milk crates and a piece of plywood.

Did you do that. Yeah. Yeah. Um yeah. The Josh but it was not that stable.

Uh, it's a vertical is when people started leaving and catching air, leaving the side of whatever surface they were on.

Yeah. Which was really exciting at the time.

Yeah. I can't imagine having been there and it's only gone up and up since then you know. Yeah.

And then you got street skating which is if you've seen ladies and dudes on the street like jumping up the air onto a park bench and grinding that park bench or a railing. Right.

Or smashing themselves, trying to grind a railing that is street skating. Or if you've ever played the Tony Hawk video game, did you ever play that?

Yeah, the first one. Yeah. If you play that enough people who play that enough.

No, I'm talking about you start walking around in life and everything you see, you think, oh man, I could grind that right so hard. Yeah. If I could really skate. Yeah. Not in real life. No. Um but yeah. So, so street skating kind of I guess you could say it combines freestyle with obstacles using obstacles in the um built environment. That's street skating.

Yeah. And that's the stuff that usually you'll see like frowned upon by businesses and people thinking like these hooligans are out there. Right. Which skateboarding is not a crime. And no, although if you use a skate, go to jail.

But to combat all that crime stuff, a lot of cities built skate parks in the seventies. Yeah. What they didn't realize is that when those kids fell and cracked their heads, their parents were going to sue. Yeah. And so all of a sudden, the insurance premiums for skate parks went through the roof and all of the cities shut them down. Yeah. And they went away for a very long time. And then I guess there is some changes in liability laws that allowed skate parks to come back.

And so now skate parks are back. Yeah, but they're very frequently put up by cities. They're like, we'll build a skate park and they don't ask the skaters how to build a skate park.

So they build like a terrible skate park and the skaters don't use it in the cities are like you skate park kids use the skate park like your skate park sucks. And they're like, no, it doesn't.

Yes, it does in the skate away or they do it. Well, it's too crowded. Well, if there's one thing I know is that for every skate park in any city, there will be a group of skaters saying this place sucks. Sure. I remember when we shot at a skate park, remember? Oh, yeah, these local kids. And it was a new skate park.

One of them. That one kid was pretty good. Yeah, he's all right. But it seems like, guys, this is great, right? This is new and it's in indicator. And like they're like, oh, it sucks. Yeah.

Well, that one kid lied. He said he lived from like a sixty year part of Atlanta. Yeah. Hit us up for bus fare. He's a total pussy and some. Yeah. One of the crew saw him go into his house like a block away and this very nice neighborhood of Decatur and had a skateboard in his backyard.

If you and they can be different, they can be like a smaller half pipes and ramps and rails and things and obstacles to my recommendation, if you ever visit L.A., is to go to Venice Beach to their new ish skate park there.

And it is like the cement bowl. It's like a huge series of connected swimming pools. Yeah. And this is where you'll see some like you'll see the old school guys that aren't leaving the bowl that are just like carving it up is like sweet as pudding. And then you've got guys that really know what they're doing. Yeah. Like catching Aaron doing, you know, three sixty thousand. And there's a bulldog that rides a skateboard there too.

Uh, I've heard of that. You should see him. It's quite amazing. It is like you can't catch it or whatever. But just the fact that a dog is using a skateboard, it's pretty awesome.

So should we talk about some tricks? Let's. Well, almost every trick on Earth is based on the Ali theatric named after Alan Ali Gelfand. He invented it in the early 1970s, mid 1970s. And that is basically when you jump up in the air and if you've seen skateboarders do it, you might wonder how on earth do they jump up in the air and have that skateboard seemingly attached to their feet? I never was very good at it. Oh, really?

No, I could all be pretty good. I was more of a sidewalk surfer then. Like trick aerial guy. Yeah. You know, while I was in a trick aerial guy either, but I could all you know. Well. Explain that, Ali. Oh, well, OK, so the Ali is let's say you're on your board and you're on a flat surface, you kick you're the tail of the skateboard down really hard against the ground.

Yeah. And what this does is this exerted force allows you to overcome the force of gravity. And since you're jumping at the same time, you jump into the air. Yeah. You're taking off your own downward pressure on the board. So the front of the board, the nose goes up high in the air.

Yeah. And the fact that you slap the tail against the ground means the tail comes up into the air until it's even with the nose and the boards flat in the air. And it looks like it's attached to your feet if you do it right. Yeah. And all of a sudden you and the board are four feet into the air and then you come back down and you land it.

Well, it's in, Ali.

It's funny, you mentioned four feet, the world record.

Danny Wainwright of I think he's from England, recorded at 44 and a half inch, Ali. Wow. It's pretty amazing. Yeah. What was it like standing still?

No, you know, it's like, you know, they just set up something to jump over. Oh, God, you keep adding layers until, you know, you can't jump any higher. Yeah. And then you've got, like, you know, 10 feet to to get going and then just pop up and it looks like it's attached to a suite.

And the all is so integral to so many other so many other tricks. Yeah. That it's almost not a trick any longer in and of itself. It's like the basic mechanics of whatever other trick that follows. Right. But like you pretty much can't do anything without all. And that's how those guys originally er on vert skating was to alley off of the coping the top. Yeah.

And then you would get some serious air because you already had that extra momentum behind you as well.

Hi, this is Boin Yang here, and if you're as excited as I am about the upcoming fourth season of Search Party on Biomax, then you'll want to tune in to Search Party the podcast. I'm sitting down with the creators and stars of the Dark Comedy to delve deeper into the disturbing world inhabited by Doree, Drew, Elliot and Portia, and to help us discuss search parties most prominent themes for inviting a very special celebrity fan to join each chat. Folks like Paul Scheer, Vanessa Bayer, busy Phillips, Taran Killam and Carrie Brownstein, among many others.

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Search Party Season four comes to Biomax on January 14th, with seasons one through three available now. Meanwhile, subscribe and listen to Search Party, the podcast on the pirate radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

It's been 30 years since the first episode of Beverly Hills. Nyota went out 30 years since we walk the halls of West Beverly High and since we all hung out at the Peach Pit.

Relive it all with Jennie Garth and Tori Spelling on their new podcast, Niono, two a.m.. We get to tell the fans all of the behind the scenes stories to actually. Join them as they watch every episode of the beloved 90s TV show. From the very beginning, listen to Niono, two OMD on the I Heart radio app or wherever you get your podcasts.

OK, we're back, Chuck, we're going to talk about the names of tricks, different types of tricks. Yeah. All right. So if you've ever watched the X Games and you hear the sort of annoying announcers.

Yeah. Admittedly using all these words you've never heard, we're going to explain what some of these words mean just to help you follow along a little bit. That's right.

You might hear we got Frontside there or whatever Frontside is when you're facing the obstacle and performing a trick as opposed to backside when your back is to the obstacle.

Yeah. Like you're basically going backwards on the skateboard. That's right. Yeah. Of 180 is pretty basic trick, but it's well it's where you Ali and you in the board turn 180 degrees to facing the opposite direction.

You know, like you go up the ramp and then you turn in midair and you come right back down. You can also do it on a flat surface. Or you could 180 on the like a park bench or something, whatever. Yeah, but the 180 also kind of forms the basis for a lot of other tricks, especially virt tricks like three 60s and five 40s all the way up to tornadoes. Yeah. And you can like grab the side of your board and just do all sorts of cool stuff.

Yeah.

Tony Hawk famously completed the first nine hundred degree turn and for many years they thought that was it until a 12 year old.

Name Tom Schaar in 2012 pulled off the first in Haiti, and they filmed that it wasn't a competition.

The first one in competition was a guy named Mitch Ruscoe. He did it the X Games, and that is three full rotations in the air. And obviously, you have to land successfully for it to count in the live and love. And it's amazing. Man Three full rotations in the air. These dudes are getting up super, super high now. Yeah. You ever heard the word fakey?

I have a fakie is basically where you remain in your regular stance, but you're going backwards. Yeah.

So you're doing like you're going into a backside trick.

That's right.

Pop shove it is when you do an alley with the 180, but your body isn't moving. You're just popping up in the air and flipping the skateboard around underneath you. Right. And then landing on it. Yeah. And then we talked about grinding. There's a couple of ways you can grind a true grind is when you're on the actual axles. So you've got to be going forward or you can go sideways and grind on your board.

And that's called a board slide. Yep. Or a rail slide.

And then the kickflip, of course, is the one that you see people busting. But on which I've pulled off once. That's right. The famous Josh Kickflip.

And then, of course, Chuck, there's the manual, which is another way to say a wheelie.

I was thought I was good at those frontside manual.

Yeah, backside manual.

I could do like I was not good. I think that's becoming clear. Like, I thought it was cool if I could do a little wheelie and do a little 180 turn on the ground.

Yeah, no, I'm with you man. I understand. I wasn't very good either. But Chuck, I had years of enjoyment twice. Third wave and fourth wife. Yeah. Loved skateboarding. Love it. I like I just love skateboarding. I think everybody should go out and skateboard all the time.

So you're never going to be one of those old men that's like quit grinding my real well.

Yeah. I mean if I had a nice real out I'd be like get the hell off of my rail.

But I would still it's not like I hate skateboarding in general.

Yeah, but you might chip in and help build a half pipe in your neighborhood away from my really nice real right. It's a good idea if you do want to try skateboarding. Obviously these days with the safety consciousness of people, you should get a helmet and some knee pads and elbow pads. And if you're smart, maybe some risk guards, although that might not be cool.

Well, no, actually, like, there's that's another reason skate parks often go and use it, because there's local ordinances that say you have to wear a helmet and pads. And of course, skaters like that sucks.

Yeah, but the wrist guards, that's a common injury because you'll you'll often go to brace yourself with your arms when you fall and they say to try and fall on your fleshy parts of your body, but you're really kind of at the whim of where gravity takes you, I think, at that point.

Well, you know, that was another reason I think I was never that good is because back when I was a kid, they were all fleshy parts.

It's hard to get air. We should have been safe.

Well, that's when you fell. I was, uh. You got anything else? No, I it's it, uh, skateboarding.

If you want to know more about it, you should type skateboarding into the water search bar at HowStuffWorks Dotcom.

That's the first thing you should do. You should follow that up by watching skate videos and going by skateboard and go skating. Yeah. Yeah. No, I want to get a longboard now. Oh yeah. Yeah. That's the old man's style. Yeah. Just Kruzan. Yeah. Get on a flat surface and use it in the concrete way. A mode of transportation. Yeah.

Are you going to learn to do handstands on now. Uh let's see. Since I said handstands and then laugh that means it's time for listener mail.

I'm going to call this Josh. What are you hiding? And I'm glad to get this email because I knew I wasn't crazy. So let's just get into this.

You know, can I say I don't even remember this most recent reference?

All right. Well, let's just explain here what's going on. This is from Ben. Ben says, Hey, guys, I've been living like a troglodytic troglodyte for the past six years because I just discovered your amazing podcast a few weeks ago as penance. I've been listening to several per day and I've since gone to over 100.

So he's been doing he said just noticed something in a during the can cat scuba dive episode. Not one of our best.

No. Uh, on August 12, 2008, Josh goes into detail about he was a certified scuba diver and the one time he was in open water, he not only got seasick, but also got a slight case of the bends due to surfacing too quickly. Then in twenty thirteen and the Diving Bell episode, Chuck says, I thought I remembered many moons ago you mentioned something about getting the bends in. Josh quickly and confidently retorted, I've never had the bends.

So I know this is almost five years later, but it begs the question, what are you trying to hide? Josh, you have answered some of the greatest, long, long lasting questions in history. But this is one of the few times where you've simply added another mystery into the pile of the enigma and conspiracy that is our world. So have you ever had the bends so?

Well, in 1990, I was skating downhill and I fell and hit my head.

Yeah, I would call it a mild case of the bends. OK, so you just don't remember denying you had the bends, right? OK. All right. Well, there's your answer. Yeah, well, I not only do I not remember denying having the bends when I denied having the bends, I had forgotten that I'd had the bends before. And again, this is a very mild case. But it wasn't just seasickness. It was directly related to having just spent half an hour underwater, you know?

All right. So I would call that the case of the bends.

I think that clears it up then. That is from Ben Helmes from Mount Shasta, California. And I'm sure Ben will be unsatisfied with your explanation of Ben.

I just forgot. That's pretty much it. Yeah.

Uh, let's see if you want to get in touch with Chuck and I. You can tweet to us that as far as podcast, you can join us on Facebook, dot com slash stuff. You should know you can see us on our YouTube channel. Just look up Josh and Chuck on YouTube. Tons of fun there. And you can send us an email to Stuff podcast at HowStuffWorks dot com. Stuff you should know is a production of radios HowStuffWorks for more podcasts, My Heart radio, visit the radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

I'm Alec Baldwin, delighted to announce that my podcast, Here's The Thing, will launch on I Heart Radio on January 12th. It's my chance to talk to artists, policy makers and performers. Don't miss our first show with actress Kristen Bell. If you like listening as much as I like talking to interesting people. Take a listen on. Here's the thing, dawg, and subscribe now on the I Heart app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi, this is Bohane Yang here, and if you're as excited as I am about the upcoming fourth season of Search Party on Biomax, then you'll want to tune in to Search Party the podcast. In each episode, I go behind the scenes with the writers and actors of the disturbingly dark comedy and chat favorite moments and things with special guests. Celebrity Fans.

Search Party Season four comes to Biomax on January 14th, eight seasons one through three available now. Meanwhile, subscribe and listen to Search Party, the podcast on the radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.