- [Interviewer] It's always been seen as like a rebellious thing?

- Exactly, it's just a rebel mentality, you know?

That's just as corny as that sounds.

- [Interviewer] Yeah.

(chuckles) - But it's serious though, like, growing up, you know, I was kind of more alone and everything.

I had some stuff going on at home so I was kind of just left to myself.

Like not really too much guidance and everything.

So I just kind of went out on my own.

I don't know, I'd always realize, like, even when I was younger, I was just always away from home, like 10 years old, just going around, like, all around the city, just on a bike, just away from home.

And then I was like, man, I wish I'd gotten out earlier 'cause this is my home.

This is where I'm meant to be, like, I don't have to be home with this.

(Skateboard sound) - What makes skateboarding unique?

I think just the people.

Everybody's good at their own things.

You got some skateboarders who are good at flat ground, some skateboarders that are good at rails, ledges, you know, there's different styles, but nobody really cares about that.

Everyone really cares.

If you have a good vibe, it doesn't matter what color you are, it doesn't matter what you look like, it doesn't matter your gender, as long as you can kick it, and you have a good time, and you have a good attitude, you can hang, then you're gonna be a homie.

And that's what's unique about it.

- These skaters get knocked out and they'll get right back up and they're like, nah nah.

Like, I'm getting that real quick.

It's like, dude, you have to be kind of insane for it, I feel like.

Mostly, what I see is like when people are like that and they're resilient, they constantly get up and they're back on and they're like, man, I don't care about taking that hit.

Like, usually they're just running away from something or like, I don't know, the problems- we're all out here.

We all have, we're all running away from something.

It's like, these are our problems and you slam out your problems, (car alarm sounds) you know?

- (gruff voice) Turn it off!

- (laughs) - I'd say skate culture in the Central Valley a lot of people are very, very supportive of it.

We have ArtHop, you can skate at ArtHop and you can combine yourself and immerse yourself and not only, just like the art and the music you get to meet cool people who may not skate themselves but they support it and they'll talk to you about it.

It's really nice just to see that whole arts community just, kind of flourish together.

(skateboard sounds) (clapping) - Skateboarding in the Central Valley, dude, it's gigantic man.

There's people from all over.

Everybody here is usually really good to each other.

And then all, there's a lot of spots, a lot of skateboarders from up north or down south come here to skate a lot of the time.

And it's just luckily that I wasn't born on like, you know, the outskirts or something.

If they don't have stuff that's big they wish that they could have, like, grown up skating here sometimes, you know?

So the people who don't understand it, it's like what thing do you have to hold onto that really gets you through my lifeline of skateboarding.

That's the only thing I've ever had to like grab through and just kind of keep going.

I don't know like it just gives you something to hold onto, you know?

(apple crunching) (skateboard wheels on pavement)