Etnies Presents: Ryan Sheckler’s Skate For A Cause 2012

Etnies just put up a video and some photos from this past weekend’s Skate For A Cause. Check it out.

Here’s our full video recap of this past weekend’s Skate For A Cause event put on by the Sheckler Foundation all to benefit the A.Skate Foundation. Check out all of the gnarly skating that was put down by Ryan Sheckler and all his friends. Click here to see photos from the event.And check back later this week for a behind the scenes video of Sheckler’s foundation and why they benefitted the ASkate Foundation this year.

It’s always so amazing seeing the skate community come together for a great cause and this year’s Skate For A Cause hosted by our frienda over at the Sheckler Foundation for it’s third year running was all to benefit our other friends Crys Worley and Peter Karvonen and their A.Skate Foundation which uses skateboarding as a tool to open autistic children up to the world. Ryan Sheckler and his foundation (which includes Gretchen, Haley and Angelique) pulled off an amazing event filled with tons of games, prizes, food and good times for all the kids that came out to see some great skating. Check out the photos below and check back later for a full video recap.
Photos & Text: Jaime Owens

Tons of games and goodies for the kids.



Even cupcakes.



Cool photo opps.



The crowd gathered.



The legends bowl jam started the day off. Dave Hatckett is one of the raddest guys out there and recently beat cancer, so it was awesome to see him still out there ripping. Check the face.



Sergi Ventura was whipping around the bowl faster than anyone and making it look good.



Steve Olson checking out some of Jay Adams photos.



Bill Weiss took a gnarly slam earlier in the day but still threw out some McTwist attempts for the crowd.



Elisa Swan and Crys Worley from A.Skate were all smiles.



This little guy is Sasha. He’s Crys Worley’s son and the reason A.Skate was founded. He had just met Sheckler moments before but was more worried about being able to skate. So here he is getting some.



Alex Midler is a straight shredder and is always down to support every charity skate event there is.



Shecks was having fun all day.



And he was busting all day too. Backside 180 over the table.



San Clemente local and one of Shecks’ good friends, Tony Panici, noseblunt slides con un sombrero.



Tons of heads were out to support the cause. Sheffey, Craig, Cannon and Creager playing games of SKATE.



Shecks frontside alley-oop 360



Andrew Cannon, frontside bluntslide.



Shecks gap up to backside tailslide all the way off.



Jordan Hoffart broke out some tech gnar. Laser flip back lip craze.



Future rippers getting stoked on all the festivities.



Sheffey didn’t care who was in his way and still got this noseslide.



Kevin Romar is all butter. Nollie heelflip.



Hawks



One last banger as time ran out. Shecks, euro-gap up to crooked grind.



At the end of the day, The Sheckler Foundation reached their goal of raising $50,000 for the A.Skate Foundation to help fund a 10 city tour to hold A.Skate clinics for autistic children around the country. What an amazing way to end the day.



Things got emotional.


Yep, a really good day.

click here to see video of the Skate For A Cause.

Got a free 30 minutes? Then you should watch and learn about the brand history of Etnies and Emerica. The CEO of Sole Tech gives you the whole inside scoop. Check it out.

We’re partnering up with the Sheckler Foundation this year to cover their Skate For A Cause event which is solely benefitting the A.Skate Foundation which helps children with autism through skateboard. It’s this saturday May 5th at the Etnies skatepark in Lake Forest, CA from 10am to 5pm so we hope to see you out there if you can make it.

etnies and the Sheckler Foundation’s Skate for a Cause event is this Saturday, May 5th, at the etnies Skatepark of Lake Forest, which is bringing out more than 30 pros and ams to compete in different contests to help benefit the charity A. skate.

Etnies is giving away one pair of VIP tickets to Skate for a Cause (which means full access inside the course and rubbing shoulders with all their favorite skaters) and a pair of autographed Sheckler 6 shoes to one lucky winner. All the contestants have to do is like both etnies and The Sheckler Foundation on Facebook then submit their entry here: http://contests.etnies.com/skate-for-a-cause-vip. The winner will be selected at random. Please feel free to share the news if you’d like!

Nick’s one of those people you can probably interview 100 times and get a great new story every time. Somehow he’s manage to float along from North Carolina to Florida to Vegas to Florida to California, all the while running into random trouble and ending up in precarious situations and never really letting them weigh him down. Debt collectors, drug dealers, biker dads, and more. I don’t know if he has a magnetic pull to those kinds of things, but he keeps finding his way into them, and lucky for us he’s willing to share them. So here’s a quick chat with Stacks and Super Brand’s new am Nick Zizzo, who we’ll hopefully be hearing a lot more from in the near and distant future. -Christian Senrud

Who are you, where are you from and who do you ride for?
I’m Nick. I’m 20 and from Fort Myers, Florida. I ride for Stacks, Super Brand, Etnies, Bliss Wheels, Pile Hardware, Cruizees, Pharmacy and Usko.

How’d you end up on Stacks?
It was actually through the Super Brand guys. Tony Larson, I asked him if he knew anyone I could get on because I didn’t have a board sponsor at the time. He was like, “Oh, hell yeah. I can send that over to Michael [Leon, owner/art director at Stacks].” Around that same time I met my friend Compton from Long Beach, who’s actually the guy who started Pile Hardware and he was interning for them at the same time too so he said he’d put in a good word for me too. I already knew Sebo and Adrian Adrid too, so they put in a good word. I guess just having a couple people kind of pushing it helped it work out.

Are you going to move in with Sebo now that you’re teammates?
I don’t think there’s too much room in the van, but that’d be pretty sick. He’s pretty much my neighbor anyway. He parks his car at Stoner all the time and I live pretty close to that, like three miles away. It’s like a five minute skate because it’s all downhill. He’s got a really good set up there.

Being from Fort Myers how’d you end up in California?
It was really random. One night my parents were going to fly out to help her out and she talked them out of it. I was in the room with my parents and my dad was like, “Well I already got the flight, what do you want me to do?” And she just told him to give it to me since I wanted to move out anyways. So my parents asked me if I was ready to move out to California the next day. It was kind of a shocking thing. I flew out here then had all my shit mailed out and my sister and I got a place together and it all worked out. It’s pretty sick.

Isn’t your dad like a gnarly biker?
Yeah, he’s fully tatted and all that. He’s like the complete opposite of me. He’s huge, scary as fuck, looks kind of like GG Allin sort of only way bigger. It’s sick. If anyone fucks with my sister I can just show them a picture of my dad. My dad still scares the shit out of me and I’ve known him for 20 years.

You lived in Vegas too right?
Yeah, that was kind of a crazy situation. Right when I graduated high school, I moved out. It was actually me and 12 other people, like all my homies from Florida and this photographer from Atlanta. I drove my car out and my friends rented a van. We drove cross-country to LA and San Diego to skate and whatever. Me and my friend Aaron who I grew up with actually ended up staying at Black Box. It didn’t work out really. It fizzled out pretty quick so I was kind of stuck out there. My friend I grew up with called me saying he heard I was in Carlsbad and I was like, “Yeah, I’m kind of sleeping in a tent on the beach right now.” He told me to come stay with him, so I stayed there for a minute then went with him to Vegas where he lived until I figured my shit out. I met all the Pharmacy dudes out there and they helped me out and took me under their wing so I ended up staying there for a year or so.

So living in Vegas for a full year, how many strains of Hepatitis do you have?
None that I know of. There’s definitely some sketchy shit going down there, I just tried to stay away from it. I stayed away from The Strip as much as possible. Being in Vegas, you’re kind of prone to go there once or twice a week.

You take part in any high roller shit or penthouse coke parties or anything like that?
I actually went on a secret drug run to San Francisco the first week I was there and I didn’t even know it. I was at a friend’s house and this dude came up to me and said he and some people were going to San Francisco if I wanted to come. I’d never been to SF so I was down, so I hopped into this dude’s truck and we drove out there. The whole time I thought we were just down to skate and I guess it wasn’t really like that. We made it to some skatepark in Sacramento and I guess those dude’s didn’t really know I don’t smoke weed and they’d gotten me a brownie from the weed store or whatever. I just thought it was a normal brownie because it was already open, so I ate like 3/4s of it and they were in shock that I ate that much. They were like, “Holy shit, you ate a lot of that.” And I was like, “Yeah, I’m starving.” They told me it was a weed brownie and I was like, “Oh shit.” I was fucked out of my mind for the whole day, like 9 hours, and I woke up later on some farm two hours past SF. I just woke up to bags of weed being thrown into the truck. We went back and skated around the city. After that I tried to stay away from those people.

Are you working right now?
I work at a restaurant as a busser. It’s pretty hectic. A lot of famous people go there. The day I started, Sean Penn came in and I was in shock. I think that’s the second or third time I’ve ever been star struck. I was like, “Holy shit, that’s Spicoli!” So I made sure to be the dude to give him the silverware and that shit. Then he asked one of the servers if anyone had a cigarette, so I got to give Spicoli a cigarette. That’s pretty much it. I should’ve tried to charge him a hundred bucks or something, but I didn’t. Actually the next day and he came in, not even to eat. He just came in and asked me to use my lighter. He just kind of chilled outside for two hours then left. It was weird.

Did you get a photo with him or anything?
No, you’re not allowed to have your phone at work. I guess if you get caught with a phone, you get fired. It’s crazy. They’re just trying to keep it professional so the staff doesn’t fan out and shit, which is funny because I’m not professional at all. I’m a pile of shit working at this super nice restaurant. The money’s good, so it’s cool.

What else you got coming up this year?
Super Brand is coming out with a video by the end of the year because we’re doing a lot of trips. It’s going to be all the footage from the trips. I’m not sure if people are going to have parts or whatever but they’re really creative with their ideas so I’m sure it’ll be cool. Then Stacks is trying to make a video too, so I’m filming an intro video for them too.

Daryl has been tossed (literally) out of a bar, is almost homeless and morphed into Forrest Gump whilst playing tee ball as a child. Jose explains his prostate exam, catching Jerry Hsu wanking in a hotel room and how Koston & Jeron snubbed him when he was a kid. All this nonsense and more on Weekend Buzz.

Wow this is going to be an epic day for you kids. Not only is the Flip team going to be at the Garage Skateshop Opening this weekend but so are some of the DVS team, Matix team, Vans team, DC team, and Etnies team. Come out to meet these legendary pros and get free product!

Words and Photos: Sam McGuire

It’s pretty impossible to pinpoint exactly what it takes to make it in skateboarding anymore. I’ve seen countless Youtube video of kids ripping and have plenty of photos of un-heard of kids doing tricks easily up to par with tricks you see in videos and magazines. Nick Garcia is a unique character in his own right. Long Beach born and raised, he wasn’t a kid of wealth, stature or family connections—but rather of hard work, perseverance and over all, just being a good person. He’s worked hard for everything he’s gotten and it’s great to see someone as deserving as him succeeding like he is. His energy is contagious, always skating and smiling he’s awesome to travel with, skate with and party with, enjoying every step along the way. I mean, basically what I’m trying to say is….he’s the challest!!!! Here’s 15 photos I had and some stories behind them and some travels I’ve been lucky enough to accompany Nick on. Be sure to check out his part on the Etnies website and keep your eyes out for his part in the new Element video as I’m sure it’s gonna be, well, sewperchall.

Backsmith – Melbourne, Oz
This spot was really cool but on a super busy street and right outside of a theatre so there were people going in and out, cars all over the place—it was a really hectic scene but I think I was more stressed out than he was. Think he boardslide it, backside 5050, feeble grinded it and then backsmithed it all pretty quickly. Pretty ripping if you ask me.

Wallride up to Noseblunt – Long Beach, CA
This was the first thing I shot of Nick and I think it was around the end of 2010. I have an annoyingly bad memory so I don’t quite recall the turn of events that linked us up, perhaps it was fate, but I think it was more Cole Matthews talking to me about trying to get Nick on Etnies. Paul Sharpe, the Etnies Team Manager at the time, also knew of him and was bugging me to go shoot with him, so we linked up one day and shot this wallride/wallie to noseblunt. He was killing it, I was really hyped on the way he was skating and so, I think we literally just skated this spot and bounced, on the way home I called Paul and was just like, “dude, we gotta put him on.” I think things got busy internally and it took a bit longer and I wasn’t quite sure it was going to happen….just due to how good he is he’d be a huge asset to any company. Luckily Nick was down to ride for Etnies, I heard rumors in the interim he was buying shoes at the skateshop just to rep the brand which I thought was super cool. In April of 2011 we went to Australia and he was there and just killed it the entire trip. Think that pretty much sealed the deal and can’t say how rad it’s been having him on the team. Very happy he stuck it out.

Big Ass Beer – Mallorca
We stayed in this German area of Mallorca and we both just got off a long Etnies trip before and flew straight to Spain from Amsterdam. A big exhausted we headed down to the beach to get some beers and they brought us these. It was the end of a long day and the beginning of another awesome trip and one of the best beers I’d had in a long time. Look how happy he looks. I love it.

Backsmith – Sydney, Oz
We got into Sydney at around 6 am and were all just wide-awake so we headed out skating. Nick was feeble grinding these wooden benches so I started shooting them and since he was grinding away from the camera I tried to get in as close as I could. I got in extra close one time and he switched it up and backsmithed it with his nose inches from my head. Scared me so bad I forgot if I even pushed the shutter but I must have right before I jumped away and, I don’t know, I’ve always liked the photo. Kind of a cool happy accident.

Diving – Mallorca
The whole trip we’d find postcards and then try to find the beach that was on that postcard and swim in it. This one had a perfect rock to jump off where Madars just went absolutely h.a.m. on that bad boy with big ole backflips and gainers. It was the first cliff jumping spot we’d found. It was so fun, and so scenic—never in a million years did I think I’d have taken a picture like this in a place like that. Huge thanks to Cole and everyone, let’s do it again!

Swimming – Mallorca
We spent 17 days in Mallorca with Element and got to drive all over the island and it’s beyond beautiful, but my only complaint would be there’s no waves, bro! Super glassy. So we’d just wade around the beach and rig up some goggles or a snorkel or whatever and try and find some fish or whatever. It was super chall.

Gap to Five O – Los Angeles
I drove by this spot on the way to the airport one morning and Nick needed an ad one month so we went to go check it out. This place is in Inglewood or Florence, south central and hood as a mo-fo. When they started skating there were these two pit bulls behind this fence that started going off! They started barking, but then they started barking at each other and then basically started to try and kill each other. There was blood all over the dogs they were going to rip each other apart when this stocky gnarly Mexican guy came out, totally ignored the dogs and asked me what I was doing. I just explained that we were trying to skate this spot but we needed him to take his dogs inside so they wouldn’t distract us. Then I was like, “That’s not gonna be a problem…is it?!” It was weird, he just seemed annoyed for some reason and said, “Well next time just come knock, don’t get my dogs all rawled up.” He dragged his bleeding dogs into his house and Nick gapped to 5-0’d the rail.

Wallie to Backsmith – Los Angeles
With the exploding popularity of internet videos, it’s hard sometimes to get the photo ran somewhere before the footage is put online—something that seems to be coming up more and more these days. This day, Etnies filmer Ricki Bedenbaugh hit me up to go shoot a photo with Nick. When I got there he told me he needed to use it in Nicks up coming commercial, set to release in a week. At first, it bummed me out because there was no way I could have gotten a photo ran in a week, but then I came up with this really epic plan of revenge to really show Ricki where the power lies. I was going to shoot….a still. That’s right, of a wallie up to back smith. So, I shot two of them and looked at it and realized it just looks like a front feeble. Well, that was a stupid idea.

Wallie over entire rail – Los Angeles
It did pay off in the end as after the wallie to back smith, he decided to just straight up wallie the entire rail and I got this cool photo. It never ran but it did make me feel like less of an idiot.

Sweat – Finland
Nick skated this rail for a few hours in the hot Finnish sun one afternoon. He slammed and sweat so much he salted out his pants and they were covered in wax, so I’m sure he was super excited I was annoying him taking his picture. He just rolls with it though and repped the pants all day—which is another reason I like Nick, he rips AND he’s fashion forward.

Ice Bar – Oslo
When we were in Oslo we stayed right by this Ice Bar lounge where the bar was completely made of ice and they served drinks out of big chunks of ice with cups shaved into them. It was, quite literally, sewperchall.

Noseblunt – Oslo, Norway.
We skated the demo and some other spots all day and after dinner we ended up at these step banks where a fierce session by car lights went down. It was pretty fun, just drinking beers and dorking around on these steep banks.

Tailslide – Oslo
We did a demo in Oslo at a courthouse, I believe. There was just a big rail with a slight kink at the end and the kids made an aisle to skate down and skate down it they did. It looked stressful but they killed it. Here he is tailsliding under some pretty claustrophobic conditions.

Backside Noseblunt – Barcelona
At some point during the Mallorca trip talks about Nick BS Noseblunting this big quarterpipe in Barcelona came up and Cole suggested we just take the ferry or fly to Barcelona to get the photo since no one was there when he filmed it. He said we could get a cheap flight, go there for a day, shoot the photos, fly back the next day and that’s exactly how that shit went down.

Be sure to enter our Nick Garcia Product Toss!