Kids get caught up in technical & electronic things like games & videos when all we had were magazines.

Every kid wants to reach their goals in life and be the best. During my Bruce Lee phase, I wanted to be the best martial artist in the world.

Being involved and hanging out with my brothers who skate is really amazing, especially because of our age. I mean, we're in our mid-late forties and we're still skateboarding in competitions. Who'd have ever thought?

It felt like I was a bucket full of holes. Things kept going in but just as quickly, they'd drain out. So I had people telling me I was this and that and then I'd feel pressure to perform up to their standards, jumping through hoops so I could live up to their expectations.

I wanted to be the best in the world and at 12 years-old I won my first big amateur contest called The Gold Cup Series Contest at Marina Del Ray Skatepark. That's when I really started to believe I could turn pro, though it wasn't until two years later when I was 14 that I actually did with Sims.

When skateboarding hit, I wanted to be best skateboarder in the world, and I fought for it, there was nothing that was going to get in my way.

I was introduced to skateboarding through my father. He was a surfer back in the 50's & 60's in Hawaii, where my parents grew up. They later moved to California and I was born. Skateboarding was the thing for surfers here in California in the 60's and my Dad immediately made me a homemade board.