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Steve Alba maintains the highest level of respect in the skate community. I have had the pleasure of skating with him
on more than a few occasions and can attest to his amazing abilities to shred apart any pool, anywhere at anytime. One time,
he took me to Palm Springs to skate some pools that he heard of. We jumped a fence to see a pristene right hand kidney with
a ton of vert. I jumped in to try to get a few runs in before Salba took over and it was so slippery and gnarly that I could
barely grind it....Salba jumped in and went over every deathbox, light, stair, and step in his run. By his second run, he
was throwing airs around like it was nothing.....I was blown away.....Rob
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| Salba-right at home.... |
MW 1. Did you really cement you backyard back in the day? If so, were your parents pissed or what?
SALBA Yes I did....sick of mowing the lawn and picking up dogshit...so I did it and yeah, they were super pissed at first...
MW 2. Being from the east coast, I only saw what was printed in the mags. Did you hang out with Duane and Olson a lot
or was it just portrayed like that?
SALBA Yeah, we did hang quite a bit and meet at shows or go together...d.p. and my girlfriend were roommates so we hung
out even more cuz of that....we'd go party in the mountains at the Baldy rock slide.
MW 3. When was the first time you went to Baldy and who was it with?
SALBA Don't really remember..I have been going for so long..but like in 6th grade or something like '75 with my old sk8
bros mike martin, and the lozone bros.
MW 4. When you took us to Baldy that time, you said that it was tradition to have all newcomers jump the gap before sessioning
the pipe. Was that true or was it just a ploy to see if we'd do it?
SALBA I made everyone jump at one point but, nowadays, everybody is a big pussy...it's not politically correct to make
people suffer anymore...pussies for sure but, I still do it...just did it the other day and boy, was it scary!!
MW 5. How did feel that last session at Pipeline when the place was getting torn down?
SALBA It was rad but sad at the same time...your playground was being lost forever and all the people you met there and
memories will be intact though....a great loss for skating..
MW 6. Did you guys really hate the Variflex crew?
SALBA Yes and no...Lance was cool, Orton was a goon, Grisham skated hard but, had varistyle and Losi once shot his board
at me so I spit on him during his run... Eddie was a robot and all my punker friends would spit on him while he skated and
fight with his brothers....good clean all american fun. Yeah, I love those guys!!!!!!!
MW 7. What was it like doing the DEVO Freedom of Choice video?
SALBA Hella fun. Long hours but free catered food and 300 bucks a day even then....super rad to hang with DEVO...quite
an accomplishment nowadays....
MW 8. I never got to skate all the famous SoCal parks (except DelMar). All we had was Cherry Hill!@# How did you think
that park compared to all the SoCal ones?
SALBA Cherry Hill killed DelMar as far as I'm concerned but the DM locals would probably not agree with me....that pool
was fun but way too mellow. Upland rules as with Lakewood, Big-O rocked as did Whittier, Colton was super fun and the snake
run there killed all, all, all, all who'd follow...Winchesters pool was sick as shit and Milpitas was rad..but Cherry Hill
had it all-pools, halfpipe with oververt....never made it to Apple but, Cherry Hill was insane...one of the best ever!!
MW 9. Give me a quick estimate on how many pools you think you've skated and which are your top 5?
SALBA At least 1,000 and more like 1,500 for sure....figure 50 pools a summer for 30 summers now and that is a small
estimate...the best for me.....L pool, San Juan, Dolphin pool, the valley earthquake pool scen and the trailer park pool in
H.B.
MW 10. Lastly, you are known today as the best and most dedicated pool rider ever. Does it make you feel good that so
many people look up to you for that?
SALBA I'm stoked that people dig what I do...but it is kinda strange to believe people look up to me.....
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