Danny Way.

Are you stoked on the resurgence of the classically trained pool skaters of the '80s?

I think it's cool to watch so many guys that rip pools, and that are just good in general. But it's good to see all the guys l grew up watching still skating, inspiring, motivating. And then there are guys like Chris Miller who have always been skating behind the scenes that take any one of us out in a pool currently, so it's fun to watch him.

How sick would Gator be in one of these contests if they let him out?

Gator, I mean, that sucks--obviously--what he's done, but he was one of my favorite skateboarders growing up. I totally think he's one of the baddest pool skaters I've ever seen. He definitely put together some crazy combinations, technical stuff, too. He always had the style.

What's up with your Hawaiian skateboard compound?

Nothing really, yet. I've just been trying to take it one step at a time and not do anything that's not permitted or illegal. I'm trying to get a house on the property before I do anything. Without a house there's not really any place to stay or hang out, so that has to happen first. And that's just getting approved, so hopefully within the next year I can get that done and then start experimenting with some of the skate stuff.

How big is the property?

Twenty acres.

Sounds like the kid from Rainbow did alright for himself.

Definitely got a good deal on the property. It's up in the hills; it's going to be insane if I can ever get some of the skate stuff I've envisioned built on this property. It would be, I think, some of the craziest stuff ever built.

What do you think is the mandatory thing for a good skatepark design?

It's hard to say, depending on what the area is. I'm a big believer in the street plaza thing. It's cool to see parks that have good bowls and concrete, more diverse terrain and stuff than just plaza stuff. I don't necessarily like to see the combination of all of it together. It's cool when there's a good bowl or a good public park for vert, but the street plaza is the most ideal for what the whole skate community needs. It's the best concept I've seen, but at the same time kids need to learn to control their speed. They try to incorporate everything into one, and it turns out pretty shitty when they do that.

They try too hard and they miss it.

Yeah. I mean, I love tranny, no question about it. I like pumping around parks that have all kinds of different things, and have good lines and a good flow through it.

You said it's all about the diversity. If you're not well-rounded--the era that we came through where everybody skated everything, you had to have that.

I don't know how many of the kids that are into skateboarding right now know how many of their skate legend heroes have come through an era where tranny was one of the fundamentals you had to learn. Guys like Koston can skate vert.

Oh, of course he can.

Guy Mariano? Jason Lee? Gonz? All those guys back in the day hit it up.

Do you have any desire to do the loop or to loop a fullpipe?

I'm not opposed to doing it, but I'm not going to set out on a mission to do the loop. If I end up at a place and the loop's set up and everyone's doing it, I'll definitely give it a try. I'm not that interested in it where I'm going to set out on a mission to do it. But I would definitely go for it if it were sitting in front of me.

Tell me the story about Dyrdek trying the MegaRamp.

We took him down there a couple times; we went to the warehouse where we've got the vert ramp. We tried to get him trained in there a little so he could get ready for it, tried to teach him how to do some backside airs and drop in from the extensions and stuff in there. Did that for like a week and took him to Bob's house where he'd built the MegaRamp. He went up there and stood up there for like an hour trying to psyche himself up to do it, and kept dropping in and jumping off the board. He would barely get 10 feet, and then just jump off and slide.

He'd jump off on the tranny and slide down that thing?

Yeah, but it's not like the one at Point X. This one's more mellow. It's not the X-Games where it's like crazy gnarly, so he can jump off and slide down no problem. He did that a bunch. He's gone out there like four times now but hasn't committed to shooting the gap once. I give him respect for the motivation. He'll eventually do it. I don't think he's done trying.

Is it going to make the TV show if he does?

Yeah. The last season's finale for his show is him not jumping it, going out there, Bob and I showing him how to do it, and him basically flipping out. The first episode of the next season hopefully he can get this done for the start of his show.

What's the new shit going on out there that Bob's percolating with? Or anybody?

Bob's been putting in some hours on the MegaRamp. He's done some tricks that I can't even comprehend lately. Hopefully he won't get pissed if I let his secrets out of the bag, but switch backside 180 frontside late shove-it no grab over the 50-foot gap. Then he did a switch backside 360 ollie.

How do you session something like that? What's the sequence of events there?

There's so much time between each go, by the time you get back to the top and drop in it's been like five minutes. Then you've got to take a breath. All in all, between tries you probably have seven to 10 minutes of down time.

You can't break a sweat?

You can, depending on what you're trying and how amped you are. I get pretty damn sweaty when I'm doing the thing, but I have all the gear and shit on. I skate for three to four hours out there. It's not repetitious. You don't get worn out as quickly. You get beat up.

Oh, fuck yeah. I've seen the scars.

You get served up where you feel thrashed after three hours, but you're not winded.

So if you skate for three hours it's probably like 30 tries. You go out there with a mission you want to do. You don't just session, like, "I'll do this, I'll do that."

Yeah. We usually skate the quarterpipe from the landing ramp, and skate the lip for a little while 'til you get a good little sweat going, and then go up to the top and start jumping things. There's no real half stepping; when you drop in on that thing it's not like you can cruise. You go full speed ahead. It doesn't matter what you do over the gap. If you make it you've got to hit the quarterpipe and go like 10, 15 feet. So there's a real big gap from the time you actually step on your board and start warming up 'til you actually drop in. There's no warm up in between there.

It's got to be one of the scariest feelings.

It's not that big of a deal. It's more of a mental thing. Once you do it and feel it, it's not really as gnarly as it seems.

What about the heelflip lipside, Danny. What were you thinking?

Heelflip lip, I don't know. I was trying to think of anything I possibly could come up with, and that one somehow came together. Psyched on that one, for sure.

You still do motorcycles quite a bit?

No. I mean I have motorcycles; I would like to do more, but I feel like there's so much stuff I want to try and do on my skateboard here in the next couple years. If I get hurt, it's like, now is the time. There are no windows for going out and doing stupid shit.

You're 34 now?

Thirty-two.

Who are your three favorite concrete skaters of all time?

I'd have to say Hosoi, Miller, and Gator.

Has Christian ever done the MegaRamp?

He has not. He's been out there and come and checked it out a couple times. He didn't want to take a risk, but he's told me several times that he was pretty inspired to get on the program and wanted to do it.

He said that when he was in prison, "That's where I got to be and I'm sitting in prison. FUCK."

Shit, well I hope he gets on the Mega someday soon.

You could just session with Christian. It would hype you up, right?

Oh, it would hype me up. Fifteen-foot crossbone lien, Hosoi style.