Allen Losi skated for Variflex in the times of Cherry Hill and Apple. Two summer tours for that team in 1980 and '81 took him these fabled locations. Interview conducted in-person at the offices of Sole Technology in Lake Forest, California on April 11, 2002.
How did that whole Variflex Tour come about?
I think it was the second Variflex tour. No, actually, it was the first one—I remember seeing my [Skateboarder] photo from Oasis, so it would have been the first tour.
Summer, 1980?
Yeah. I even have the Variflex shirts from the '80 and '81 tours. I was diggin' through the other day looking at them—that would have been the '80 tour.
Had you guys heard of Apple before that?
Yeah, Apple and Cherry Hill were very well—I wouldn't say promoted, because everything had pictures in mags then—but I think by word of mouth, all skaters really wanted to migrate to that place to ride it.
Cherry Hill?
Yeah, Cherry Hill and Apple were both prestigious spots for skaters.
What did you think of Apple?
I cheated, cuz I flew to Cherry Hill before I drove to Apple. So, I'd already seen Cherry Hill—the indoor mecca, modern thing. When I walked into Apple, it seemed like it was the next version of what Cherry Hill was...until I rode it. A lot of things at Apple were better and a lot of things were worse than Cherry Hill.
What was Cherry Hill like?
I think Cherry Hill had a really good concept in design—they just didn't have enough knowledge of how to do it when they built the bowls.
What was wrong with them?
The consistency in the pools—one pool would be really good, the next pool would be completely unridable cuz the surface was done so wrong. It's like they flew different people in for every step of the project, or something—it was all messed-up.
Which pools were the good ones at Cherry Hill?
The kidney all the way in the back—so it would have been the right-hand kidney—and the egg bowl. The halfpipe was fun, and that little footie bowl thing was a ball.
Were Cherry Hill's kidney and egg pools pretty much perfect?
Yeah, except the back kidney was a little too shallow, it had a quick—what I call widow-maker—transition (laughs). It was weird—you went from one pool that was eight feet deep and not even vert to the other one that was fifteen feet deep with three feet of vert and kind of nothing in between—and I was twelve (laughs). So, that thing was huge, man.
Was Cherry Hill's halfpipe smooth?
Yeah, it had a little ripple at the bottom, I think Apple's halfpipe and two-thirds pipe was smoother and didn't have the bottom ripple that Cherry Hill's had. But, I think Cherry Hill had a better radius-to-vert size format.
Did Cherry Hill have any banks?
Yeah, it had a killer street thing—a few rectangles connected at a hip and you could fly over it. You could grind the edge, ollie over the hip—it was really new-school for that time.
What do you remember about going into Apple?
I remember having a lot of fun (laughs). I remember showing-up and seeing my first full-page color picture in a skateboard publication and kind of being overwhelmed by it. Actually, it was black and white—it was The Big O, the layback air, or something like that. I wasn't really aware of magazines yet—I didn't catch-on to that until much later in my skating career.
Do you remember any stuff that was going down at Apple?
No—I was thirteen, fourteen. They drove-up in a van and I jumped-out and rode.
The whole Variflex team was there?
A lot of it—as many people as we could fit in the van (laughs). I don't remember everybody right off the bat, but I'm sure I could in five minutes. But it was an absolute ball. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I'm very grateful to my parents—forgive my language—for giving enough of a fuck to take us all out there, because nobody made money at skateboarding then. If you cared about it, you did it. It was a chance and a reward that I really will cherish and not forget.
Do you remember any of the pools at Apple—the kidney and egg?
Yeah, I do, and I remember that I had a lot of trouble there—for some reason—because of the way the coping was. I used to hang-out in the back halfpipe thing a whole bunch because I was so intimidated—I was young—by how hook-lipped the coping was there. I couldn't figure that out yet (laughs). I rode the halfpipe more than anything at that place.
That was the smoothest halfpipe ever.
Yeah, it was very fluid—it was very easy just to roll and get speed.
It just barely touched vert.
Yeah, that was almost a problem I had—I would go over the deck a lot. I was kind of getting used to vert and I was having trouble because it had a lack of.
Do you remember the keyhole at Apple?
That thing was shallow, too—that was a widow-maker, for sure.
The banked L-bowl.
The banked L-bowl was kind of a improved version of the Cherry Hill bathtub that I was describing.
What do you think was better about Apple than Cherry Hill?
Halfpipe, I'm going to call it better—but it was different, size-wise. I think Cherry Hill's pools were better. I liked Cherry Hill's little footie bank better, although a lot of people would probably disagree with me. I was young and I enjoyed the little one better. Apple definitely had a more complete, functional skatepark ridability than Cherry Hill did. You could enjoy every item at Apple more than you could enjoy every item at Cherry Hill, but Cherry Hill had a couple of items that I liked better.
Do you remember doing anything in the two-thirds pipe at Apple?
No, I couldn't get it—I was too small. Just fly-outs from the two-thirds to the halfpipe, tail-taps, lipslides—I always loved to do lipslides. I remember Eric Grisham, Eddie Elguera and Steve Hirsch ripping the hell out of it. I remember Grisham doing huge, standing-up rock 'n' roll slides on the two-thirds pipe—not where you're like this (leans far inside). His board came all the way up—it was just gnarly, dude.
He pulled it in?
Yeah, Grisham is one of the gnarlier skaters I've ever seen and he proves it on big shit—and that was big, gnarly stuff. The bigger it is, the more he'll impress ya (laughs)—no doubt about it. The only contest he ever really won was SkaterCross, Pipeline and big shit (laughs). He's never won anything on small vert, never. I thought he was going to win Big-O, but he hurt his knee. But, every time he ever won, it was four feet of vert or more, pretty much. I remember reading about all of you guys later on, too, after that generation faded and the new group came up.
A few years later.
Yeah, it was pretty cool, though.
Rob Roskopp and Marty Jimenez used to skate at Apple.
Yeah, I remember talking to Rob about it the day he blew his thumb out. He broke his thumb one time in Santa Cruz—it blew-up like a grapefruit. We got into humoring him while he was in pain, and I remember, for some reason, Apple was part of that conversation (laughs).
You mentioned before that you walked into Apple and it was all painted-up...
Oh, yeah—it was a professional business. Cherry Hill wasn't—it was a warehouse (laughs), way more ghetto, dirt. I got no complaints with either one whatsoever, I just prefer to have good terrain and people that are fun to ride with—that's all you can ask for.
It's weird those massive parks were open less than two years.
It's sad—all that money, all the effort, engineering, construction, labor. It was one of the best places that people will never really experience.
After Apple, did you get in the motorhome and go on tour?
Yeah, we were gone for three months, almost. The second tour was two months, the first one was like three months.
Did you go to Get-A-Way?
Yeah, I rode Huntsville.
Was that a good one?
Incredible. In fact, the overall park was fair, but man, that keyhole was incredible.
What was so good about it?
It was the fastest surface, with the best coping I ever rode.
Did it have flat bottom?
Not much (laughs), it was very tight—it had a little flat. It was half the diameter of Del Mar with twice the vert (laughs). It was so fast and fun—it reminded me of Oasis' new keyhole right before Oasis closed and they converted the back egg bowl to a keyhole. [Get-A-Way's keyhole] was a bigger version of that concept built perfectly.
Do you remember the three-quarter capsule-pipe at Get-A-Way?
Yeah, I rode it a little, but that was another thing that you needed to be Eric Grisham, the man, to ride and I was little Allen, the school boy. I'll tell you one thing that blew me away was Skateboard USA in Michigan. That was probably the gnarliest thing I've ever ridden in my life. It was—honest to God—probably eleven-and-a-half foot transitions with four-and-a-half to five feet of vert and the coping was that big, nasty, bull-nosed coping. It stuck-out so much, you could see at least a half-inch of flat sticking-out where the coping was supposed to be set back more (laughs). Grisham was doing frontside airs over my head back then. I couldn't even do a rock 'n' roll, and Grisham was pumping airs over my head.
Was it bigger than Upland's combi-pool?
Oh, hell yeah—pool, vert, coping. Smaller tranny, more vert, big kink.
Than the Upland square-pool?
It would be like like a keyhole version of the square face-wall at Upland. Now make that into a keyhole with bigger coping, that's what Grisham was riding, dude (laughs)—with a big kink in the middle of the tranny.
Did he grind it?
He ripped it, he sessioned it, he did full contest runs—pumping airs over my head. I couldn't believe it. Me and Ziggy Siegfried both barely made rock 'n' rolls and we were stoked (laughs). Grisham was one of the most manly skaters of all-time, for sure. But if he didn't have that vert, he didn't shine.
Was that Endless Summer or Skateboard USA?
That was Skateboard USA. Endless Summer was in Detroit.
How was that one?
That one was funner—right-hand kidney. Rained a lot—we ran-around and slid in the pool. I remember running and diving in. The surface was so slick, you could run on the deck, head-dive right into it on the rain and just slide on your stomach—it wouldn't fuck you up. That's how slippery it was.
Do you remember anything else about that tour?
I could write you a book about that tour, bro. Mike Jeslowski [Cherry Hill] was probably the most under-rated skater of all-time. That guy was so rad, dude—he was so fast. How good the concrete surface was. Out here [in California] we were riding too much brushed concrete. We went out there [East], rode smooth concrete and it was just overwhelming. The biggest thing is going to be the surface. Cherry Hill and Apple had a more modern surface than any California park.
It was plaster.
But the way they finished it was better than what we had (laughs)—distinctively. And I rode a lot, you know? The only park out here at that time that had a surface near that was Big-O.
Who owned Colton?
My mom got a job there as manager of the skatepark and she worked for some company that owned it. Later on, my whole family got more involved. Then the corporation was backing out, skateboarding was dying, my family was trying to save the park. It kind of made it harder for my father to accomplish some goals, then the corporation said, "There's no way we're going to let you do it anymore," and kicked us out.
Your dad's name is Gil Losi?
Yeah, he runs Team Losi Radio-Controlled Car Manufacturing.
Is that where you work?
No (laughs), I did for the last ten years, but right now I'm unemployed—proudly unemployed (laughs).
Where do you live at these days?
Upland.
Do you go skate Vans Ontario and Fontana?
Yeah, I do a little—I get hurt a lot lately. When I'm not hurt, I ride.
Have you been to Fontana?
Once. I really thought it was smooth and fun, but once again, I hurt my ankle and couldn't do much.
What has been a highlight in skateboarding for you?
The thing I miss most is the eleven-in-the-morning, barefoot, bank-riding sessions at Del Mar with Bruno Herzog, Reese Simpson, Jamie, Swank, you and Duncan—those were truly probably my favorite times on a skateboard.