Robert Brink - Writer

Chris Cole X Games 11 Interview

February 22, 2006 | Skip To The Comments (1)

Ok, here's the deal. At a large event like the X Games, before they can even catch their breath from skating the contest, all the medal winners get shuffled into press room and sit at a table waiting for reporters to swarm in, acting all frantic and asking gay questions, as if they are interviewing Tiger Woods or Kobe Bryant after some huge tournament or game or something.

At Summer X Games 11, I was providing the skate coverage for EXPN.com. Most of the time I just put my recorder down on the table and let the other reporters do all the work. But sometimes the questions got lame, so I had to chime ask my own too. So here's a never-before-seen Chris Cole interview from after he won the bronze medal medal in Street. I pressed "record" in the middle of him answering a question from another reporter dude...

Cole: …I don't think the runs counted as much as the jams. I think if you skated good in the jam sessions you had it. But a lot of the contests don't even have a run, they just have jam sessions, and those are ideal.

Male Reporter #1: So what was your best trick? The 360 thing at the end?

Cole: Ya…that was the best trick I pulled. I didn't get too nuts out there. I didn't get too many crazy moves. I tried to skate well enough just to keep up.

Male reporter #1: Is it tough to keep up with Paul?

Oh it's impossible to keep up with Paul. [Reporters start their fake laughter, as if they really know what Chris is talking about] He's on of the chosen ones. The chosen few whose skateboard is one with him. He knows exactly what to do with it. I'm kinda more “no brains no headache.”

Male reporter #2: Well that's ok I guess for big falls! [More fake laughter.]

Yeah, serious.

Female reporter: How cool is it having Christian Hosoi here?

He was my favorite skater when I was a kid. I had a videotape at my house and it had him at a contest with a shredded tee shirt doing all this awesome stuff. He was my favorite. I wanted to be that dude when I was a kid.

Female reporter: What was it like to be skating in front of him? I was watching and he was giving a couple nods to you.

I was awesome. It was rad. I just met him when he was at the Vans park and it was great. It was good to see him. I called my friends and told them about it.

Male Reporter #1: What was the trick you ended up landing in the final stage and you were kinda going over and over and then probably landed it? I don't know because I didn't see.

It was a backside 360 kickflip. Um...yeah, that's it.

Male Reporter #1: Did you know going in you were gonna try that or is it something you just kind of…

Yeah, it was something I wanted to try but after I fell a couple times, I wasn't sure I was going to be able to do it. But then I thought about it and there was no not doing it. I had to do it so…

Male Reporter #1: Cuz if you try so often you don't want to feel like you've wasted the stage right?

It's kind of like, after a certain number of tries you start going backwards it feels. You start really not knowing how to do it. You develop bad habits real quick.

Male Reporter #1: Do you think that was the trick that put you on the podium?

I think so. I don't think I skated that good in anything else and the judges seemed to like that trick. It's awesome that I could be here and support my sponsors and stuff.

Brink: This was your first year here at the X Games. What made you decide to come? Was it just the fact that you were invited?

Well, I was invited and the format was really good. The skaters that they chose were really good. So even if you got dead last you got dead last with a lot of really good dudes. I skate for a shoe company called Fallen and they are a relatively new company and I want to support them as much as I can and this can help so I'm here.

Brink: Everyone but you and Bryan Herman have been here before. And when I asked Paul Rodriguez what he felt about you guys skating, he said that you were the one dude, that when he saw you, he was like “Uh oh.”

It was great. It's also a really good to be here because when mention to your girlfriend's family you're a professional skateboarder they never really know what that means or take it seriously until you are in the X Games so I figured I would stop by and be in them. So it makes them happy and gives them something to talk about.

[Lots of fake reporter laughter here]

Male Reporter #1: Do you enter a lot of competitions or do you just generally stick to the videos?

Just best trick contests. Those are the only ones I go to and I skip some and I'm mainly video part and tours. I do a lot of tours with Zero and Fallen. I do a lot of demos. It's important to go and kick it live for the kids, ya know? When you are in front of them like today, they get to actually watch you skate, it means so much more than a video. A video they get to watch all year round, and they are excited about it but when you come and skate in front of them they appreciate it.

Male Reporter #1: In a format like this, does it take someone who is totally really well-rounded on their board to win?

Ya, if you're not well-rounded in one of these, the other dudes are gonna take it. They are gonna take you for sure. Cuz, you know, Paul did an amazing line and then went to the ledges, skated the ledges amazing, trick after trick after trick, then went to the rail, trick after trick after trick, and then the launch—more tricks. And if you only got a couple of moves, you're gonna be doing those same moves in each spot and the judges aren't gonna feel it.

Brink: What was your favorite jam session?

The launch ramp. I liked watching the rail session though. The rail and the hubba…they were great because the dudes were breaking it off. Right when they said “Go!” there were like four dudes just went at the same time, it was nuts.

Male Reporter #1: How tough is Sheckler to come back after a fall like that? It looked like he might have shattered a rib when he went down in the rail section…

Ya, he probably bruised his ribs. Ribs are harsh. Ribs are really bad. I've hurt my ribs a couple times like before an autograph signing or something, doing the whole autograph signing with my arm above my head so I can breathe. It's rough.

Male Reporter #1: You weren't doing launch ramps afterwards like Sheckler, right?

Huh?

Male Reporter #1: You weren't doing launch ramps afterwards like Sheckler, right?

Um…no, no.

Male Reporter #1: Do people kinda give you guys credit for being as tough as you have to be to get through one these things?

What's weird is…there's crazy people that enjoy pain, and people fear people like that ya know? And skateboarding isn't really the same way. We don't really enjoy pain, but we have dedication enough that we will endure pain to get what we want. I think it goes through their head like “You guys fall all the time” and whatever, but they don't really know. They don't know what its like to fall all the time.

Male Reporter #1: You know Danny Way has fractured his ankle and he's gonna be doing…

Danny Way is like a super-human though. Danny way is the gnarliest of all of us. None of us have anything on what he's got. He's got like a messed up shoulder, no ACL, synthetic shit, fractured his ankle jumping the Great Wall of China, hung up yesterday on a 10-foot air. So he slammed, has all this wrong, and is still gonna skate. That dude is gnarly. I wanna be like him.

Brink: Seems like the regular contest runs were irrelevant in all this…

They sucked.

Brink: Ya it looked like no one was even into it.

I actually broke my board one minute before, so I had to switch my board and I couldn't even kickflip. So I was definitely doing nothing. But I got to have fun and do a couple dork tricks.

Male Reporter #1: Where are you from?

I'm from Langhorne Pennsylvania.

Male Reporter #1: How old are you?

I'm 23.