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Curren Caples Birthday Party on Skateboarder

Hey! If you missed Curren Caples Sweet 16 video then you owe him a gift.
I'll just go ahead and assume that you didn't send your gift with any of the
Skateboarder Magazine guys who posted these photos from Curren's birthday bash
this weekend at the Vans Park with the Flip team.
That's cool. You can just, like, put some cash in a card and give it to me and
I'll totally make sure he gets it.

PHXAM UPDATE: DAY 1

Friday March 30th PHX AM 2012: Let's Get Ready To Rumble

The bros rolled over to the park at high noon for their practice session in the 90 degree heat while Griffin Collins went to go pick up Dan Lu and Cody Green from the airport. The park was filled with tie dye clad air babies, leather desert rats and eager Johnnys that were fine-tuning their routine. The crowd didn't stop Curren Caples from blasting face high airs and Taylor Smith from flipping into every hubba trick with ease. Once we had Dan Lu in our possession it was back to the hotel for a well deserved soak in the pool and some water cannon battles between Patrick Ryan and Cody Green that nearly ruined a couple's jacuzzi kissing session. After dinner it was time for the Bones Brigade Premiere and this separated the men from the boys. Exhausted by the desert sun the boys decided it was in their better interest to stay back and get some rest for the competition. Griffin and I rolled over to the Brigade premiere where it was filled mostly with older dudes who found themselves reminiscing about, "Back in the day." The showing of the video had a couple of glitches and pauses which made for perfect bathroom break moments that relieved many of the beer guzzling attendees. The curtain fell and the crowd wiped away their tears and roared with approval. —Grant Hatfield 

Since 66: 7-Minute Video History of Vans

In this 7-minute piece on the family that is Vans director Eliot Rausch tugs on our heartstrings with beautiful images of just a few of our family members. As he put it, "Vans came to me with a proposal to create a short film that embodied the essence of their brand. The creative exploration and freedom they allowed me was unlike anything I had ever experienced. Pure trust, pure faith, in my abilities as a story-teller / director and as a friend. In creating this piece, it was profound to realize the success of their company, at its core, is based on a similar model they share with everyone they work with. To feel part of a brand, part of a family, part of an authentic creative expression, truly moved me to my core."—Eliot Rausch 

Curren Caples DItch Photos on Flip

Head over to the Flip Skateboards site to see Curren Caples and friends skate a ditch with some beautiful photographic proof courtesy of Arto Saari

Behind Curren Caples Skateboard Mag Cover

  When the latest issue of The Skateboard Mag, with our own Curren Caples feeble grinding a 22-stair handrail on the cover, hit skateshops last week jaws hit the floor. The photo was amazing and cover worthy and any skater would be proud to have it on his wall but more mind-blowing than the trick was the fact that it was Curren. No one really expected such heights from Flip’s newest pro. Prior to that we’d never seen Curren hit a rail in the double digits; the bar was instantly raised on what people thought Curren was capable of. 
With such a break out cover dropping as Curren works on both his Flip and Vans video parts for next year we felt we should hit up Curren and the man behind the lens ace photographer, Anthony Acosta, and find out just what went into the amazing and surprising new cover. 

Anthony Acosta 

  We went there two weeks before we had to finish shooting his interview with Louie [Lopez] for The Skateboard Mag. Curren hit me up and was like, “I want to grind this 22-stair.” I was like, “Ok, when do you want to go?” Because that’s kind of rare from Curren. It was a Wednesday at 5pm and we drove out to the spot and it’s at a high school. I was already like, “Dude! We’re gonna get kicked out. Did you even do your homework?” We get there and it’s a full-blown basketball practice right next to the rail, the coach and everyone is looking at us. Cars are parked right near the spot; I was sure we were getting kicked out. I was thinking he did this on purpose so he could get out of it and say at least he tried. 
He rolled up to it a bunch of times but just didn’t do it, didn’t get to it. It was probably like 30 roll ups and then he says, “I think I can just feeble it easier.” So we set up on the other side and he starts rolling up to and rolling up to it. Probably close to 40 minutes pass by and I was getting nervous. I could tell he wasn’t that confident on it and I think the rail was way different than the time he looked at it. I told him, “We should just come back. There’s a lot of people, a lot of chaos, let’s just come back on Sunday when no one is around and we’ll get this done.” 
We were about to leave. He never even ollied onto it. We were skating flatground in the parking lot for a little bit and he started to say all the bushes were in the way to grind it and that’s why it was really weird but he thought he could do it if we came back and cut the bushes. We were with this kid named Louie and he was like, “I’ll just hold the bush for you.” So he went back up there and jumped on one and transferred into the bushes while Louie was holding the bush back, you can see it in the one photo. 
He walks back up and 50-50s it first try for real; you can see the bushes are touching his wheels. We were super-psyched and we were still set up for that side and he runs back up and jumps on a feeble grind on the other side and grinds down the whole thing without us being ready. He had the juice in him and he just had to go and do it. Me and the filmer, Riley, just looked at each like, “What is he doing?” He said, “I just had to get one on to know if I could do it.” So we hurry up and switch positions and set up in two minutes and I ran to the top because I thought that angle would look rad for that side and dude did it in like five tries. That thing is so steep that it just shot you straight into the floor. Usually big rails are kind of mellower so you can get on and ride it like a flat bar but this thing was like a train track into the cement. But he handled it! 
I was so stoked that he overcame the initial fear and handled business. It was really sick because I’ve never seen him skate a rail that big before. I wasn’t doubtful at all because I know that kid is so good and he could feeble it all day in his head; he’s got that. I just never seen him skate anything bigger than a 9-stair, I was more concerned about his confidence. It’s like dropping in on a vert ramp; the longer you sit up there the bigger it gets as you’re looking at it and it increases your chances of slamming or not doing it. I didn’t want to see him jump on one after an hour and have his feet wrong and just bail and get served. 
But he nailed it! 
I feel like that whole interview was the transition from him and Louie being little guys to now having big man tricks with pop and power. I think having this cover is a real statement for Curren. No one saw that coming. So many people have said, “I can’t believe that’s Curren!” Curren, who can win X Games tranny contests one day and then do 22-stair handrails the next. I think it’s just a sign of what is to come from these dudes. 

Curren Caples
We went to that school a month before to skate something else and I saw that rail and I asked if anyone had skated it and everyone said no. So I went back to just grind it and it took me at least 20 minutes, maybe longer to get myself to jump onto it because I was so scared to try it. I was crapping my pants. It was funny because that was the first day that I actually put together my pro Flip board and Acosta was like, “Dude! Look at your board! You gotta do it!” so I went for it and ended up jumping over the rail on the 50-50. After I grinded it Acosta told me I had to feeble it. It took me about five tries but that freefall side was way worse. The other side you could just fall and land in the bushes but the feeble side was just fall to flat. It was scary. Luckily, I didn’t get served. One I jumped off midway. And the first one I tried I slipped into boardslide and went down the whole thing in a boardslide so that was really scary.
It’s pretty funny because everyone knows I can kind of skate street but they didn’t know I could actually skate street so people have been tripping out. Everyone was shocked. I was shocked! I wasn’t expecting it to be a cover. But I was psyched they liked it enough for a cover. I showed my mom the cover online and she was like, “Is that fake?” Like someone had made a fake cover of me as a joke.
But I’m stoked and I think this cover will help a lot with the Vans video to bring more hype around my part for people who weren’t really talking about it. I want to show people what I can do and that I can do other stuff than just frontside flips and fronstside airs.

FIRST TRY FRIDAYS

FIRST TRY FRIDAYS with Ben Nordbeg, Curren Caples and Mikey Taylor.