Riding a Dream
The highflying and grounded force behind Skatepark PV
Diane, Kristin, Myles, Amelia and Kenny Anderson. Photo by Ellen November
What began as a simple two-by-four board with roller skates attached to the bottom, “sidewalk surfing” has evolved more in the last half century than any other sport in the world. From the use of drained swimming pools to plywood ramps to common-day steps and handrails, skateboarders continue to push the laws of gravity as the sport increases in popularity.
But when someone mentions to professional skateboarder Kenny Anderson that skateboarding is the fastest growing sport in the world, Anderson is the first to argue the statement.
“Skateboarding is not so much a sport as it is a lifestyle,” the 34-year-old Anderson points out. “While skateboarding is still growing, there’s a whole different group of kids and whether you skate in contests or not, there’s a feeling – or relation – that doesn’t change. I can travel the world by myself, run into a kid with skates and completely relate to him as a skateboarder. The fact that I can ollie (a fundamental trick and often the first to be learned by a new skateboarder) and so can he – we have something to talk about and we can hang out.”
A professional skateboarder since the age of 20, Anderson has displayed his skills in countless countries and on every continent except Africa and Antarctica. Despite his worldly travels, it was the Palos Verdes Peninsula that caught his eye.
Kenny Anderson skates on natural terrain at one of four proposed sites for Skatepark PV. Photo
Raised in Las Vegas, Anderson and his wife Kristin became high school sweethearts after Kristin and her father moved from Torrance during her freshman year. It was during a trip to visit Kristin’s friends in her hometown that Kenny became enamored with the Palos Verdes Peninsula.
The couple eventually married and, after living in Redlands for four years while Kristin attended grad school for Speech-Language Pathology, the Andersons settled down in Rancho Palos Verdes where they live with their three children Diane, 5, and twins Amelia and Myles who will turn two on October 29.
“We looked at Santa Monica and considered moving up north to be away from everything because we like the preserved land,” Anderson said. “But I was floored with Palos Verdes. We’re only a half hour away from L.A. but far enough away to be home. We looked into school districts and everything the hill had to offer which was the best of the best. We plan on being here forever. It has an energy that has a positive vibe. It’s quiet and just feels like home.”
It wasn’t long before Anderson became involved in the community and is now playing a vital role in Skatepark PV, a drive to have a skate park constructed on the Peninsula. Currently, skateboarding is illegal anywhere on the Palos Verdes Peninsula, resulting in a $90 fine (RPV municipal code 12.16.120).
“The intention of Skatepark PV is to have a skate park built on the Peninsula that is a safe and welcoming place for all skateboarders,” said Ellen November, Chair of Skatepark PV. “Skateboarding is a mainstream sport now and a $4 billion industry. We have the support of the YMCA and many businesses. Kenny has been a great help. He is very genuine and a dynamic person.”
Anderson was one of many supporters to speak at the Rancho Palos Verdes city council meeting on September 21 where the council unanimously agreed to put Skatepark PV on its agenda in the near future.
“When I first moved to the Peninsula, I would skate to the store and be kicked off my board by security guards,” Anderson said. “I was talking to kids and asked them if there was a skate park up here and they said no. I asked where do they skate and they replied we can’t. Cat Spydell introduced me to Ellen November. Ellen is like a skateboarder. She has the passion of a skateboarder in every way. I don’t plan on leaving the hill, ever, so I’m here to create a park for the kids.”
Spydell’s son, Kodiak, has been skateboarding since the 7th grade and helps keep his peers on the Peninsula High School campus informed about Skatepark PV.
“Watching Kenny skate really inspires me,” said Spydell, a 17-year-old senior at Peninsula. “He’s always been there to help us out, whether it’s with broken boards or spotting us money for repairs.”
Suzy Seamans, a city councilwoman of Rolling Hills Estates, was one of the first to support the cause. More than 600 attended a Skatepark PV Expo and Fair on the roof of the Peninsula Center library, raising enough money to pay for an engineering feasibility study.
PCH Skate hosted a skateboard day camp at Ernie Howlett Park in Rolling Hills Estates and held free skate nights on every Friday and Saturday throughout the summer.
Anderson has deep feelings for the need of a skate park, relating to teenagers through his own life experiences.
“Skating is a focus. For me, if I didn’t skate, I don’t know what I would have done,” Anderson said. “Skating saved my life, skating kept me active, skating kept me focused in school and taught me everything in life. It would be different if nobody was skating up here. If you look at your environment and there’s nowhere to skate, you’re going to end up skating your environment.”
Anderson said that statistically, skateboarding is the third most popular youth sport behind basketball and football.
“If you go down the hill, there’s a park in every city,” Anderson explained. “A skate park is supporting the community and what the kids are doing. From there, it gives them a safe place to go, gives them a focus the same as a basketball court or even a dance studio. I’ve watched neighborhood kids grow up from say 12 to 16, which is a huge gap, and they still have the passion for skateboarding and still no place to skate.”
Wheels of Fortune
The youngest of six children, Anderson grew up playing neighborhood sports like football, basketball and soccer and enjoying snowboarding in the mountains near Las Vegas. He began skating at the age of ten, emulating his brother Kyle.
“I just copied my brother. Whatever he did, I wanted to do,” Anderson said. “I grabbed one of his old boards and started skating. When he and his friends got home, they were laughing at me, which made me feel a little insecure but it didn’t matter. The feeling of trying something, learning it and never truly being able to master it is a special feeling. I’ll wreck today just like I did when I started. I got addicted to that feeling. It becomes a lifestyle and it’s about form and technique. It’s a form of art. It’s taught me a lot about emotions, having the highs and lows of good days and bad days.”
Anderson said his parents, Alden and Reiko, were always supportive of his skateboarding and glad he found something to be passionate about.
“I always did well in school because I knew that if I did poorly, my parents wouldn’t let me skate,” Anderson recalled. “Kyle would travel out of town to skate and my parents would let me go with him because they trusted us. As long as I did well in school, I’d be able to do what I love to do the most and that’s skate.”
Anderson was sponsored at the age of 14 by Planet Earth Skateboards, but didn’t pursue a career in skateboarding at that time, focusing more on graduating and attending college where he wanted to study archeology or architecture. He attended UNLV, paying his way through college. In 1996, Anderson’s sponsor offered the 20-year-old an opportunity to go on the Planet Earth Skateboard Tour. He took off work and was part of a team that drove a van from California to Florida, taking in the sights and culture of America
“From that point, I was hooked,” Anderson said. “Doing demos for kids and signing autographs was really fun. I was a no name but part of that crew. Then the pros left Florida to skate in Europe. They got to fly for free, travel in Europe and got paid for it. I realized I had an opportunity that many people would die for. I went back home and moved to California to see what’s out there.”
The following year, Anderson began a relationship with Converse that would change his life forever.
“Converse decided to come out with a skate program and my roommate was their number one guy and he told them, ‘Hey, there’s this kid who always skates in Converse,’ and that’s how I got involved.”
In 1998, Anderson started traveling the world, a benefit of his talent that he enjoys to this day. He rode with Converse through 2001 when the company suffered financial difficulties and restructured itself. When Converse re-started its skate program, Anderson was contacted and the team reunited.
“I felt like I was getting my identity back and going back home,” Anderson said. “It’s great to be able to incorporate the classic Converse shoes, like Chucks, into skate shoes.”
Anderson’s style and charisma helped him progress to become one of the top skateboarders in the world, competing in the X-Games, Red Bull Manny Mania and winning the Grand Circuit prize and the Vans Triple Crown in 1998. His current sponsors include Converse shoes, Chocolate skateboards, Elwood clothing, Independent trucks, Satori wheels and Swiss bearings.
He considers himself fortunate not to have had career-ending injuries, his most serious accident coming in an attempt to catch himself while skating in the rain.
“My feet slipped, my hand slipped and I hit my chin, fracturing the jaw bone up by the ear,” Anderson said. “I rolled an ankle in 1997 and the doctor said it would have been better to have broken it. It was stretched so badly. That one comes back to bite now and again.”
Anderson said his scariest experience came when skating on a hand rail that had five kinks – or levels – in it.
“That night after I went to sleep, I relived the feeling of going down that rail and woke up shaking and sweating.”
Although he has cut down on competitive events, Anderson continues to have an impact on the next generation of skateboarders.
“I’m not too competitive of a person and you don’t necessarily have to do that to be a professional skateboarder,” Anderson explained. “It’s more of a lifestyle and what you do on your skateboard. Kids can relate more to a video than a contest win.”
Earlier this month, Anderson was a member of the Converse team that competed in the Thrasher King of the Road contest tour. He also signed autographs in his hometown for the Goody Two Shoe Foundation which provides shoes and backpacks with school supplies for underprivileged kids.
One event dear to Anderson’s heart will be held next month in Houston, TX, where Anderson will be one of more than 50 top skateboarders performing at the 14th annual Johnny Romano Skate Jam benefitting the Make A Wish Foundation.
“Elwood clothing produces a shirt once a year to raise money for that,” Anderson said. “I skated with Johnny and knew him personally. He passed away a couple of years ago, so it’s a really personal event.”
Staying focused
Despite his success, Anderson remains a well-grounded individual. While he admits he still has that “little kid energy” and skates four days a week – sometimes 12 hours a day – Anderson has learned to allocate time for his family.
“It’s much more difficult to travel and be away from family,” Anderson said. “The spontaneous skateboard schedule is no more. I went on a month-long trip and when I came home my daughter looked at me like she didn’t know me. From that point on I’ve had a two-week maximum on trips. I prioritize more now.”
Kristin said now that Diane is in kindergarten at Silver Spur Elementary and, with assistance from her mother-in-law and father, she has been able to return to work twice a week, serving as a Speech-Language Pathologist at Redondo Union High School.
“The kids have grown accustomed to having their dad away on trips,” Kristin said. “Kenny’s an excellent dad and I’m very fortunate to have my extended family and a career that I love so much.”
Kenny is adamant about letting his children discover their likes and dislikes on their own and won’t push them into skateboarding. However, Diane has shown more interest after receiving her first skateboard as a Christmas present and Myles will make a beeline to his father’s lap whenever Kenny is watching a skateboarding video on the computer.
A strong family man who was born to a Japanese mother and Danish father, Anderson is proud of his roots and is passionate that his children know their ancestry and heritage. He and Diane are taking a Japanese class together on Saturdays.
“Although we had a lot of Japanese culture in our household, I regret not learning the Japanese language growing up,” said Anderson, who visited Japan in 1999 and took his mother back in 2001.
“It was like a dream come true to take my mom back,” Anderson recalled. “She has a best friend there that she grew up with. To see my mom and her friend act like little girls was fun. We were raised with the Japanese culture in our house so to see it first hand was special. We saw little girls in uniforms at the train station, the same as my mom when she was that age.”
Kristin and Reiko plan to visit Japan by themselves next year.
“I really want to visit Denmark,” Anderson added. “There’s a pro contest in Copenhagen and for some reason I keep missing it.”
The Anderson children will undoubtedly have their lives chronicled by their father who not only uses skateboarding as a way to express his artistic side, but the medium of photography as well.
“When you travel, you always have to document it,” Anderson said. “Traveling with professional photographers, I’m able to see their media and formats which is very inspiring. Sometimes you don’t get to choose what you care about, it just hits you. What really got me back into photography was when my daughter was born. I brought out an old camera that I hadn’t used for years. Now I take at least two cameras with me on all my trips.”
Anderson’s work was recently displayed at This Gallery in Los Angeles. The exhibit showcased photos taken by Anderson during a trip to the Amazon River which was filmed for “First Hand,” a television program airing on Fuel TV that features Anderson at home and also on a skateboarding trip from Belem to Manaus, Brazil.
Anderson’s travels have created a deep concern for the environment, something he has translated into his everyday life. He recently remodeled his house in an environmentally safe method including materials and layout.
He also purchased a 1976 Mercedes 300D from a friend who owns a company that restores Mercedes automobiles. After reading about bio fuels and Waste Vegetable Oil (WVO), Anderson partnered with a friend at Mercedesmotoring.com and the two began experimenting with the use of alternative fuel.
He spent about $2,000 for a conversion kit and labor and has a 55 gallon drum with a pump at his house. Anderson picks up oil from local restaurants, brings it home, lets it settle and then filters it.
“I have my own gas station at home,” Anderson said. “I do it for the environment, something I try to incorporate into everything I do. When you are faced with decisions and you are aware of alternative options and truly care about it, who’s going to do it if not you? I want to teach my kids about every option and help them pave their own way.”
The Future
Anderson’s vision of having an environmentally-friendly skate park consists of four possible locations and he hopes the popularity of skateboarding will make the park a reality sooner than later.
“I think skateboarding is still growing,” Anderson said. “Doing what I do as a professional, being in contact with shops and all the kids on a personal level while traveling the world, I’m able to see the growth worldwide. Generations keep flourishing. On a mainstream level, the X-Games have had a huge influence on skateboarding. It’s brought awareness to people who ordinarily would not see our lifestyle which had led to the construction of so many skate parks around the world.”
Anderson credits Tony Hawk and others for their continued effort that has led to so many neighborhood skate parks being built. Hawk, the first superstar and household name in skateboarding, is placed on a pedestal by Anderson.
“No one can reach Tony. Rob Dyrdek and his show on MTV have enlightened many to the world of skateboarding. Paul Rodriguez (son of the comedian) has helped out a lot. He’s a great role model. He’s a hard-core skateboarder that’s a good example of lifestyle mixed with sport. His video parts and contest skating are so amazing and it’s the best of both worlds in people’s eyes. He does a lot of positive things including starting skate parks in L.A. I’ve watched him grow since he was on a schoolyard with his friends.”
While Anderson continues to push for a safe haven where the next generation of skateboarders can develop their skills, he is the first to stress the importance of an education.
“There have been moments, especially as I’ve gotten older, when I’ve realized how much I’ve sacrificed for skateboarding,” Anderson said. “I don’t take anything for granted in terms of what skateboarding has given me. As a young kid, archeology piqued my interest because of the traveling. Architecture came from taking art classes and my love for the design aspect. All the classes I’ve taken throughout high school and college have helped me learn. Whether it’s been photography, architecture or whatever, I have used the knowledge in my skateboarding career. That’s where the regrets don’t come in because I have the outlet to use what I’ve learned. I believe that is the reason I am in the position I am in. I’m very fortunate.” PEN