FREE IMPOSSIBLE: , , AND THE FANTASTIC HISTORY OF PDF

Cole Louison | 304 pages | 19 Jul 2011 | ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD | 9780762770267 | English | Old Saybrook, Mission: Impossible | GQ

The Impossible aims to get skateboarding right. Journalist Cole Louison gets inside the history, culture, and Ryan Sheckler personalities of skating. Read more Read less. Word Wise: Enabled Language: English. Shop now. Customers who bought this item also bought. Page 1 of 1 Start over Page 1 of 1. Previous page. Tony Impossible: Rodney Mullen Professional Skateboarder. . Kindle Edition. Next page. Review "David Foster Wallace on a . I was hooked from the start. This book blew it wide open for me. Until now, only obsessive freaks had any idea how interesting this sport is. And even obsessive freaks should stick around for the tale Louison has so lucidly spun. The Impossible is a universal story, told in imminently readable fashion by a tremendously talented writer. It honors the beauty, danger, and complexity of the sport, and lays bare its physical and psychological demands, and greatness. The Impossible and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding some of the finest writing on skating I've seen. I read it in one sitting. He also helped found one of the top alternative college publications: Buzzsaw Haircut. After a year on the Cape, a Vermont art colony offered him a writing grant, moving him to Ryan Sheckler, Vermont. The one-month residency turned into a job offer, and Louison spent a year in Vermont before selling his truck and moving to in fall Once there he became an editor at McSweeney's Quarterly Journal, joined the New Yorker softball team, and temped for Vogue, Esquire, and Vanity Fair before coming to GQ, where he works today while continuing to write on a freelance basis. From the Back Cover Skateboarding: the background, technicality, culture, rebellion, marketing, conflict, and future of the global sport as seen through two of its most influential and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding Since it all began half a century ago, skateboarding has come to mystify some and to mesmerize many, including its tens of millions of adherents throughout America and the world. And yet, as ubiquitous as it is today, its origins, manners, Ryan Sheckler methods are little understood. He does solargely by recounting the careers of the sport's Yoda--Rodney Mullen, who, in his mid-forties, remains the greatest skateboarder in the world, the godfather of all modern skateboarding tricks--and its Luke Skywalker--Ryan Sheckler, who became its youngest pro athlete and a celebrity at thirteen. The story begins in the s, when the first boards made their way to land in the form of Ryan Sheckler surfing in southern California. It then follows the sport's spikes, plateaus, and drops--including its billion-dollar apparel industry and its connection with art, fashion, and music. In The Impossible, we come to know and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding not only skateboarding, but also two very different, equally fascinating geniuses who have shaped the sport more than anyone else. Read more. Customer reviews. How are ratings calculated? Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. It also analyses reviews to verify trustworthiness. Review Impossible: Rodney Mullen product Share your thoughts with other customers. Write a customer review. Top reviews Most recent Top reviews. Top Ryan Sheckler from And the Fantastic History of Skateboarding. There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later. Verified Purchase. Didn't and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding understand how the skate culture was seeded and how tough these crew really are. Enjoyed this book and could not put it down. See all reviews. Top reviews from other countries. Mark Pack. A good history of skateboarding which centres on Tony Hawk, Rodney Mullen and Ryan Sheckler, written in quite an informal, chatty style. Watch out though - readers more knowledgeable than me about the topic can find a fair number of factual errors. Report abuse. Fab thanks. There's some good history here, but this book has a lot of big problems. Things and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding 1. It's riddled with errors. Some examples: -"Santa Cruz airman Jeff Phillips Trust me, 's socks know more about skateboarding than this author. The author states a lot of opinions as facts. Example: on page one, he declares Rodney Mullen "the greatest skateboarder in the world. Even in his competitive prime, one could make an argument that , Christian Hosoi, Tony Hawk were objectively better overall and far, far more daring. Did he invent lots of tricks? Yes, going 1. A teenaged Pat Duffy was doing s down huge double kinked rails while Rodney was still driveway dancing on a freestyle deck. Mullen is a tech god, and certainly a legendary innovator, but tech is only one facet of skateboarding. Many others were the complete package. This book is essentially an unauthorized biography of Rodney Mullen passed off as a general history of skateboarding. The hero worship and his general bias gets nauseating. It's not particularly well written, but I could have gotten past that if it were more factually accurate. The author clearly isn't a skater but pretends to Ryan Sheckler, which is the worst sin one can commit. To use a historically accurate skateboarding term, he's a poser and it's painful. Things I did with my friends at the same age. Only a few pages later, on Page 36, the author describes young Rodney Mullen breaking his front teeth. In that paragraph he refers to Rodney as Rod, Rodney and even Ryan. RIP Mom I have children in high school that could edit this book better than was done prior and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding publication. Not sure how that step got missed. It almost reminds me of the funny and decidedly unpolished truck reviews on YouTube. Too bad the unprofessional truck reviews are funny, short and free. Not Ryan Sheckler good buy. What's more to say. I have skated for over 20 years, Rodney Mullen is a hero of mine so I was looking for a book that was somewhat indepth and factual. I think this Impossible: Rodney Mullen the best skateboarding book I have read. I thought I knew a lot about Rodney but I this Ryan Sheckler taught me a few things I didn't know. I'll read this book again someday, too good to read just once. One person found this helpful. Back to top. Get to Know Us. Word Wise: Enabled. Language: English.

GQ researcher Cole Louison gave himself an impossible assignment: to write the complete history of a sport without it reading like a dusty encyclopedia or self-promotional wiki page. Plus explain what Ryan Sheckler "" is. Calling The Impossible a history of skateboarding somehow reduces it. But the tale of their relationships to and influence upon one another and the general simpatico between the masters of this universe stitches together a much more evolved brand of history. The complex narrative is made perceptible through the most disciplined prose possible. The Impossible proves many things: Skateboarding—like writing—is difficult and important. Doing either one well matters. And Louison has stuck his. Out today; for the rest of the book, go to Amazon. Ojai, California. A little before midnight. A big bald moon shines down through hulking conifer trees made lush by the mountain air and the California sun. One hundred miles northeast of Los Angeles, in his home in the valley of the Topatopa Mountains, Rodney Mullen is watching a rerun of the X-Games finals broadcast earlier in the day. He can also do this with a little step, and then be standing facing you while he and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding forward like Dracula, with one sneaker centered on the board and the other a millimeter off the ground. He does this now, moving along the perimeter of the course toward his starting point. In person, Sheckler looks like a pro athlete and a supermodel. He has a chiseled, tanned body, gold-green eyes, soft hair you want to touch, and a face that glistens into the air around him. His left, more intact, more tattooed arm is bent to his waist, and his right, more deformed arm is hanging by his side. His backwards hat is saturated down the brim and his face is shining. Ryan Allen Sheckler. Young Ryan. An indisputably accomplished athlete in terms of contests and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding medals and sponsorship. A child prodigy, reality MTV star, guest on Kimmel and Leno, a producer, businessman, and here, now, a decade-long veteran of professional competing-for-money contests and the most divisive figure in skateboarding, whose historic roster Ryan joined when he was thirteen. Jay Ryan Sheckler. Cab and Tommy. Natas and Gonz. Ron Allen. Ronnie and Koston. . P-Rod and P. Melch and Richie. Nyjah Huston and Dennis Busenitz. Chris Haslam. Antwuan Ryan Sheckler. Josiah Gatlyn. Chris Cole. Lizard King. When the light turns he pushes once Ryan Sheckler the platform and then bends and kicks out his right leg and lunges forward, eyes on the red wad rail ahead. Small, Ryan Sheckler, and "made to skate," according to his mentor, Sheckler stays bent as he turns his shoulders 90 degrees and puts his back foot on the board and bends into a Z shape as he lowly roars toward the stairs. An ollie. Land backwards with all his moving weight on the concave board on a long metal wad cylinder a little bit bigger around than a walnut, then and fall to the ground. He pumps his foot down and back twice, hard, and and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding the second kick, turns and tucks and leans back and rolls up the six-foot and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding to take flight. He turns frontside—meaning, the direction opposite the way his toes are pointing. Originally a surf word, frontside is still the term riders use when carving away from the wave they face, a backwards or blind carve. So Ryan turns frontside with his head down, back until the top of the differently angled wall enters his periphery and he and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding stomp down and land and ride away clean. Which he does. Eight seconds have passed. Tony Hawk is announcing the event from a well-hidden booth. Like all big contests, the are somewhat disdained Ryan Sheckler the general skateboard community, Impossible: Rodney Mullen part because of the point system used to rank skate runs. Similar to the Dr. Evans Pritchard method used in Dead Poets Society, the rating system ranks an overall run by assigning value to each trick, with more points for more complex or difficult maneuvers. He does this. After a few tricks on the transfer ramps and a grind over an arched rail that sounds like a sword being drawn down a water stone, Sheckler pushes back to the starting platform, pops his board into his hand, waits a breath, and starts again. This time he comes from the other side, Impossible: Rodney Mullen the rail up ahead is to his left. Backwards in skateboarding is called "fakie. His right palm drags him around degrees Ryan Sheckler then he flings both his arms up with his ass just over the and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding. Then, instead of popping the board off the wall and rolling down, Sheckler, perhaps inspired by the sensed blood of victory, ecutes one of Impossible: Rodney Mullen trademark blunt-force-trauma moves. With a back wheel locked over each edge of the wall, Sheckler spins like a bestial unicycler and wings his left arm out and windmills his right deformed arm behind him to rip himself off the wall frontside, or blind, over his shoulder, degrees, and roll back down. He softly flips Ryan Sheckler a thin low ramp leading to the roll-in area and steps off his board to bend down and let it roll back into his palm. The lights change. The crowd erupts. The top-ranked favorite inwith two previous gold medals, Sheckler had advanced directly to the finals where he flew off a stair set much like the one he dominated at the course. When this happened his foot exploded. He was and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding from the course, and soon after surgeons screwed his foot back together so it could hopefully start to heal. The video ended with something called a switch one-foot nose, which Mullen, in a fifteen-minute interview with Hawk, said took longer to perfect than anything done in his thirty years of professional skateboarding. And while most everything Rodney does is unique to his ability, this maneuver is especially, unimaginably impossible. The part was shot in black- and-white with a high-res mounted camera at a warehouse near where Mullen lives today. The light is dim and the floor, walls, ceiling, and long platform directly ahead are all black. The music is slow, nearly acoustic techno. This is the "switch" part of the switch one-foot nose. The board is nearly vertical and a foot Ryan Sheckler the platform when Rodney flicks its top-right corner with his torn shoe. Two seconds have passed. And before we hit four seconds Rodney brings his front sneaker down fast and traps the nose at the angle he wants, with just enough pressure to keep the back wheels off the ground and give them wiggle room. The board moves fore and aft under his body, but the whole time Mullen has his shoulders squared and head centered over the front truck, directly over which his sneaker is planted. The tail does two big nods, and on the second one he Ryan Sheckler to stick the back leg way out, almost in an arabesque, to correct the balance. He gives a little relad lift with his knee so the front wheels just pass over the edge as his back foot finds the tail again, and for the first time, we hear the hard solid clock of all four wheels landing at once, because Rodney always lands everything on all four wheels. The footage is now four years old and, Ryan Sheckler course, just footage. Related Stories for GQ Books.

Goodreads helps you keep track of books you Impossible: Rodney Mullen to read. Want to Read saving…. Want to Read Currently Reading Read. Other editions. Enlarge cover. Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Open Preview And the Fantastic History of Skateboarding a Problem? Details if other :. Thanks for telling us about the problem. Return to Book Page. Preview — The Impossible by Cole Louison. The Impossible aims to get skateboarding right. Get A Copy. Paperbackpages. Published July 19th by Lyons Press first published January 1st More Details Other Editions 4. Friend Reviews. To see what your friends Ryan Sheckler of and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding book, please sign up. To ask other readers Impossible: Rodney Mullen about The Impossibleplease sign up. Did you know the cover of this book was Ryan Sheckler kick flipping over and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding 10 ft fence. See 1 question about The Impossible…. Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. Showing Average rating 3. Rating details. More filters. Sort order. Jul 18, Ryan rated it liked it. I was once and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding skateboarder: from - I terrorized the streets of my Macon, GA neighborhood. I still have my Rainbow Gator board as a souvenir. But I broke my Caballero deck long ago. This book describes the two primary figures in recent skateboarding - Rodney Mullen, who invented nearly every trick done today, and Ryan Sheckler, who's perfected nearly every trick done today. Tony Hawk is thrown in for good measure, and a number of other skaters show up a long the way. Louison describes the I was once a skateboarder: from - I terrorized the streets of my Macon, GA neighborhood. Louison describes the ebb and flow of skateboarding's popularity through the years and how it's changed in the last 10 years. I bought this book as a vacation read and became so engrossed, I nearly finished it before even getting to my destination. It's a quick read, especially if you remember much of the history as I Impossible: Rodney Mullen. And I claim it's truly an interesting story. Rodney Mullen is an interesting character - essentially a skateboard monk, taking it to the edge purely for the joy of discovery. The writing in the book is a little weak though. Sometimes, Louison sounds a little like a middle schooler who's unable to get his thoughts down on paper. He apologizes for having to talk about "uncool" stuff like wheel and board technology. And has an annoying of telling the reader he's going to talk about something before talking about it. Just talk about it, for god's sake. Nonetheless, worth a read. Sep 22, Jisiaha rated it really liked it Shelves: summer-reading. In the non-fiction book The Impossible by Cole Louison, Louison attempts to bring light to the careers of both Rodney Mullen and Ryan Sheckler while also describing the evolution of skateboarding as a sport. In the beginning of the book Louison describes how skateboarding originated and vastly began to expand. In the first chapters, Cole describes one of skating's first brands, Makaha. The author talks about the quality of baords as well as the reatailed prices. As time went on different brands In the non-fiction book The Impossible by Cole Louison, Louison attempts to bring light to the Ryan Sheckler of both Rodney Mullen and Ryan Sheckler while also describing the evolution of skateboarding as a sport. As time went on different brands began to make their boards out of stronger materials, they were often Ryan Sheckler of wood and metal as opposed to just wood. Rodney Mullen was one of the first ever to perform any sort of trick, inventing tricks such as the ollie, , flip and and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding others. In the book Sheckler shares some of his throughts during some of the most important moments in his career. I would only recommend this book to others skateboarders due to the fact that I think they would be Ryan Sheckler confused and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding who the people are and what is going on in the book. However if you have any basic skateboarding knowledge I would reccomend that you read The Impossible. If this book included images, diagrams it would be much easier to follow and it would be much more interesting. However, despite its lack of visuals, the book gives the ultimate insider experience that you do and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding get while just skateboarding. As a skateboarder, I am now better informed. Nov 30, GnosticShockmaster and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding it liked it And the Fantastic History of Skateboarding non-fiction. Interesting look into the skater culture, though there are a few too many page and the Fantastic History of Skateboarding descriptions of tricks which are a bit hard to follow for someone who has litte or no knowledge of skating or who like me has been out of the scene for a decade. 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