The Best Skateboarding Books 2024

1. Hawk: Occupation: Skateboarder, Pre-Owned (Paperback)

Pre-Owned - For Tony Hawk, it wasn't enough to skate for two decades, to invent more than eighty tricks, and to win more than twice as many professional contests as any other skater.It wasn't enough to knock himself unconscious more than ten times, fracture several ribs, break his elbow, knock out his teeth twice, compress the vertebrae in his back, pop his bursa sack, get more than fifty stitches laced into his shins, rip apart the cartilage in his knee, bruise his tailbone, sprain his ankles, and tear his ligaments too many times to count.No.He had to land the 900. And after thirteen years of failed attempts, he nailed it. It had never been done before. Growing up in Sierra Mesa, California, Tony was a hyperactive demon child with an I44 IQ. He threw tantrums, terrorized the nanny until she quit, exploded with rage whenever he lost a game; this was a kid who was expelled from preschool. When his brother, Steve, gave him a blue plastic hand-me-down skateboard and his father built a skate ramp in the driveway, Tony finally found his outlet--while skating, he could be as hard on himself as he was on everyone around him. But it wasn't an easy ride to the top of the skating game. Fellow skaters mocked his skating style and dubbed him a circus skater. He was so skinny he had to wear elbow pads on his knees, and so light he had to ollie just to catch air off a ramp. He was so desperate to be accepted by young skating legends like Steve Caballero, Mike McGill, and Christian Hosoi that he ate gum from between Steve's toes. But a few years of determination and hard work paid off in multiple professional wins, and the skaters who once had mocked him were now trying to learn his tricks. Tony had created a new style of skating. In Hawk Tony goes behind the scenes of competitions, demos, and movies and shares the less glamorous demands of being a skateboarder--from skating on Italian TV wearing see-through plastic shorts to doing a demo in Brazil after throwing up for five days straight from food poisoning. He's dealt with teammates who lit themselves and other subjects on fire, driving down a freeway as the dashboard of their van burned. He's gone through the unpredictable ride of the skateboard industry during which, in the span of a few years, his annual income shrank to what he had made in a single month and then rebounded into seven figures. But Tony's greatest difficulty was dealing with the loss of his number one fan and supporter--his dad, Frank Hawk. With brutal honesty, Tony recalls the stories of love, loss, bad hairdos, embarrassing '80s clothes, and his determination that had shaped his life. As he takes a look back at his experiences with the skateboarding legends of the '70s, '80s, and '90s, including Stacy Peralta, Eddie Elguera, Lance Mountain, Mark Gonzalez, Bob Burnquist, and Colin Mckay, he tells the real history of skateboarding--and also what the future has in store for the sport and for him.

Hawk: Occupation: Skateboarder, Pre-Owned (Paperback)

2. The Mutt: How to Skateboard and Not Kill Yourself, Pre-Owned (Paperback)

Pre-Owned - The world-champion freestyle skateboarder and the man who brought the ollie - the trick that revolutionised the sport by taking it from the ground to the air - to street skating shares the history of skateboarding, as he tells the dramatic story of his life. At the age of 13, Rodney took the freestyle skating world by storm. He won 35 world titles in less than five years. But through it all, his father looked down on his son's love for skating and pressured him to walk away from the sport and leave behind his fans and status as the most famous skateboarder of his era. After years of stress and conflict, Rodney gave in and promised his father he'd quit for good. But by the time he finally broke free from his suffocating and abusive home life, the popularity of freestyle had waned and given way to vert and street styles. So Rodney picked up his board and started from scratch. With the help of mentor Mike Ternansky, Rodney used his freestyle background to usher in a whole new era of street skating. Today Rodney is more popular than ever. The videos in his series Rodney Versus Daewon are among the most popular skateboard videos ever produced. He won the 2002 Transworld Skateboarding readers' choice award for favourite street skater and is the most popular character on the top-selling Tony Hawk's Pro Skater video games.

The Mutt: How to Skateboard and Not Kill Yourself, Pre-Owned (Paperback)

3. Impossible: Rodney Mullen, Ryan Sheckler, And The Fantastic History Of Skateboarding [Paperback - Used]

CONDITION - USED - Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "From the library of" labels or previous owner inscriptions. Accessories such as CD, codes, toys, may not be included. 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, methods, and mystique are little understood. ? The Impossible is the first book to get skateboarding right. Journalist Cole Louison gets inside?the history, culture, and major personalities?of skating." He does so largely by recounting the careers of the sport's Yoda?Rodney Mullen,?inventor of?most of the tricks performed in street skating today?and its Luke Skywalker?Ryan Sheckler, who became its youngest pro athlete and a celebrity at thirteen. The story begins in the 1960s, when the first boards made their way to land in the form of off-season 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 ?whose publication will coincide with ESPN's 2011 Summer X Games?we come to know intimately not only skateboarding, but also two very different, equally fascinating geniuses who have?shaped the sport more than anyone else.??

Impossible: Rodney Mullen, Ryan Sheckler, And The Fantastic History Of Skateboarding [Paperback - Used]

4. Bikes and Boards, Used [Paperback]

Readers will be amazed to discover that every time they climb onto bicycles and ride like the wind, they are defying gravity! This book explains the physics and history behind bicycles, skateboards, and surfboards. Readers learn what happens from the simplest movement of rolling forward to more complex tricks and stunts of jumping and spinning. Readers will never look at bikes, skateboards or surfboards the same way again.

Bikes and Boards, Used [Paperback]

5. Skateboard Roadmap, Used [Paperback]

A study of the history and development of the sport of skateboarding and its surrounding culture. It includes information on techniques, equipment and clothing and it is illustrated with colour and black and white photography.

Skateboard Roadmap : History Triocks Culture Global Coverage Top Skaters, Used [Paperback]

6. Serious as Dog Dirt, Used [Paperback]

He s bared himself on screens big and small, but now, Bam Margera exposes himself as never before. Famous for his fearless, cringe-inducing, funny as s*** daredevil stunts, he has thrilled and revolted audiences worldwide. Now, for the first time, Bam shares his private writings, never-before-seen personal photos, drawings, and more in this anarchic auto-collage/travelogue, a frenetic yet brutally honest document of the life he leads and a dynamic testament to his wild imagination. Known for his creative style since becoming a pro skater at thirteen, Bam pulls readers into his chaotic world the music, the movies, the pranks, the skating, the glory, the pain, and the blood. This time, Bam Margera is serious . . . as dog dirt."

Serious as Dog Dirt, Used [Paperback]

7. Skateboarder's Start-Up: A Beginner's Guide to Skateboarding, Used [Paperback]

Providing updated and revised chapters on safety, equipment, and basic skills, this instructional guide discusses the fundamentals of skateboarding. Presented in a helpful question and answer format, beginners will find information on buying a first board, where to plant one's feet, how to stay safe while learning new stunts, and the history of this exciting sport. From ollies to kickturns, detailed techniques are presented on the 15 tricks every skater should know. Honest and humorous interviews with skating professionals are included, along with an invaluable list of resources--including books, camps, museums, skate parks, shops, websites, and magazines. With more than 500 new images, step-by-step instructions and photographs illustrate the foolproof methods to turn skateboarding novices into experts.

Skateboarder's Start-Up: A Beginner's Guide to Skateboarding, Used [Paperback]

8. Skateboarding Skills [Paperback - Used]

CONDITION - USED - Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "From the library of" labels or previous owner inscriptions. Accessories such as CD, codes, toys, may not be included. All the moves to become a serious skateboarder. From selecting the right board, to learning which way to stand, to landing a kick flip, 'Skateboarding Skills' provides critical instruction for young riders of all experience levels. New riders will learn essential skills to advance their riding ability while experienced riders will learn new tricks to add to their repertoire. Ryan Stutt shows riders the fundamental techniques that will lead them to success as they practice skateboarding's most important and widely-used flips, grinds and slides. These include: * Ollies and Nollies * Manuals * Boardslides, Lipslides, Noseslides and Tailslides * 50-50 grinds, 5-0 grinds and Nose grinds * Smith grinds, Feeble grinds and Crooked grinds * Kickflips and Heelflips * Pop Shuvs * Varial Flips and 360 Flips. With 'Skateboarding Skills', riders will learn the building blocks that are the basis of all skateboarding tricks. Instruction for both flatground and vert skateboarding, plus real-time action sequences that capture the tricks step by step, will help riders learn how to execute the same moves that professional skateboarders use. All photographs show riders wearing the most essential of safety equipment -- a helmet. AGES: 9-13 AUTHOR: Ryan Stutt has worked in skateboarding and the extreme sports industry for many years. He is the publisher of King Snow snowboarding magazine. His previous book, Skateboarding Field Manual, was a Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) Quick Pick for Reluctant Readers in 2010.

Skateboarding Skills, Used [Paperback]

9. The Answer Is Never: A Skateboarder's History of the World [Paperback - Used]

CONDITION - USED - Pages can include limited notes and highlighting, and the copy can include "From the library of" labels or previous owner inscriptions. Accessories such as CD, codes, toys, may not be included. From the hard-ridden half-pipe of a suburban driveway to teens doing boardslides down stairway handrails in Rio de Janeiro, from the bright-light glare of ESPN's X-Games to the groundbreaking street-skating videos of Spike Jonze, skateboarding has taken the world by storm -- and if you can't deal with that, get out of the way. In The Answer Is Never, skating journalist Jocko Weyland tells the rambunctious story of a rebellious sport that began as a wintertime surfing substitute on the streets of Southern California beach towns more than forty years ago and has evolved over the decades to become a fixture of urban youth culture around the world. Merging the historical development of the sport with passages about his own skating adventures in such wide-ranging places as Hawaii, Germany, and Cameroon, Weyland gives a fully realized portrait of a subculture whose love of free-flowing creativity and a distinctive antiauthoritarian worldview has inspired major trends in fashion, music,art, and film. Along the way, Weyland interweaves the stories of skating pioneers like Gregg Weaver and the Dogtown Z-Boys and living legends like Steve Caballero and Tony Hawk. He also charts the course of innovations in deck, truck, and wheel design to show how the changing boards changed the sport itself, enabling new tricks as skaters moved from the freestyle techniques that dominated the early days to the extreme street-skating style of today. Vivid and vibrant, The Answer Is Never is a fascinating book as radical and unique as the sport it chronicles.

The Answer Is Never : A Skateboarder's History of the World, Used [Paperback]

10. So You Think You're a Skateboarder?: 45 tales from the street and the skatepark, Used [Hardcover]

From humble beginnings through to the modern day multi-million dollar industry it has become, skateboarding has been dragged from its outsider roots into the mainstream world. While the grizzled 80s skate veterans are up in arms that you can now buy a skateboard from nearly every mall or high street in nearly every town from LA to NYC, the fact of the matter is the skateboarding community has snowballed from counter-culture activity into a sport that appeals just as much to the underground as it does to the average kid on the street.Now you're just as likely to see a skater sneaking into a local school as you are live on ESPN. With so many different strains of the skate family tree, it's hard to keep track of all the different tribes out there, and that's where So You Think You're a Skateboarder comes in. Fifty examples from the contemporary skate scene are examined in an attempt to unravel what makes skaters tick. Skaters include the Pushy Parent spending every Sunday at the local park trying to convince his kid to love skating in the same way he did. Or the "friendly" Local, who's been determinedly skating the same spot for the last 10 years and will be damned if he's going to share it with any newcomers. The Wannabe Gangster spends as much time trying to nail bigspins as he does trying to emulate Biggie, and the Piss Drunk has spent the last four hours eyeballing shots of tequila and is about to attempt to boardslide the next handrail he can find.

So You Think You're a Skateboarder?: 45 tales from the street and the skatepark, Used [Hardcover]