How does Eric Koston put together what I would argue is his most entertaining part at age 40?

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9ohmfKkkCk?rel=0]

I suggest that being freed from the boundaries of the need for switch stance innovation is the cause.

He has more than proved himself deserving of lifetime pro status to both the skate world and his Nike overlords, and the expectations for a full-on, non-shared part in 2015 weren’t all that high. Koston could have easily blown it for this video and we all would still love him. A few DIY skate ledge tech moves and a manual or two would have been plenty to keep him in shoe dollars for another 5 years or more.

Some cooks make their best meals when they aren’t hungry. Perhaps the lack of pressure to make a defining part wasn’t the cause of such a great part (Koston never really seemed very stressed about skate tricks anyhow), but it probably didn’t hurt.

Witness a 3 minute Eric Koston skate part with wallies, trollies, pole jams, death-drop 5-0s, and, if I’m not mistaken, only 3 switch tricks. It’s as if he was given permission to drop the switch tech innovation and all that natural talent went in a different and, I think, more aesthetically pleasing direction. He got downright Oyola with it.