The 2024 Paris Olympics w/ Olympic Silver Medalist Tom Schaar | You Be Trippin' with Ari Shaffir

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance.

Fiscally responsible, financial geniuses, monetary magicians.

These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds.

Visit progressive.com to see if you could save.

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates.

Potential savings will vary, not available in all states or situations.

Where you been and where you going?

This is our Reese Travel Show.

Yeah, we're gonna talk about travel today.

It's you be

trippin', yeah.

Hi, everybody.

Welcome to UB Tripping.

It's a travel podcast.

Every week we go to a different place with

someone who's been there and

seen what they experience and stuff.

And today's all about America and showing these fucking frogs what time it is.

the my guest today is US Olympian Olympic silver medalist Tom Schar how's that feel it's pretty crazy I'm still trying to

I don't know it's kind of hard to put into words really yeah yeah yeah

god damn it was so for how

how long has skateboarding been in the olympics this was only its second time in the olympics so you never really grew up thinking I mean started skating thinking that's what I'm gonna do or no not at all I mean I just skate because I love it but I found out I think in like 2018 they announced that it was gonna get added and then there was kind of this like

big shift that you could feel in skating where people kind of picked a side it was either you were for it being in the olympics or you were against it who would be against it

the people that are like very core skateboarders that are just I don't know they think it shouldn't be in there do they do uh like street or just or just like it's kind of whoever it's a lot of people who just think it maybe

just doesn't fit the whole olympics vibe really and i guess the olympics doesn't fit the skating vibe like vice versa and you were not in that camp no i was all for it i mean i think it's cool it brings skating to a like huge platform the whole globe gets to see it also they always had snowboarding in the winter yeah true remember one time um some canadian guy i think it was like 15 years ago or whatever it was he got uh popped for weed And he had to give back his medal.

And he goes, hey, just so you know, all of us smoke weed.

I'm not the only one.

I did everybody.

Yeah, he goes, that's crazy.

We're snowboarders.

What are you talking about?

Yeah, it'd probably be the same in Seattle.

He's like, we do it during competition.

You're nuts if you say we shouldn't be smoking.

That's funny.

Have you ever been to Paris before, France?

When I was like a little kid, but no, that was the first time in a long time.

Okay, so tell me all about it.

We're going to talk about it.

I mean, we didn't get to leave.

Okay, so they fly you in there.

Yeah.

You go straight to like a

three-hour long outfit fitting where they just make you try on all your different team USA gear and whatnot, and then they take you straight to the Olympic village and you're kind of you're not locked in there.

You can leave, but you're not really supposed to.

They don't like when you leave.

Really?

Yeah.

What do you mean?

Fucking in Vietnam, they were allowed to like

they're just worried that

people

are gonna fuck with the Olympians if they leave the area.

How big is the village?

It's like a college campus.

It's big.

There's

10,000 Olympians, I think.

Okay, I got a ton of questions.

Answer what you can.

Answer unpersonally if you want to.

But how much fucking is going on in the Olympic Village?

I don't think it's really like that.

Really?

Yeah, it's really not.

I remember one year

they were like, it was like grinder heaven because all these repressive countries were like, well, we're not allowed to fucking be gay.

And then suddenly there's a bunch of other gays meeting up.

I don't know.

I think, I mean, I heard the rumors going into it.

I was very curious.

And, no, it's not really like that.

Everyone's pretty...

I also, okay, so I left early.

So I think towards the end of the whole Olympics, it gets kind of a little crazier.

Because once everybody's done their competition.

Yeah, but when everyone's like prior to having competed, they're pretty locked in and like not really messing around.

Yeah.

What were your expectations going in to Paris?

I honestly have no idea.

I didn't really know it took.

I qualified like very last second for it.

Really?

Yeah, there was so there was like six qualifying contests over a span of 18 months.

And I was like, they take only three people from the U.S.

So I was like the fourth guy the entire time.

And then who was above you?

The two people that went and then this other kid, Jagger, who like me and him kind of kept going back and forth between like third and fourth.

Oh fuck.

And yeah, I like had to get either first or second at the last one and I got second.

And then I barely made the team.

So I didn't even have time to like really prepare for it.

My parents like started panic booking hotels and flights to go to Paris and everything.

Oh, right.

Yeah.

All your friends are like

to try and figure it out.

Yeah.

And it's not just a trip to Paris.

It's the fucking Olympics.

Yeah, yeah.

It's pretty crazy.

So, okay.

Okay.

So you get there.

They take you right to the village.

They take you straight to the village, give you your

room key for your very small room and your very shitty bed.

You got a roommate?

Oh, wait, was it the cardboard thing?

Yeah, it was.

It wasn't as bad as everyone else was making it sound.

You got a picture of it?

No, I don't think I do on it.

Okay, okay.

But the bed's not cardboard.

The bed's like a normal,

not so great twin mattress.

But the bed frame is made of cardboard.

Okay, but hard cardboard, right?

I saw some video where they were like jumping on it.

Yeah, no, you could probably jump on it, but it would break eventually.

Oh, well, yeah, like every bed.

No horseplay, you know.

Keep it to a minimum.

So you get there.

What do you eat?

Yeah, so there's a big giant cafeteria in the like right in the middle of the village, and that's where

that's where you do most of your hanging out with like other random countries.

So every country gets their own building in the village.

And that's where all of

the U.S.

has this big building.

There's like 600 U.S.

athletes or something.

So all of them are in that one building.

And then if you want to mingle with other countries, you kind of have to do it outside of your building because some countries are

kind of against letting the other countries into their building and I don't know there's some weird rules about that

well I bet it's like I bet they don't want like

the Chinese ones and the Russians like don't hear about freedom yeah don't want to know about that they don't they don't let some countries hang out with other countries yeah but uh yeah I mean you go into the cafeteria and you can meet a bunch of random people I hung out with the North Korean ping pong team oh yeah I saw that pretty crazy what do you mean you just made friends with them kind of I went up to them because there's the whole pin trading thing you get your own pins.

You go to other, ask random people if you can trade pins and whatnot.

What do you mean?

What's a pin?

They give you like the little pins to put on your lanyard, just like a little metal pin, and you just try and trade them to see how many you can collect from different random countries.

They give you a lot of them?

Yeah, they give you like three Ziploc bags of them.

So I saw the North Korean team in the cafeteria, and I was like, I got to see if they have pins.

So I went up to the guy.

Yeah, oh, North Korea.

That's in register.

It's like, you have to.

So I went up to him and I asked him, I was like, they gave us these little skateboarding pins.

And I was like, do you want the skateboarding pin?

He was like, oh, skateboarding.

That's cool.

Yeah.

Like, for sure.

And

he gave me the North Korean one, and that was it.

We parted ways.

But, like, I mean, we talked for a second, but I don't think he spoke very much English.

Yeah.

Wow.

Fucking wild.

Yeah.

Did you did you go to the ping pong stuff?

I did.

Yeah, like, what'd you go see?

Like, what was your, what was your, like, yeah, I remember, go on, tell me about whatever.

Like, what'd you do there?

It's they're uh they're pretty strict about giving out tickets to like just anybody, so they'll like give the athletes tickets to like maybe not the most exciting events.

Like if you wanted to go see women's gymnastics, they'd be like, No, that's it's full, that's where we make our money.

Yeah, exactly.

But if you want to go watch, I don't know, badminton or something, for sure.

Dude, I met somebody in the crowd.

I was like, What do you watch?

I don't know, not to offend any badminton fans, but uh, yeah, she was Taiwanese.

She goes, Oh, it's big in my country, and I'm like,

in my country, it's for retirees.

My country, it's laughing.

Some of the sports are kind of like that.

But we went, they gave us table tennis tickets, and we saw China play North Korea.

I think China won.

I'm pretty sure.

Yeah.

And what else did I saw 3v3 basketball?

The U.S.

lost, which was tragic.

Yeah, none of our players play on that.

No, that's what I thought.

I thought I was going to see LeBron and Steph and Katie on a 3v3 team, but no, it was not them.

Why?

I don't know.

Do you want to have a three-on-three basketball team in high school, in college?

This was 90, let's say, seven or something.

Before I tell the story, I'll actually say it's a different time.

But

it was one sub.

So we call our, well, we were just trying to fuck with the student unions.

So we were like, we call our team three N-words and a Jew.

And they were like, no, you can't use that name.

That's not going to work.

But I was like, they're the ones who chose it.

So,

okay, what's the food like?

What's the shitters like?

What like food was uh

I saw a lot of complaints online from other people, but it wasn't that bad.

It's just, you know, chicken and rice and veggies and

desserts.

It was fine.

I mean, there was nothing to complain about.

It wasn't anything special.

But did the basketball team hang out with you guys?

No, so like the really

high tier celebrity athlete people, they stay at like the four seasons down the street or something.

Like Simone Biles too?

Yeah.

like that.

No, actually, she was in the village.

I saw her like every day.

Wow.

Very nice.

Yeah.

But like the really

honestly, because they probably wouldn't even fit on the beds.

Oh, fair.

But they all, or if they're like, you know, a much more famous person, they don't stay in the village because they'll just get bothered all day, probably.

Dude, I took a sleeper bus in Vietnam once, just like a 10-hour whatever.

You lean your seat back and sleep, but it's all made for Vietnamese, so it came up to like middle of my neck.

Schloating.

They're like, no, six feet.

That's not a a person.

I'm that big.

Okay, so

was there a camaraderie between all the Olympians?

Did people come to your events?

Yeah, people were actually very hyped on the skateboarding, which was surprising.

Because

we were walking around the village because there's not much to do.

There's the cafeteria and a gym, and that's kind of it.

So you have to try and find some entertainment.

So we were just walking around asking random people what sport they thought we did.

And it was just me and my other skate friends and a lot of the people like would look us up and down and just be like nothing

they just like didn't think we were actually competing they think you're playing a jump yeah because everyone in the village is either seven feet tall and like the strongest buffest person you've ever seen or like a four foot five gymnast so it's pretty obvious to tell like who's athletes and then there's just us kind of like scrawny skaters yeah skateboarders are the type they have the build of someone you would cross the street to get away from because they don't have good parents most of the time yeah

but like a lot of people were asking like what sport they thought we did and this one guy named a bunch and then we finally told him that we were skaters and he was like oh i was trying to think of real sports i was like oh cool thank you thank you okay okay so what's like competition like how do you when do they get they get you and like time to go down uh yeah they so we had practice for like a couple days before the event and then uh

they just come and grab you you got to bring your your whole outfits and everything.

You got to lug your own.

I mean, what do you have, really?

You have a board.

Yeah, a skateboard.

And we had to wear like a certain USA jersey, but that was about it, really.

Everything else is you can choose what to wear.

Wow.

But yeah, they grab you and they take you down there.

What, like a shuttle over there?

Yeah, bus over.

You compete, and that was it.

It's over very, it happens very fast.

Like, what do you mean by fast?

It just, like, I don't know.

Well, okay, maybe because it was, like,

two months of, or two years of like buildup to like this

grand moment, and then it's just over in like 30 minutes.

So it feels it wasn't just one competition, was it?

Was it like qualifiers for finals?

There was everyone else.

Yeah, there was qualifiers and then finals.

Okay, maybe not 30 minutes, but like two hours.

And then it's qualifiers and finals right then, one time?

Qualifier.

Yeah, it's back-to-back.

Oh, it's not like days later.

No, no, no.

Same day.

Popsicles, sprinklers, a cool breeze.

Talk about refreshing.

You know what else is refreshing this summer?

A brand new phone with Verizon.

Yep, get a new phone on any plan with Select Phone Trade In MyPlan.

And lock down a low price for three years on any plan with MyPlan.

This is a deal for everyone, whether you're a new or existing customer.

Swing by Verizon today for our best phone deals.

Three-year price guarantee applies to then-current base monthly rate only.

Additional terms and conditions apply for all offers.

I get so many headaches every month.

It could be chronic migraine, 15 or more headache days a month, each lasting four hours or more.

Botox, autobotulinum toxin A, prevents headaches in adults with chronic migraine.

It's not for those who have 14 or fewer headache days a month.

Prescription Botox is injected by your doctor.

Effects of Botox may spread hours to weeks after injection, causing serious symptoms.

Alert your doctor right away as difficulty swallowing, speaking, breathing, eye problems, or muscle weakness can be signs of a life-threatening condition.

Patients with these conditions before injection are at highest risk.

Side effects may include allergic reactions, neck and injection, side pain, fatigue, and headache.

Allergic reactions can include rash, welts, asthma symptoms, and dizziness.

Don't receive Botox if there's a skin infection.

Tell your doctor your medical history, muscle or nerve conditions, including ALS Lou Gehrig's disease, myasthenia gravis or Lambert Eaton syndrome, and medications, including botulinum toxins, as these may increase the risk of serious side effects.

Why wait?

Ask your doctor.

Visit BotoxChronicMigraine.com or call 1-800-44-Botox to learn more.

That's the worst thing about watching Olympics is like you're watching this someone from like USA.

So that's what what you're rooting for.

Let's say track and field.

And you're like, they're take off.

And it's like, oh my God, they're going to win.

They're going to win.

And then they win.

They're like, all right, sweet.

He advances to second out of four rounds.

Heat three of the quarterfinals.

Like, why is this hard?

Why are you fooling my emotions?

Tell me about the competition.

Do you have the medal?

I do, yeah.

Oh, wait, hold it, though.

Don't wait.

Let's wait until you fucking win it.

Okay.

Okay.

So fucking nuts you have an Olympic medal.

It's weird.

When you get heavy into drugs, that's the last.

That's your bottom.

That's the last thing I've got.

That's your your bottom when you're selling it.

You're like, shit.

It's all gone south.

Oh, God.

Contest.

So we had like four days of practice.

For the people who don't know, like, you skate competitively for

like 20 years,

like professionally, maybe for.

20 years, since you were four?

Yeah.

Really?

Yeah.

I don't know why my parents let me do it that young, but they did.

You should have started you a year early.

You would have won gold.

True, true.

A little sharper.

Yeah.

Come on, Mr.

and Mrs.

Shar.

Get with it.

I know.

Fucking tiger mom.

Four years old, though.

Jesus.

Well, my older brother skated.

Shout out, John Shar.

Shout out, John.

RIP, I miss you every day, buddy.

He started skating when he was, like, I don't know, six.

And I was the younger brother, so I had to just copy everything he was doing.

Yeah.

And, yeah.

Just kind of kept going with that.

And that was about it, really.

And then you just started getting hella good?

No, I sucked for a long time.

Um I didn't really start getting good until I was like

ten, but that was after six years of skating.

Right.

But um

now I've been professionally skating for like ten years and

uh yeah, made my first Olympics.

What's your ranking?

What do you do?

Vert or what have you?

I do Vert and Park.

Okay.

There's Vert, Park and Street.

Those are like the main three.

There's other options.

But those are like the ones you would see in competitions.

Okay.

And street's just for video?

Uh street is for video, but there is street con like street was in the Olympics too.

There was park and street.

Street's the one with like the rails and the hands the stairs and everything.

Uh and park's like the

it's hard to describe.

Yeah, like a empty backyard pool on steroids.

And that's all the SoCal like.

Yeah, exactly.

What what was it called?

Dogtown?

Yeah, Dogtown days.

Dude, yeah, when I met you, it was I was I met Tony talk and he was like, what are you guys doing now?

We're like, no, I think we got a show in San Diego, like in five hours.

He goes, you should stay.

Rock quietly.

He goes, there's some guys coming.

Oh, he made you say and watch?

Yeah, like the best there are.

He goes, if you were at all interested, this is the time to stay.

And it was pretty wild when you could be that far a foot away from this ramp.

Yeah, you were sitting on the

couch right there.

Yeah, just watching.

Yeah, it was pretty cool.

Yeah, that's the that's the best ramp in the world, though, so it makes it easier.

It's nutty.

Yeah.

That he built a fucking...

Actually, this is what Joe Rogan did with his comedy club in Austin.

He was like, make them come to me.

Oh, he just built the best thing ever?

He built a great comedy club, and he goes, I don't want to travel.

They'll come here if I build a great one.

It's a good

strategy.

Yeah.

What are your rankings and stuff?

Do they do it like that?

No, not really.

Well, they do for the Olympic stuff, but outside of the...

Olympic rankings stuff, that's not really a thing.

I mean, outside of like

skating being in the Olympics, there's a whole nother world of skateboarding.

I mean, there's like filming the video parts, there's Thrasher magazine, which releases all the videos.

There's a whole nother like entire separate world outside of competitive skateboarding, which

is still

and probably will be for a long time more.

It's, I don't know how to explain it really.

That's more of what skating is still.

What?

Videos.

Yeah, like stuff outside of competition.

Yeah, it's so cool when you see it randomly in the neighborhood when someone's like trying to just land a skate trip and they do it like 50 times.

You see what they're trying to do, just eat shit over and over, and then you're just like, I'll post up.

Yeah.

And then when it hits, man, after like 45 minutes or an hour, you're a part of it, but you're so a part of it.

You're a part of it, then.

Yeah.

I've had to be warned, like, you gotta, I don't know why.

I don't know why, but like, hold the celebration for two seconds.

Oh, yeah, you do.

You have to wait.

Why?

Well, I mean, you don't have to.

Sometimes they it can make a clip better if there's someone yelling in the background, but usually you want to kind of wait a little bit after someone lands a trick.

The emotion's right there, right now.

I know.

I know.

And then I got to like,

damn!

Just so it doesn't ruin, like.

The skate away?

Yeah, I guess.

It really shouldn't matter, but some people are kind of picky about that shit.

Yeah, okay.

You got pictures from the Olympics and stuff?

Yeah, I do.

Let me see what you got.

I mean,

were your parents proud of you?

Do they?

Wow, look at that.

They were.

Oh, my God.

I'm trying to see if I can find any good ones.

This was

on the podium.

I'm on the left.

Keegan Palmer's in the middle.

Did you know these guys going in?

Yeah, we've all, everyone in this contest has known each other since we were nine, ten years old.

Right.

Keegan's the one who got gold.

He's from Australia.

And then Augusto Aquio is the Brazilian.

He got third.

Okay.

Brazilians are fucking good, huh?

They're very good, yeah.

Brazilians, U.S., and Australia is kind of the three main.

Really?

Yeah.

And that's represented right there.

I'm trying to see what else I got.

My metal has

bite marks in it because people were doing shit like this all night.

Like going hard?

Taking chunks out.

Yeah, there's like pieces missing of it.

What?

Can I see it?

Let me see it now.

This is so fucking cool.

Everybody just was passing it around and taking bites out of it.

Did they give you a satchel?

Did you have to get that for yourself?

No, this is just a random bag I found at my house.

Nice.

Oh my god.

People are just biting it.

That's so funny.

What's it made of?

It's kind of...

Oh my god, it's heavy.

It's heavy, yeah.

But if you turn it around, there's you can see like scratched and bite marks everywhere on it.

On the other side, there's like the little hexagon.

Yeah.

That's a piece of the original Eiffel Tower that's in there.

What do you mean, this?

Yeah.

So in like

the 50s they did repairs on the Eiffel Tower and they just had a bunch of like

scrap pieces of it laying around.

And they made

that's so fucking artistic.

But that's from the original one from like 1889 or something crazy like that.

Wow.

Yeah.

Do you know it's Eiffel?

Huh?

It's Eiffel?

No, it's not.

Yeah.

Is it really?

I think so.

I went to the there's a museum there and they had like a first a mock-up of it that this guy made.

His name is like Eiffel.

Oh.

and we're just like it changes everybody's like cowboys we're like

wow

i mean did you show this to everybody

uh yeah pretty much

it's got paris oh and then athens right there yeah it's got the wow who's this chick uh i forget what it's called lady olympia or something like that bro

Is this what does it say on there?

Oh wait.

I tried to translate it, but I think it's.

Oh, is it Latin?

Yeah, I think so.

I mean, did you show this to everybody back home?

Were you just walking around, like, trying to get in a coffee shop first?

No, I didn't do that.

I brought it on the flight, though, and they gave me

just

plenty of free snacks and stuff.

Really?

Yeah, it was great.

Were there other Olympians on your flight?

No, I left early because I just really

to go back home.

Why'd you leave early?

I just kind of wanted to get out of there.

I was only there for two weeks, but it felt like a lifetime.

Yeah.

Wow.

Tell me about the podium.

It's kind of a weird like.

Did they do it right then or later?

Yeah, immediately.

Really?

So as soon as it's done, you change into your podium

podium outfit.

Yeah.

And then

they take you to go do your drug test really quick.

Yeah.

And then straight to the podium.

That's it.

Straight to the podium.

Yeah.

Fuck.

Oh, here's my camera.

Fuck.

Oh, a drug test, really?

Yeah, you have to do that right away.

For Reids?

Yeah, for Reids, which Do they care about...

They care about a lot of stuff, but they're mostly testing for stuff like that, performance-enhancing drugs.

Yeah.

Did anybody pop?

Do skateboarders even do that?

No, I don't think it would really help with skating.

Yeah.

God damn, this is so fucking cool, man.

Yeah, it's pretty weird.

Yeah.

It's pretty weird.

Is it like surreal?

Yeah, it is.

God damn.

So you get.

Yeah, there's bite marks everywhere.

Yeah, it's kind of funny.

You eventually like, hey guys, come on.

Yeah.

Like the photo, it's like the whole thing is in his mouth.

It's kind of.

Yeah.

Let me see what other photos you got.

Did you meet Snoop?

I did.

Yeah.

I actually just found the best video ever.

Someone else took it?

Yeah.

Yeah, that's it.

That was you meeting him?

You had your I couldn't tell.

That was it.

You had your uh helmet on.

Yeah, that was me.

So I like landed my

last run, and I got up onto the deck.

And just like the first person that was right in front of me was Snoop Dogg.

Because he was leaving the venue at the time.

And he was just walking.

He was five feet in front of me.

He was walking past.

And I just finished my run.

And he was like, yo, come here, come here.

And then he got over there, dabbed me up, and that was it.

And then he just kept going.

Fuck.

It was pretty crazy.

I mean, you're both still cowboys, right?

Yeah, I guess so.

Yeah.

Where are you from?

San Diego.

Okay.

I mean, Long Beach is pretty close.

Damn, it's so fucking heavy.

Yeah, it's weird.

I didn't know what I was expecting, but it's like curved, too.

It's pretty sweet.

Yeah.

What else you got?

What other pictures you got?

I want to hear every I mean, like,

what were you expecting?

What was like a letdown and what was not?

What was like different than you were expecting?

Letdown.

Oh, shoot.

I'm trying to think what a letdown was.

Did your dog smile?

Yeah.

Oh.

nice one.

Or like, what was just different than your expectations?

Let's not go negative, I guess.

I guess maybe the whole like village experience was kind of weird.

There's just like not much to do.

You get there, you sleep, eat, and there's a gym.

That's it.

There's like nothing else going to happen.

Yeah, I would think you would have the run of Paris.

Like, especially

go nuts.

I had fun.

The one thing I was bummed about is the, like, not being able to go to any event.

I thought, like, because we were athletes that we could just like have some secret athlete pass.

Yeah.

But no, you couldn't really go watch anything.

But besides that everything else was how many athletes are there?

Like thousands.

Ten thousand I think.

Ten thousand.

Yeah, they couldn't.

You'd all yeah, they'd all it would be all athletes.

Yeah, exactly.

I bet it was that though in like the 1930s and stuff.

They were just like, yeah, we can't fill this up.

So like let the athletes fill it up.

I wish.

I wish.

Yeah.

Damn, and did you have a big contingency of Americans like rooting for you and stuff?

Uh, yeah, it was pretty cool.

When uh I got back to the village after the uh whole event was over, there was like a

a welcome welcoming crew in the USA building.

Of who?

Athletes?

Of random people that I had no idea, but yeah, athletes.

It was cool.

Wow, that's fucking nice.

It's I don't know.

It's a weird, it's a weird feeling.

Yeah.

Does your like patriotism go up during this?

Yeah, it does.

It has to, right?

It definitely, definitely does.

Yeah, that's interesting.

Because normally, like, I don't, I mean, I never think about what it's like to be an American.

No, not that often.

But when I'm there, it's your U.S.

and fucking A.

The whole how.

At blinds.com, it's not just about window treatments.

It's about you, your style, your space, your way.

Whether you DIY or want the pros to handle it all, you'll have the confidence of knowing it's done right.

From free expert design help to our 100% satisfaction guarantee, everything we do is made to fit your life and your windows.

Because at blinds.com, the only thing we treat better than windows is you.

Visit blinds.com now for up to 45% off with minimum purchase plus a professional measure at no cost.

Rules and restrictions apply.

Attention, all small biz owners.

At the UPS store, you can count on us to handle your packages with care.

With our certified packing experts, your packages are properly packed and protected.

And with our pack and ship guarantee, when we pack it and ship it, we guarantee it.

Because your items arrive safe or you'll be reimbursed.

Visit the ups store.com slash guarantee for full detail.

Most locations are independently owned.

Product services, pricing, and hours of operation may vary.

See Center for Details.

The UPS store.

Be unstoppable.

Come into your local store today.

Wow.

So did you get to try any food or anything?

Like,

what do they serve you?

Slop?

Like, go next.

I mean, it's really like it's rice and chicken and pizza and

vegetables.

That's the whole thing.

It's buffet.

Yeah, buffet.

There's like a coffee shop.

The chocolate muffins were very talked about.

Yeah.

They were pretty good.

Okay.

Nothing that wasn't.

No, like baguettes and like and like croissants and shit like that.

No, there was, yeah, there was there was baguettes.

But not like, I don't know.

They were Olympic Village baguettes.

They weren't really

that great.

Fuck, that sucks.

You couldn't just go out and like do Paris.

We could have, but it was kinda I don't know.

They were just not

they were kind of just skeptical about us wandering around.

Yeah.

I mean, also, like.

They told us if we did want to leave to wear normal clothes.

Like, don't wear your team USA stuff so you wouldn't be, like, recognized.

They had these,

like, someone was doing an interview about the 92 Dream Team, you know, basketball.

And everybody was going out into the main, like, tract of Barcelona.

And, um...

And they were all getting recognized.

It was Michael Jordan, and they're getting mobbed everywhere.

Charles Barkley getting mobbed.

And then John Stockton is 6'2 ⁇ , white, Normal guy.

Just no one's even talking to him.

They have no idea.

He's just like, well, beat it, white guy.

We're looking for

the accountant for the team.

This must be your agent.

He's just making solid bounce passes all the time.

That's funny.

Making solid bounce passes.

Fundamentals, bro.

He gets in the Hall of Fame.

He does.

What does this change for you?

I mean, honestly,

I don't know.

I really don't know what's to come.

Not much.

I'm still just going to keep skating.

That's really

kind of the only thing I want to do.

But I mean, are you like,

I mean, your stock goes up.

Stock goes up a little bit, yeah.

Yeah.

Stock goes up a little bit.

But

outside of the Olympics, me and Tony are working on some video projects that are soon to come.

What's he going to do?

Like, skate with a cane?

No disrespect.

No disrespect for Star Hawk.

Keep him healthy for as long as we can.

By the way, it would be great when he does hit like 85.

He is going to be doing tricks.

He'll still be, yeah.

He'll still be skating.

How cool is that guy?

I know.

He's the best.

But yeah, we're working on a couple things that are coming out sooner than later.

And

yeah, that's kind of on my pretty much my whole agenda right now.

It's going back and filming.

Yeah.

So

tell me more about this fucking experience.

Like,

I don't know.

What else did you do there?

So you're stuck in this village.

You're stuck in the village.

It's an interesting way to see Paris.

Yeah.

Like, no one will get to see it that way.

That city's done now.

Yeah.

It's taken down already.

Oh, yeah.

Everything's already.

I think when you see places, like there's a time, like my friend went to Kabul during the occupation.

Yeah.

And he goes, that city's gone now.

Of these people working out there building stuff up.

Or like if you were like a Nazi in like French-occupied, like German occupied France where you'd be like oh you don't get to do it like that anymore just walk into any coffee shop like gimme um but like Olympic village

France Paris is like so specific and unique when you go back it'll not resemble that at all no not at all I mean at least I'll get to go do something

I can go see some stuff yeah but yeah it's weird it's you're it's you like lose track of time because you're just in this like place

you don't pay for anything you don't you don't pay for anything you don't pay for anything you don't have to wake up at a certain time really for anything there's kind of just like

i don't know is anybody annoying

um

i'm not gonna say names no yeah yeah don't say names point fingers or anything but yeah but belarus was annoying some of the some of the track and field people kind of high maintenance not gonna lie really a little bit yeah

well i mean their bodies are temples scapegoats not saying not saying who or what country or anything What do you mean?

What do you mean high maintenance?

Just, I, yeah.

They might have thought their bodies were too much of a temple.

So they're like, I can't eat this pizza.

What is this?

No, not even that.

Like, I'm worse than that, honestly.

What do you mean?

It's

black fish.

There's a thousand of them.

It's true.

Yeah.

On the way back from...

We did the opening ceremony, and then

they take us on buses from there back to the village.

And

our bus got lost, which was a common theme throughout the whole Olympics I think because they hired there's all the like the Olympic volunteers but they just had random people as the bus drivers that like weren't previously bus drivers like just full bus yeah full full bus it was like just some uber driver was your bus driver now and it wasn't working they were getting lost like running into things buses were crashing into poles all the time

so our bus got lost for an hour and a half maybe and uh

like 10 people on the bus were like i don't actually know what sport they were i just i'm pretty sure they were track and field yeah but um

they were yelling at the bus driver telling him that we were all frantic like calling people trying to get the bus driver in trouble like just calling higher up saying that we were all panicking and everything but no one really

cool man we're just looking outside it's nice there's windows here

but yeah kind of some drama but that was kind of yeah that's how uh comedy festivals are they'll hire just like volunteers to be drivers of smaller things.

But then like the theater comics are all like, This is the worst that's ever happened to me.

And all the club comics are like, what?

Yeah, that's kind of exactly how it's all just talking, man.

It's pretty cool.

Going on a skate trip, getting lost, or hitting something in the like bus is pretty common.

Right.

Yeah, skating, especially street skating.

It's like, isn't there a lot of like, oh shit, pull over.

Let's try this.

Yeah, let's try the stairs.

Exactly.

That is funny.

What time was your competition?

The qualifiers started at noon, and then the finals was at 5, but it kind of sucked for everyone back home because that was 3.30 in the morning on the west coast.

And the qualifiers.

Yeah, qualifiers.

Fuck that.

That's maybe you can stay up.

Yeah, I will.

I had some friends that just pushed through the whole night and watched it, and then I had some friends that went to sleep at like 8 p.m.

and woke up at 3.

You can't just go to bed at 8 p.m.

Oh, God, that's right.

I could never do that.

Yeah.

Yeah,

that's bad planning.

Because also, the skate world is not like get up for work world.

No, no, it's not.

I don't really have a schedule.

I make myself have a schedule, but no one's telling me to go skate every day.

What about the other

U.S.

skaters?

How are they feeling?

The two that didn't win?

I mean, they know

how good they are.

They're two of the best in the world, Gavin, Bogger, and Tate Carew, who are the other ones.

And

I mean, that's kind of the crazy thing with skating.

It's anybody that makes the finals could win.

Because everyone has such a diverse approach to how they skate.

And it's just kind of whoever's feeling it the best that day is usually.

Do you have to

tell them ahead of time, like in ice skating, what tricks you're trying?

No.

Okay.

Thank God, that would suck.

There's no surprise.

Yeah, there's, yeah, exactly.

You can't be like, fuck, I need to just reach down last second and pull something out.

We get to use the element of surprise, which helps.

Okay.

Yeah.

Dude, it's so fucking cool.

It's, yeah, it's crazy that it's going to be

in the Olympics.

I don't know.

It kind of did last night.

Last night.

Yeah, a week later.

Yeah.

Kind of.

Because I've just been pretty busy since it happened.

But flying here, I just got to the hotel and just kind of sat down and I was like, holy shit, I'm in New York now.

I don't even know how this happened.

I mean, it's such an outsider sport.

It's like a punk sport.

Yeah.

So to be like, it's so legit to be in the Olympics and to win a fucking silver medal.

Let me see some more pictures.

Let me see what else you got there.

Let's see.

I mean, that's you in front of the Eiffel Tower.

Let me see that.

Yeah, they did

like a

weird ceremony.

Oh, here.

So this is the third place guy.

He's.

What's he doing?

He's just juggling?

He juggles everywhere he goes, and he's really good at it.

So they let him go.

Yeah.

He does.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So they let you go on like a cat walk after you get your medal and you do like a little runway show kind of in front of a big crowd.

And everybody's screaming for you?

Yeah, it's pretty crazy.

It's all like

it happens so fast though.

They just like, as soon as you get your medal, they grab you.

They pull you in 20 different directions.

And

take a picture here.

How long after you win was the medal ceremony?

Immediately.

So no showering and putting on a suit.

It's like what you're wearing, go.

No, I just poured water on my hair so I didn't look like a silver.

Let me see that one with you in the middle with it with the um

which one the one down like two up from the bottom in the middle

above the Eiffel Tower one

yeah

you look way older there

That's the water in your hair.

That's the yeah, I had to do something my hair looked pretty fucked up.

Yeah, regardless I mean you're just wearing a helmet.

These are the

These are the media outfits that they make us wear what?

Yeah, what is that?

It looks like you're about to fucking spin in vegas that's that's tony's stepson miles it's in that he wanted to put on the whole outfit was he was he on team no no no but he just went out there to support that's cool oh well

let's see what else i can find

oh here's the video oh that's it yeah

so you just you just got off i like just finished my run

And he's like, come on, come over here.

Oh, my God.

Oh, my God.

And then he was just saying what's up to everyone.

He was so supportive, huh?

Yeah, he loved it.

He was the mascot of the Olympics.

Yeah.

Of the U.S.

Olympics.

Yeah.

I wonder if, like, Russia had their own version of Snoop Dogg.

We're like, I killed 30 Cossacks.

I'm a fucking legend in my world.

I'm surprised no one else is doing something like that, though.

Yeah, free trip to the Olympics.

Trying to think what else I think.

And the other Olympians, when you got back, they're like, hell yeah, congratulations.

Yeah, they've finally accepted that skating was somewhat of a sport.

Yeah.

But still, not really.

A lot of people just,

I don't know.

It was me and the bird man.

Damn.

He's so cool.

I met him.

It was so fucking cool.

Yeah.

He's a cool.

Dude, he gave me one of the sweatshirts, one of the old school sweatshirts.

Oh, that's a good one.

And people are like, look at Ari poser, whatever.

And I'm like, not poser, free shirt.

I've always been into free shirts.

Free shirts are great.

Totally tracks.

Yeah, no, it's an iconic logo, too.

It's what?

It's an iconic logo, too.

Oh, it really is.

It really is.

Damn, is he having a good time?

Yeah, they were.

He never got to do it.

No.

I mean, if they added Vert, he'd still have a chance, honestly.

I'm not even kidding.

Really?

Yeah, he still is that good.

Damn.

That's all right.

But

it was great that he was there.

Like, every single run, someone would land, they'd cut to Tony right away, and he'd be cheering, and he was having a good time.

It was great that he supports skating.

He's really supportive.

Yeah, for sure.

He's skating's biggest fan.

Yeah, it's like you can go two ways.

Yeah.

Which was like, well, in my day, we had

more like,

nice.

Yeah,

he's not at all like that.

I know some older dudes that are like that.

That are like that?

Yeah, for sure.

When that chick, the video of that chick hitting the 3900s, the little girl.

He just jumps up.

Yeah.

He loves seeing, especially Vert skating.

He loves every second of it.

He's so supportive of everyone.

It's great.

Wow.

What were the shitters like at the village?

Did you have to go to the American ones?

Or could you go anywhere?

You could, well, like in the

cafeteria area, there was bathrooms.

But in our building,

I mean,

fine, yeah.

Okay.

Normal.

AC?

Oh, we were.

So.

Going into it, they didn't put any AC in any of the buildings.

It's France.

Yeah, which is pretty gnar.

Yeah.

Won't everybody sweat and stink?

They're like, what do you mean stink?

This is how we smell.

What do you mean?

Yeah.

But the U.S.

put AC.

Fake body odor on it if you want.

I'm joking.

Go ahead.

Yeah.

The U.S.

put AC in their building, and a couple other countries did, but most of the buildings had no AC, and it was like 95 when we were there.

How are you going to compete if you can't sleep?

Yeah, I don't know.

But yeah, we got AC, luckily.

So they wake you up.

What time do you head over there?

The qualifiers are 12.

What time do you head over there?

9, 10, 11?

How far away is it?

I think I got up at like 7 in the morning.

No, really?

Were you still jet lagged?

No.

Well, so there was like practice that started at like 8 in the morning.

So I had to get there like 7.30.

Okay.

And

they take you straight there.

You practice.

You relax.

The other heats practice.

As soon as all the practice is done,

you do the qualifiers which there was four heats of six people all judged all judged

and then the top eight scores from that go to the finals so then there's eight people in the finals

and then uh

there's eight people in the film okay how many Americans made that

two

Two of the three

and then

eight people in the finals and then, yeah, everyone just tries to do their best run pretty much.

You get 45 seconds in the bowl.

45 seconds.

Yeah, which doesn't seem like that long, but it feels like forever when I'm doing it.

But then 45 seconds, you get three tries.

What do you mean, three tries?

Three 45 second tries?

Yeah, three 45 second tries.

If you fall, the time's over and you're done.

It's over.

It's over.

So if you Lance...

So do you save the crazy tricks for the end?

You want to

spread them out, kind of.

Yeah.

Start when he brought out

like something nuts.

Like when he brought the the 900 or something like that, or some like the first dark slide.

I guess that wasn't in competition, but like whatever.

Do you like you can't land that and then fall and you're like, uh, no, nothing.

Or do you still get a good score?

I mean, it depends.

If you did something crazy like that, yeah, you would still get a good score.

But if

you did a 900 your first trick, and then fell, you're not going to get a very good score.

Dark.

But so usually, so like within 45 seconds, most of the time you'll squeeze in like anywhere from 11 to like 13 different tricks.

Okay.

So if you did a 900 on your 10th trick and then you fell, you would still probably get a good score.

Okay.

Do you have video of your run?

I think I do.

I'm honestly not sure.

Let me ask you a question too about judge sports.

Yes.

Do you ever go, that's a fucking bullshit score?

That was better than that?

I mean, yeah.

Skating is very subjective, so it's hard.

Because there's like track and field that's like, I won.

Yeah, it's the fastest.

Yeah, that's why it's hard to judge skating.

Because, I mean,

most of the time, actually, a lot of the time, they get the scorings right.

There's like very few cases where

the majority of the people disagree with it.

And people boo?

No, I wish people would start booing at skate contests.

I would encourage that so much.

It happens in UFC.

It'd be great.

And people are like, you can feel the whole crowd.

Like, no, that's way wrong.

It'd be great.

The other guy won that fight.

That's ridiculous.

There's too much cheering in skating.

If there was more booing, it'd be great.

But

let's see.

Oh, yeah.

Here's one of the runs, I think.

I don't know if it's going to play or not.

Oh, somebody told me this when I was watching you guys skate.

It's so fun learning these rules.

How do you know who's next?

It's like you just hang your board over the edge.

Yeah, pretty much.

You can do that or you can.

Yeah, this was just practice, practice, but I think this is the whole run that I did in the contest.

Oh, you're like warming up the exact run you're planning?

Yeah, I mean, you want to try and figure out what you're going to do for your 45 seconds the best you can.

And

yeah.

So you just kind of do it over and over until you feel comfortable.

Yeah.

And then you're like, okay, that's my run.

Or like, I can't make that from here, so I'll switch things up.

Because it's got to be per fucking

course, right?

Like what you decide to do, yeah, yeah, it's different every time because they build a different park for every contest, so you have to try and figure out something quick and then get comfortable doing it.

And then they sound a buzzer, and they're just like, all right, it's over, I'll just jump out.

Uh, yeah, you'll, they just added a weird, like, there's a 10-second buzzer now, which I don't know why.

To let you know, like, if you've got something back,

do it now, and then there's a 45-second buzzer to let you know when it's done, which they should just have the ones.

Yeah, but yeah, 45 seconds, do your thing.

Do you ever get where, like, let's say you're like

running, and then like, as you're about to go up, or like in the air, it's like 45 seconds doesn't count, and then you land something fucking sick.

If

what's the rule on it?

If you're going,

if the buzzer goes off before you go up the wall, then it doesn't count.

If you're like already going up the wall and doing the trick, then it still is within time.

It's like basketball if it's in the air.

Yeah, exactly.

Oh, damn.

But if your hand's on the ball and it goes off, then it doesn't count.

Yeah.

Same, same with skating.

So tell me about the fucking podium.

It's pretty crazy.

They like pull you over there immediately.

Let me see that motherfucker again.

It's so cool.

They pull you over.

Yeah.

They pull you over some.

I actually

forgot who the person was that gave me the medal.

I feel bad.

What do you mean?

It'll be like a previous

Olympian or something like that from like the past.

Of any sport?

Yeah,

I think.

And they fucking, you've been down.

You had a video of that?

Somewhere.

Damn.

She gives it to you or puts it over your head?

She gives it to you.

It's like communion.

Yeah.

Kind of, right?

Do I have a video of it?

I can put it.

Oh, is that the Arc de Triumph?

It is.

So you got to go around a little bit.

Well, no, that's actually just on our shuttle to the skate park.

In the window?

We saw it through the window.

Oh, that sucks.

You would think you'd have to run to the place to be able to go around.

Plus, what a baller you are.

If you're like, oh, you in this?

Oh, I'm in it, actually.

Just to every person you meet.

We were playing.

We became good homies with the.

I think he was a Filipino gymnast.

Is that you?

No, no.

Jesus.

That was Keegan.

We were going down there.

There was a basketball court in the the village, too.

And we were going.

We'd play with him like every day.

You play?

The Filipino gymnast?

Filipino gymnast.

I'm pretty sure.

Or Dominican.

I can't remember where he's from.

Oh, Jim.

He's way better than that.

Yeah, no, he was very structured.

We sucked.

But it was funny.

It was just random.

There's not much to do with the village, so we just were all stuck into basketball, and that was about it.

This is so fucking cool.

So what, they just like you bend over, oh, wow, nice sunset.

Yeah, they announce your name, you walk up there, stand on the podium for a second, wave, smile, do your thing,

and then yeah, take some pictures, and then the lady gives you the medal, and then wave and smile more.

Are you surprised by how heavy it was?

Yeah, I was.

I did not know.

Did you get to see any other medals before you got this one?

I did.

So, like, we, in our room, all the skaters were staying together.

Yeah.

And the other for the street team, Jagger Eaton, got silver as well.

And he brought it back, and I saw it.

so i saw that one before but then i got that one wow

oh so he won something else yeah okay well that's cool yeah wasn't was anybody like fucking pissed they didn't win

um

i'm sure some people were it's not really like that in skating though at least i don't think it is maybe people were bummed but in the other sports yeah there was a lot of upset silver medalists Upset silver medalists.

I'm doing a joke about it.

In America we've been throwing medals if you get a bronze.

People are like, back of the bus.

Fuck you.

How dare you?

But then I like those one country ones.

We're like, we finally won one.

They're all going to know our name for a week.

Oh, fuck.

Damn, that's so interesting.

Wild.

Yeah.

And when did it hit you?

How did it hit you?

Because I was telling you, I just did the garden with Tony Hinchcliffe with this show.

And it was a couple days later.

It said it was in my kitchen and I just like stopped and it was like, oh yeah, I was at the garden and I fucking crushed.

It was so cool.

Um, just flying here, and then sitting in my hotel last night, and I was just like, kind of sitting there, and I was like,

I'm in New York now doing all this.

So, you're doing a bunch of press on it?

Yeah, exactly.

Wow,

what are the dumbest questions people ask you?

What's the dumbest question?

Generally, what are the dumbest questions?

Um, like the most annoying ones,

I don't know for us.

It's how'd you get started?

Yeah, you're always funny.

It's like, oh, fucking shut out, Freddy.

Yeah,

probably something like that, but skate-related.

Yeah.

Have you always been good at skating?

Yeah.

No.

What are the wheels called?

Oh,

I have gotten some of those ones.

Like, somebody doesn't even understand.

What is the skateboard made out of?

I'm like, wood?

You're like, I don't know.

I'm not the guy for that.

I don't make them.

I have no idea.

Did I say somebody ask, who's the dude who plays with The Grateful Dead now?

I can never remember his name.

I'm not sure.

Real pretty guy.

Your body is a Wonderland.

Ah, fuck.

John Mayer.

Oh, okay.

And this guy was like, what do you see when you play?

He goes, that, dude, that's a great question.

He's like, nobody asks shit like that.

He goes, I see shapes.

And I just match shapes in my head.

And he just stopped again.

He was like, what a high-level question that is.

John Mayer, tricky dude.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

You think all these guys are like straight lace and stuff.

And you're like, oh no, you fucked half of LA and fucking played everything.

You'd got to do drugs to play like that.

Oh, dude, this was fucking great.

I'm trying to think, what else did I not know about this experience that I should have?

I'm trying to think.

Did you get paid?

Yeah, the U.S.

Olympic Committee gives you a bonus if you get a medal.

What is it?

It's not as much as

I forget which, I think Singapore, if you get a gold medal, you get like $800,000 or something insane like that.

Wow.

Yeah, some of the countries really.

And it goes down for bronze and silver.

Yeah.

There's another.

Wow, they really value it.

There's another country that if you get a gold medal, they give you like a four-bedroom house or something crazy like that.

In Colombia, if you get a medal, they don't kill your father.

The U.S.

is like,

I think gold is like 40,000 and seconds, like 25 or something like that.

But everybody gets it.

Yeah.

High-level sport or badminton.

Yeah, or skating, which isn't a real thing.

25 grand?

Yeah.

That's fucking nice, bro.

That's fucking nice.

How much do you get for a competition when you win?

Depending, but like, what's an average?

Like, 25-ish grand.

This podcast pays $200.

Congratulations.

Oh, thank you.

Yeah.

Look at that.

Now it's $25,000, too.

Perfect.

Yeah.

It's not as won't pay for your Uber over here.

No, it's almost, almost.

Yeah.

Dude, it was such a fucking cool experience.

What a fucking cool thing to say you wanna.

They'll never take that away from you.

No, no, unless somehow I fail my drug test, but I think I'm good.

Do they test for weeds still or no?

Yeah, they test for everything you can think of.

But I mean, like, that's on your gravestone now.

Yeah.

U.S.

Olympic medalist.

Tom Sharp.

Crazy.

Yeah.

That's like a, it's, it's, I mean, whatever.

I'm sure it's setting it for you, but like, that's a, that's a generational fucking credit.

Yeah.

You're going to compete next time?

Uh, I keep getting asked that.

I have no idea.

Yes.

I will.

Sorry, it's too early.

It shouldn't, because it's too early because you're still watching this.

I will definitely try to, but I just haven't really thought about it.

Where's the next one?

Oh, it's LA.

At home.

Yeah.

It's pretty good.

Wow.

I grew up in LA too, so it's perfect.

Where?

Like Santa Monica.

Okay.

I lived in West LA, West Hollywood for fucking pretty much a decade.

Nice.

Santa Monica rules.

It was a fucking great falafel place right across from Santa Monica College.

Like right across.

I don't know if I know my falafel spots too well.

All right, fair.

Fair.

Fair.

Yeah, you got to compete in L.A.

Yeah, I'm going to.

But everybody's going to want to.

The celebrities that are going to be there for that one.

And I'm already becoming the old guy in skating now.

So there's going to be another generation that'll

probably smoke me, but we'll see.

Dude, I saw that.

Who's that Brazilian kid that was there?

That was at that ramp that day oh uh he's like 13 maybe oh yeah ghee ghee yeah and they were talking about um that that little girl yeah and he was like how old is she because they were talking about some tricks she just landed and and they were she were like 10 he was like fuck he was like he like he i could see him feeling old like

damn it the kids actually make fun of me because i'm like old now compared to them really yeah i'm born in 1999 they were born in like 2014.

who was that it was some 50 was it bucky Lassak?

Was there?

Somebody was there.

Some older guy was there.

Bucky was probably there.

Was like on the skating, though.

Yeah.

Bucky's still kidding.

And it was like all these 19-year-olds and then this fucking grandfather.

Yeah, that's the weird thing with skating.

The whole session will be anywhere from like a 12-year-old to a 50-year-old and everywhere in between.

And everybody's chill.

Yeah, everyone's just skating.

Dude, do you snowboard or ski?

I snowboard, but I'm on a hiatus right now because I broke my collarbone twice, like two years ago.

Nice.

In the same season.

Really?

Yeah.

My friends point this out for like loopers or whatever, amateurs.

What's the fucking derogatory term for fucking shitty skaters?

I don't know.

A kook.

A kook, I guess.

Yeah, donks or for poker and like whatever.

But he was like, we couldn't do

the park, you know, between 14 and 40.

He was too embarrassed for being bad.

At 10, you're like, that's cool to try.

And at 43, you're like,

everybody knows I'm not trying to stretch.

And they're like, way to go, man.

You landed that one.

So now I'm really enjoying it.

That's funny, actually.

Yeah.

Skating's kind of the opposite of that.

No one really cares at all.

No one does.

No.

Everybody, I don't know.

Everyone sucks at some aspect of skating, so everyone's still trying to figure it out.

It was cool, too, and I saw it down there at Tony's with the fucking

slap of approval.

Yeah.

It's like, it's like nice.

Yeah,

it's pretty sweet.

The Birdman.

Yeah.

He's also like...

There's like 40 of you guys, and that's it.

Yeah.

Like real Vert skaters.

Yeah, there's really not that many.

That's wild.

It's kind of a tiny world.

It's making a comeback, though.

Yeah.

It is, for sure.

You can't find it to practice.

That's the hard thing.

There's not...

There's probably not a single VERT ramp in New York.

Wow.

But on the west coast, there's plenty.

It's just...

So you can skate the whole year.

Not everywhere.

True.

But there's fewer and fewer.

Like when I was a kid growing up, there was a Vert ramp.

Why?

Why is it done?

Every ten miles from where I lived.

But

I don't know.

I don't there's just less of them getting built and fewer kids have access to skating it.

So it's just kind of

it's a fucking cheap sport.

That's why basketball is so good.

It's like just set up anywhere and then you just need one ball.

Yeah.

There might be more liabilities now with Vert skating.

People are probably getting sued over stuff.

Does anybody not ski with a helmet in the Olympics?

No.

Well, for park skating, they make you

because someone had a very bad accident like five, four years ago, and

now they make us wear a helmet.

What do you mean?

Crush their skull and fucking hell.

Yeah, I hit their head really bad and bleeding out of their ears and shooting.

No.

What?

And just fucking really?

Yeah, it was pretty bad.

But

you're getting so high off the fucking thing.

If you come off at all, it's fucked.

If you hit your head, it could be pretty bad.

But

now we have to.

But outside of the Olympics, no, most of the time we don't really wear pants.

You don't

because you're not a fucking.

I won't even make you guys bleep whatever they're going to say.

Dude, congratulations.

Thank you.

That's so badass.

Thank you, thank you.

What are you doing while you're here?

You want to go to a comedy show?

Yeah, I'd love to, actually.

Okay.

That'd be sick.

Yeah, I'm performing tonight tomorrow, but then

I'm off on the weekend.

But if you still want to go with two buddies, I can get you in.

For sure.

Did you go in San Diego when I was there?

Yeah.

You did?

Yeah, I came down.

Nice.

That was a good show.

That was a good show.

Yeah.

Cusker went up.

Yep.

Yeah, that was cool.

Tommy, buddy.

Congratulations.

Thank you, man.

Yeah,

it's fucking cool.

Like, it's just hitting me now, sort of.

Yeah.

It's an elitist.

It goes back to Athens.

Yeah.

I was going to make a random guess, but I have no idea when it started.

Yeah, I really don't know.

It was like in like one, it was like the BC dance, and then it took a long break.

It was back when they were wrestling naked and trying to use dicks

for position.

And then straight to like, all right, no dick holes anymore.

That's a couple updates.

What was the most random sport you saw there?

I've never seen fencing before.

I saw that.

It's not that random, but it's just crazy to kind of watch it.

I think fencing, to really get more support, needs like an Alec Baldwin fucking mistake where someone doesn't put a tipper on and then just really stabs somebody

and then just the realization, like, oh, there's supposed to be tips on there.

Who took that tip off?

And the other guy's like,

I would.

I mean, if they use swords, I'd watch that for sure.

Do that, then turn away

on the walk away.

That would make it taller, dude.

I would watch that.

All day fencing would be to the death.

Oh,

um,

yeah, I saw Ecuador.

I I lived in Ecuador for a while.

I was like, they won one medal.

It was speedwalking.

And it's like, better not to win.

Damn.

That's like.

Speedwalking's a crazy one.

Yeah.

There's just a judge looking at you to bend your knee.

Yeah.

I met a girl that did speedwalking, and she was teaching me the whole technique of it.

And it's honestly, it's kind of hard as fuck.

But

yeah, she was saying that they're very...

very strict about their whole knee situation.

My dad did a speedwalking marathon at 16.

A marathon?

Yeah.

Speedwalking.

Yeah.

People are like, you can't run a marathon.

He goes, I'm not going to run it.

Wait, so hold on before we go.

So you qualify.

That's a huge relief.

Yeah.

Did you know after you run, you're like, okay, that's good enough to get me in?

Yeah, kind of.

I did my first run in the qualifiers, and

I got like a 92.

And you know, that's like, that's going to play.

92 is pretty good.

Especially top eight.

Is that what you said?

Yeah.

That's going to be top eight.

92 is pretty solid most of the time.

And then

I got in there.

I got to go second to last because I qualified

second.

That's big.

So on my last run,

I was already in the finals.

So on my last run in the finals, I was already in second.

It's not cumulative, right?

No, no, just best run.

And what was your scores in before that?

I had a 92.5 in second.

And the person in first

who was going last, who was after me, had a 93.

Okay.

So I had to just try and improve by like one point.

And I went through my whole run.

I got to the very end, and I just fell on the last trick.

But if I would have landed it, I don't know.

Maybe it would have been different, but I guess we'll never know.

Are you disappointed in silver?

No, no, no, no.

I'm not the sad silver.

Okay.

Good, good, good, good.

I'm very happy with that.

And when you land it in the first two runs, runs, when you land, as soon as you're done, do you know, like, that's that's that's gotta be 91, 92?

Um, yeah, you can kind of.

Um, I mean, sometimes their judging is all over the place, but like, going off of what they gave me earlier, you're like, and I did pretty much the same thing.

I was like, okay, well, it should be, like, a 90-something.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And then you see that 92.

What is it, 92-3, 92-1?

92.

Yeah, something like that.

When you see that, you're just like, fuck yeah, I'm getting a medal.

Kinda.

I didn't really know because it's the Olympics.

Like, everyone was going for broke.

They were all trying their hardest shit.

And,

but,

yeah, I don't know.

People just kind of kept falling or just didn't really get the scores they wanted.

And then all of a sudden, I was like the second to last person to go.

And I was in second.

And you already clinched second.

Yeah.

Oh, my God.

That was so fucking free.

Yeah.

This is what we do in comedy specials, like tape a bunch of sets and you already got it in.

Now you can just be free for the last one.

Yeah, that's exactly what it was.

It was great.

Wow.

Damn, Tom, man, thanks for coming.

Yeah, thanks for having me.

Yeah.

You got anything to promote specifically besides your fucking self?

What do you skate for?

Monster?

Yeah.

I skate for monster energy.

I just got on new balance shoes, which has been awesome.

Birdhouse skateboards as well.

Oh, right.

Shout out, Tony.

Shout out Tony Hawk.

Yeah.

He's the man.

I guess I technically.

No, I don't.

I'm like, it's one one free shirt since whatever.

Yeah, you're on the team.

Hell yeah.

You're on the team.

Thanks.

Yeah, I mean, birdhouse comedy.

Yeah, that would actually be good.

That would be good.

We're going to do a skate comedy tour.

Oh, yeah.

Hell yeah.

Make it work.

Just set up something in the back.

Like, all right, guys, enough of this.

Come on in.

Let's hear some jokes.

That'd be perfect.

Damn.

Yeah, thanks, man.

I appreciate it.

Yeah, thanks for watching.

That was awesome.

That was awesome.

Well, oh, here's what I was going to say.

Last thing I forgot because it was so specific.

Do you have any travel tips in general when you go traveling?

Like packed light, fuck

make sure to see stuff, make sure whatever.

I don't know, like anything that you try to do.

I feel like I always see people just like panicking while they're traveling.

Like just, you know, just chill.

You're going to make your flight on time.

You don't need to be there four hours early.

You really don't.

That's such an old person thing.

And, you know, just enjoy the trip.

I was going to

Copenhagen for a comedy festival.

My buddy Bobby Kelly called me.

He's like, where are you?

I'm like, What do you mean?

He's going to the airport.

Are you here yet?

I'm like, I'm at home.

I'm not even getting ready to leave yet.

You're so old.

I get to the airport like an hour before my flight every time, and I make it.

You make it.

You make the flight.

Here's what I want to see.

I want to see, like, going, like, say, I have a bag and I check the bag.

I want to see the lady behind that counter go,

all right.

That's perfect.

No waste of time.

That's perfect.

That's living.

The fucking

move.

Can I go in front of you, please?

Cut people in the security line.

Is there anywhere you want to go that you've never been that you're like it's calling you?

I haven't really been that many places in Asia.

Like,

it's wild.

Yeah, I'm trying to go.

Or India.

I've never been there either.

There's a skate scene in Myanmar.

Yeah, that'd be sick.

It's wild because it's such a just new developing country and there's in Yangon, in Rangoon, whatever.

There's like a skate scene.

That's some

things I definitely got to check out.

yeah more asia you could also they can't tell us apart so you could um i had to get a visa for china once and i went in and it said like what are you doing there i was like i'm working i got and they're like well then you need a letter from the government you need all this stuff i was like fuck i fucked it up i was supposed to just go like without saying and i called the promoter i'm like what i'm supposed to do and he goes so you know how like you have trouble telling them apart It goes both ways.

So just go back to that window.

They won't know you.

And then just say, I'm just there for tourism.

And that's exactly what happened.

Oh, my God.

But you could go to some random skate park and just fucking, I'll try skating.

Yeah.

Just blow the roof off the place.

Yeah, cool.

Skateboards.

Oh, you guys do four wheels?

All right, let me try it.

Yeah.

All right, buddy.

Thank you very much.

Yeah, have fun with the rest of your interviews.

Congratulations again.

Fucking a U.S.

Olympic medalist, Tom Sharp.

Well, guys, that was the episode.

Pretty fucking cool, I would say.

Pretty fucking cool.

A U.S.

Olympian, a medal winner.

I mean, when I started doing doing this podcast, this actually

would be a classic Skeptic Tank episode.

You know, tell me about the Olympics.

But it also works really well for UB Tripping because it's talking about going

to Paris in that specific time.

Fucking cool.

That guy fucking rules.

You know what else rules?

Kill Tony.

I got to tell you about this fucking show, you guys.

I got to tell you about this weekend.

New York City comedy scene is buzzing.

It's buzzing with what happened the weekend before last.

I mean, the whole city came alive.

If you don't know Kill Tony, I mean, you do, you know, Kill Tony.

It's a great fucking, it's the number one live podcast in the world.

It's available on YouTube all the time.

And I've done it since its inception, really.

I've been doing this show for 11 years.

So I've seen a few shows at Madison Square Garden.

And I've seen some friends.

Louis was there with Adrian Appalucci, one of my best friends.

She fucking killed.

And that was really cool.

I saw Chappelle

premiere his movie there.

He went up.

Jon Stewart went up.

And I'm friends with Ronnie Chang and

Jeff Ross.

They were on there.

This was different.

This is our show.

Kill Tony's our show.

It's his show, but it's all of ours.

So we all felt an ownership of it.

And they were like 50 comics backstage every day, Friday and Saturday, just hanging out, running around Madison Square Garden, just the back of Madison Square Garden, just having a fucking blast.

It was so fucking cool, man.

I got this hat in the gift bag meant for Harlan Williams.

I stole a gift bag from Harlan Williams and Joey Diaz on the way out of the after party.

It was wild.

I mean, I got so much to tell you.

First of all,

I mean, I don't know where to even start.

The production value is so fucking epic at these big shows.

It's big, way bigger than the Louis one, way bigger than the Chappelle one

it there's fire so so i went day one i went friday just to hang

and i mean it was comic after comic he brings it out they have these crazy like almost like the the sphere level fucking videos to start the show with all the kill tony regulars

like an ai version of all these guys doing like fucking smashing up new york city He really leaned into the New York vibe.

And then he comes out, you know, first the band plays.

Then, oh, oh, I mean, there's so many details, I'm going to forget a lot of this.

So then Jelly Roll goes up to sing New York, New York, Sinatra's version.

I saw him backstage getting hair and makeup.

Yeah, Jelly Roll puts, gets hair and makeup done.

Those,

I don't know what I'm allowed to say.

Those are not his tattoos.

He gets those put on before shows.

He's actually a very nice Christian guy.

He doesn't have face tattoos.

That's that's retarded.

Why would a Christian, nice guy have face tattoos?

He's a normal dude.

He puts those on before shows.

So he's in hair and makeup, getting his tattoos put on.

And he goes, Ari, you inspired me

to dress up.

You know, I don't do that.

I don't do that naked stuff anymore at Kill Tony.

I'm a grown man.

And I went on Kill Tony in Austin and I wore a fedora and

like a professor's shirt with like patches on the elbows.

And I said, I'm a grown man now.

I don't do that childish stuff.

Jelly Roll said he saw that and he goes, I was inspired by that.

I want to dress up and pay homage to this great man, Sinatra, in this great city, New York.

And he's saying, New York, New York, with a fucking sick smoking jacket and press-on tattoos.

So then he went on.

So then Kill Tony comes out.

Marcus King's playing in the fucking band, one of the best blues musicians of all time,

let alone our era.

He's just playing in the band, nondescript.

Red band comes up, introduces Tony, plays fucking erupts.

There's a soft glow in the room, a soft red, Kill Tony red glow across the whole fucking audience.

What a production value.

My buddy James did all the production stuff for it, who did it for my special.

Yeah, the Kill Tony production designer is a production designer on my next special, which you will see at some point, and

you'll see how fucking crazy this guy is.

So then Tony goes, I mean, he says, the place fucking erupts, goes nuts, and he goes, well, I got to have some guests for you.

He goes, guys, I'm in New York City, but it's an Austin podcast.

It's an Austin podcast.

So I got to have some Austin nights for you.

Please welcome Shane Gillis.

And the place,

there were so many eruptions, one bigger than the next.

And if you're a Kill Tony fan, you're hoping.

You know it's going to be a good show because it's always a good show.

But then you're also hoping to get one of the regulars.

Listen, it's like when you see a band.

I went to see in Austin, I went to see the Pixies.

And then I don't know know when they added to the show

Arctic monk, Franz Ferdinand.

There was this other opener named Bully, this fucking female singer, who was really quite good.

But sometimes you get a singer like Bully, and you're like, wow, she's really good.

Or they were really good, or whatever, you know?

I'm not saying she's a they, but why not?

Spread that.

But you're like, ah, that band was really good.

Maybe I'll get a t-shirt.

But then sometimes you're like, I know the opening band.

Franz Ferdinand was on a high level of that.

And we sat on,

it was so fucking hot.

It was so fucking hot.

This one chick, I know Marlene was just so out of it.

She was on, she was on mushrooms.

We looked down and she was like this, cross-legged, like, it was outside of the H-E-B arena, not arena, amphitheater.

And it was so fucking hot.

It got under 100 degrees at 9.30 p.m.

It was, I'm not joking,

on earth, the hottest city in the world that day.

Moved to Austin, they say.

It's beautiful.

She had heat exhaustion for sure, but she survived survived it.

She is infertile now, which sucks, but she survived it is the point.

So

what was I saying?

So you see a man like Franz Fernandez.

You're like, oh, even better, even better.

So he brings out the first Austinite, Shane fucking Gillis, who is, I mean, legitimately, possibly the biggest comic in the world right now.

And he's my vice president on Legion of Skanks.

It was four years ago and he drove up from Philadelphia.

It was four years ago.

Renault in August, he drove over from Philadelphia to Double Cross DeRosa during this gang selection for to hang out with everybody because it was just COVID, but also just really for free drinks.

That was where Sheng

was then.

And now he's the big, one of the biggest comics in the world.

That legitimately may be the biggest.

So

the place fucking erupts and he's like, wow.

So they got what what they wanted.

Who's next?

I don't know who's going to be.

You know, they're hoping it's somebody like me, my level, mid-level, you know, maybe DeRosa, someone like that.

No, Joe fucking Rogan.

Erupt again.

Joe Rogan and Shane Gillis on the dais for Kill Tony.

Joe Rogan comes out with this fucking giant green

mink coat, nylon, fake mink coat, with fucking baller sunglasses and just leaned into it.

It was wrestling, guys.

It was wrestling.

And that soft red amber glow just permeated the whole audience.

20,000 people in there going fucking crazy.

So then they start the show and they bring out either

the regulars and then also just comedians, just regular comedians.

There was a couple people who had their first set ever at Madison Square fucking garden.

And everybody was stoked.

I took Tony around New York for the week leading up to it to try to infuse in him a love of this city, and it worked.

He did love it.

He finally understands it.

This city rules, and he honored it.

He honored it in a way that only Tony could.

You know, he didn't shit on the sidewalks.

You know, he could have done that.

That would have honored the city.

He did it differently.

He put on one of the greatest shows of all time.

Ron White went up.

Harlan Williams went up.

A minute, a minute.

Louis Gomez, he wasn't.

Also, you got to understand, Tony's not just a comedian on the show.

He's running it.

He's a producer on the show, too.

And so he's got a heart out at 10 o'clock.

If he goes over, I think it's either $100,000 or $300,000 to go over by a minute.

And then he can go all the way till 10.59.

Show starts at 7 o'clock.

He was like, hey, doors open at 6.

We open at 5.30.

We just want to open at 5.30 so we can get, well, this is actually not my story, so I won't tell you this part.

Doors open at 6.

He got in there.

The fucking pre-show was fucking sick.

And then, I mean, he brought up, he brought up Big J.

Big J crushed so hard.

Tony was setting everybody up to win, man.

He wasn't just running the show.

He was cutting promos for people.

So Big J goes up after this fucking pretty guy goes up, this open micer who just he bombed Tony.

Also, to start with, so the show

at the forum in L.A., where I took my dick out of a hole in a Kobe Bryant jersey,

was

a shitty crowd.

They weren't a good crowd.

They were booing comics.

They were chanting.

They were trying to be involved.

You know how LA people are.

They think they're the center of attention.

So they suck.

LA people in general suck.

That's why they support the Lakers all the time and never support the Clippers.

They're both hometown teams, but of course they all go to the popular team.

And by the way, when the Lakers aren't good, they take down their flags.

They don't support their team.

They're fair weather fans.

They're a terrible fan base.

They're not as stabby as a Raider fan base, but they're a terrible fan base, full of bad people.

And they were a bad crowd.

So Tony didn't want that.

So he goes up right away and he goes, guys,

don't boo.

You got to let these people have their minute.

He tells the comics that all the time, too.

He goes, you got to let them have their minute.

Don't interrupt.

It's just one minute.

And then we'll all make fun afterwards, but don't interrupt.

And he goes, guys, don't interrupt.

He goes, because they did it in LA at the forum.

And he goes, so first he gives them the directive, don't interrupt.

So great.

But he does it in a way.

He goes, but you guys aren't LA, like, right?

You're not like LA people, are you?

You're better than LA.

This is New York fucking city, and you're better than Los Angeles.

And they all fucking went crazy, cheering.

They got the directive, they didn't interrupt anybody.

But this kid, this pretty boy, they booed him pretty hard.

They started booing him.

He was just all about his pretty good looks.

And

I stole this.

I actually didn't.

He gave it to me.

What was I going to say?

Oh, so then they start going at the end.

They talk to him.

He goes, Tell me one redeeming quality about you, sir.

And he goes, Oh, I played hockey when I was younger.

I mean, a rain of booze on this guy.

Oh, you played the rich kid sport?

Oh, that's your redeeming quality?

You played a sport for fucking rich people with money?

A reign of booze.

And Tony allowed it.

This was one time he allowed it.

And then

Big J went up next.

And man, I mean,

I don't use the word inspiring much, but the way he brought this crowd into his vibe.

You know, Big Jay, he's one of the best comics in the country.

Underrated, I would say.

Top 20 underrated comics.

And he brings a stool out, and he sits on a stool at Madison Square Garden.

20,000 people sits on a stool and he brings everybody into his vibe,

into that club vibe,

and he crushed.

It was such a good set.

And then got, I mean, wow.

I, I know, I wouldn't know how to do regular stand-up in an environment like that.

I always say, like, I told Rogan, he was like, you should do one of these arenas with me.

I'm like, I know, but I would need like five times because I would need to get used to the pacing.

And he goes, nope, you'll get one time.

Whatever you say about Joe Rogan, people forget he's a comic.

That's all he is.

He's a comic.

Nope.

I'm like, but it'll be hard.

Like, well, you'll fail.

So Jay fucking crushed.

He went, he brought comic after comic up there.

Harlan Williams did a minute.

Ron White did a minute.

I mean, it's guest starter.

And they don't know anybody who's coming.

And every time somebody comes up, fucking flames shoot up from the sides.

Flames and sparks.

And fucking, the production value was, oh,

Kronzer, man, what a fucking job you did.

And

so Lewis is on the show.

Lewis Gomez, he's running out of time.

He told Lewis, I don't know if I have time.

And then he's 10 minutes ahead of his schedule.

And he's like, get Lewis, get him down here.

I'll set you up.

I'm going to put you on after somebody who wasn't good.

We had to find Lewis.

I called him 10 times.

I kept calling him, calling, where are you?

You're on next.

They couldn't find him.

He's up in the fucking VIP box drinking free drinks.

No matter how rich you get, you want those free drinks.

He comes down.

They introduce him.

He gets a 10% standing ovation before he starts.

This is Louis Gomez.

You know, I'm not trying to shit on him, but he's not an internationally famous guy.

He's doing quite well, but he's not that.

But this crowd knows him.

They know everybody in stand-up.

And he fucking did great.

He did great.

I mean, everybody had to start off with like, how do I get to my first punchline?

So, Lewis had probably 20 seconds, and you get nervous people, like, fuck, 20 seconds.

Where's it?

That's not a lot of time at a club, and

in an arena

in a theater, it's a lot in an arena, Jesus.

And then you start like, oh no, is it?

And then he hits him with a punch, and everybody's like, boom, laugh.

And then an even bigger punch.

And it's like, boom, laugh.

Then he sets it off full circle.

And it's like, wow,

wow.

God, Lewis did well.

And I'm watching the whole thing from the side.

I'm watching the whole thing from the side.

Who am I with?

DeRosa was there for,

was he?

Yeah, DeRosa was there for a while.

Lewis was there.

Big J was there.

Kevin Ryan and Foley came.

People just came to hang out.

God, it was a fucking great show.

There's so much to it.

Dr.

Phil goes up.

Adam Ray is Dr.

Phil.

I mean, that's one of the all-time greatest guests on Kill Tony.

He's been doing it for years.

I'm so proud of my boy, Tony.

Adam Ray, I'll get back to it in a second.

I mean, I'm so, you don't understand my relationship with him.

Here's my lasting memory of Tony Hinchcliffe.

Here's my first memory.

I know I met him before, but he got there.

in during the we call them the dark years but actually i used to hate that i think i like it now

Because the dark years,

when they said it, they meant

it wasn't very popular.

But

here's the redefinition of dark years.

And Tony, you'll fucking agree with this.

The darkness came, but we got to experiment with our own darkness.

We got to be dark comics.

You call us edgelords?

We lean into it.

Yeah, give me that.

Yeah, sure, I'm an edgelord.

We're all edgelords because we're on the fucking edge.

We're doing dark shit that's going going to make people walk.

But if you're cool, you'll fucking like it.

Remember Batman's parents got stabbed on the way home from a fucking, going to a show in Harlem?

It was, it was fucking, we shouldn't be here.

We're rich whites.

Yeah, if you're cool, you can go to those shows.

And that's what the comedy store was.

People experimenting.

Benji doing a joke right after fucking Parkland that fucking leveled the room,

taking chances where no one wanted to laugh.

Night after night after night, people are taking these dark chances.

Yeah, the dark years.

Yeah, because no one's coming to see us so we could do shit.

and it was during these dark years i left for a while after uh mencia and rogan were beefing and i just didn't

just really grossed out by the way the comedy store handled it and it wasn't the comedy store was the people who were running it and i left for about a year i just didn't feel like going i was living two blocks away and i didn't feel like going there what's up guys skeptic tank rants

and i was i was driving home one day

I don't know if this was when I wasn't there or not.

But anyway, Tony Hinchcliffe got there

during that time I was gone.

So I didn't see him.

He heard about me.

I am the door guy.

I am the comedy store door guy.

I still feel like a door guy.

And so, of course he heard about the door guy.

I was the last one to drive Mitzi around.

I was the last, you know, I worked every job there.

I worked the phones, the cover booth, the door.

I fucking waitressed one night.

I worked the fucking logging and videos.

I did everything there.

I was the employee.

And then I turned into a headlining comic.

And anyway, then I got to know these guys, and I was driving home to my place on Sunset, which has now been rebuilt.

8433 Sunset Boulevard.

No, that's the comedy store.

It's down the street, right in the corner of La Sigana against Sunset.

I drive straight up La Sagana and right into my carport.

And I would sit there sometimes listening to the radio, just kind of thinking before I went into my home.

My rearview mirror, I saw Tony Hinchcliffe and Matt Edgar walking from the comedy store.

I saw them to my right.

I saw them walking.

I looked at them from my rearview mirror.

They were talking.

They were wearing their comedy store shirts.

It made me so fucking happy because that was me.

I was wearing my comedy store shirt a few years before, walking down to Mel's, one of the fucking worst diners in the world.

But that lumberjack is good, though, bro.

That lumberjack is a bargain.

And they were walking down there to get something to eat late night after the comedy store.

It's 2.30, you know, three o'clock.

And I'm like, man, that's the next generation.

That's the next generation of comics.

And that was Tony and Edgar.

That's my lasting memory of Tony Hinchcliffe.

That's my first memory of him.

He's a door guy.

He's a store guy to the core.

And then one day he started this show called Kill Tony in the belly room of the comedy store.

And just like I started my show, This is Not Happening in front of 12 people in the side room of the improv, he started it.

They have, all these clubs have their closets, I call them.

So the improv had their closet.

They've been rebuilt it now.

It's a little nicer.

When I did it, there wasn't any liquor.

You couldn't even drink in there.

It's just a black box.

The belly room is that closet.

He started it there.

And I would go to the shows there.

There's 15, 20 people there.

And I would go to those shows.

We'd have a fucking blast.

And eventually it started getting big enough.

And then started he moved into the main room which didn't fill up first he he imagined a world where he could fill it up and then he did celebrities came I remember one time at the they were all doing the show I just happened to be there and I don't think I'd moved to New York yet maybe I had no 11 years ago I had but I go back to LA all the time and

and uh they were all uh uh uh Jeremiah was uh part of the band They had sketches every time as the band.

And now it's like a legit band.

Then it was like a funny band.

He's morphed it.

He's allowed it to morph through the years.

I remember trying to sell it as a TV show.

And I was like, Tony, find it first.

I did this not happening for years before we sold it as a show.

Find it first.

Thank God he couldn't find a buyer because he did find it.

And I remember what, but he was always open to the comedy store vibe.

The dark years, bro.

The dark years.

And I remember I found a Jeremiah, he was selling a magazine, not a magazine, a calendar.

And I found one of them and I went out backstage, took all my clothes off, and I just put my belt back on on my shoes and socks.

And I was like, hey, guys, I just came out through the back because I know Tony's down for comedy.

I was like, I'm just here to sell the Jeremiah calendar.

Of course, you know, people see visceral, fucking flaccid dicks.

It's crazy.

Tony's always down for that shit.

Always down for a fucking goof.

And he brought that vibe to Madison Square Garden.

So Adam Ray comes up as Dr.

Phil, and Tony, then he's like, thank you, I'm done.

He gets off, and Tony's like, I can't do the Dr.

Phil impression.

Tony's like, well, hold on, one more thing, Dr.

Phil.

And Dr.

Phil's like, well, Tony, wait, I can't do it.

Well, thanks for ruining my exit, buddy.

And he goes, well, I got something to tell you.

And then he shows, he goes, I know you're fucking, you're never in the same room as Adam Ray, but Adam Ray's parents are here, and I think they'd like to see this.

And he played this video

about all the fucking

all the fucking appearances Adam Ray's made over the years as himself, as Dr.

Phil, as Biden, as that chick character that I never saw before until this video, making out with William Montgomery, all the while.

He's a favorite there, and for a reason.

And then he inducted Adam Ray into the Kill Tony Hall of Fame.

It was, I got choked up.

I got choked up many times.

Shane's intro, Big J set.

Dice.

I can't believe I skipped over dice.

That was the highlight for me

of day one.

But then he inducted Adam Ray into the Kill Tony Hall of Fame and had this puge.

And I mean, it was fucking, it was amazing.

Everybody went nuts.

That was the reason to interrupt him.

Tony wouldn't do a fucking interruption to ruin an exit.

He's a fucking

circus leader.

Him telling Lewis, like, hey, we're ahead of time.

Go get him down here right now any other person that run it would have a very regimented fucking plan not Tony he's fucking let's move let's morph let's do fuck shit let's fuck it if you can think of something I'll trust you do something

I had on this podcast I had Harlan Williams come in he's gonna be on soon and and he was like I don't want to cover one country I have this other thing planned I was like no we really just do one country and I was like you know what Harlan actually I respect the shit out of you if you think you know better than me let's go with it and man it's gonna be one of the greatest episodes it's ever been on this podcast I'm still flying high from it.

He was there.

He did a minute.

The place went nuts.

He's a favorite of Kill Tony.

You don't understand Andrew Dice Clay's place in the world of me.

If you're under 35, you don't know.

There were only two comics.

There were a lot of comics, but the only two

comics that sure, there was like Robin Williams and fucking, you know, all those guys.

I don't know.

But Andrew Dice Clay was bigger than life.

And when he played Madison Square Garden, no one had done anything like that.

When he came out with the new album, everybody got it.

We taped a tape of a tape of a tape.

It was like, it was before they even had two tape decks where you could record one.

It was, hey, be quiet.

I'm recording the dice tape.

And you'd play it, you'd have a recorder right next to a speaker.

So the quality got lower and lower and lower.

We listened to it in the student union at school.

And a teacher came in, you had to stop it real fast.

It was dice at the garden, it was the preeminent moment.

Hickory dickory dock.

He used words that had never been used before.

Cunt.

It had never been used before.

Rusty Dooley said it the best to Mitzi Shore.

She goes, do you think there'll be another dice?

And Rusty goes, no, because he used all the words.

And he comes out at Massacre.

I'm sitting next to Jim Norton.

Jim Norton went up, a fucking crazy favorite in New York.

He comes out, and Norton's the biggest dice fan, so am I.

And he comes out wearing the full leather, and he turns around, and he fucking doesn't have the ball patch like me, pops his collar up, and I mean, chills went down my spine.

It threw me back to seventh grade.

In one second, when he popped that collar, I was back at sleep away camp in seventh grade, you know, jerking off under my covers.

when no one could see me ever so quick.

Don't move, don't move, don't move.

No one's going to find out.

They did find out, and then I had to convince them.

I was like, oh yeah, it feels really good.

You guys should all do it.

And there was a bunch of fucking Jewish kids, all these yiddle-diddles, just fucking jerking off.

Pre-com.

Pre-com time.

Just jerking off.

Like, it does feel good.

We had eight guys around the bunk fucking jerking off all together.

I'm an innovator.

Everything was fucking crazy.

That was day one.

He spared no expense.

It was so fucking epic.

And I just watched, I love it.

Day two, Renazisi showed up.

Steve Simone showed up.

These are my buddies.

This is my class at the comedy store.

And we're just watching from the side.

Simone brought fucking.

He's such a fucking nice Christian.

He brought fucking Philadelphia.

He drove up from Philadelphia.

He brought Philadelphia

those soft pretzels for everybody.

Day two, Biden and Trump.

The place goes nuts.

Fake Biden, fake Trump.

Shane is Trump.

Adam Ray is Biden.

Newly elected Hall of Famer, Adam Ray is Biden.

Harlan goes up again, sits on the fucking dais this time.

Attel is on the dais.

Dave fucking Attel.

I think

it's wrong to compare.

But if you force me to,

he's the best comic in the world.

Day to day.

He's the best comic in the world.

If you ever get a chance to see Dave Attel, the seller, late night, that's what what real comedy is nightly.

And he's doing it on a level that nobody's doing it.

Constantly writing jokes, constantly fucking quick, so fucking quick.

He's on the dais.

The place is crazy.

Dice goes up again for a second.

There's so many fucking soft red amber glow in the audience the whole time.

The Black Keys did two songs to start the show.

Aaron Rodgers is in the back.

I see him in the back.

And I'm like, what?

He was walking in wearing a counting crow shirt.

And I passed.

When you see a celebrity like that, for a second, you're like, dude, what?

I handle it pretty good.

And I was like, oh, hey.

And he goes, he goes, hey, Ari Shafir, big fan.

Like, what?

I go, yes, same.

What, two or three time MVP?

Aaron, any chance you could fucking go to the Cowboys?

Is there any any chance you could go to the Cowboys?

Just for fucking one year.

We got a good, we got good everything, man.

The defense is solid.

Finish off this Jets contract and then fucking go to the Cowboys, man.

Yeah, it's not tampering when a Jew does it.

It's only a tampering when certain Jews do it.

Big fan.

I'm like, yeah, same.

And we're all talking in the back.

And he's just a cool guy.

Jeff Ross is there.

Jeff Ross came out day one.

And all the regulars, David Lucas, Ari Maddie, bro, killed day one on a level.

His pacing was so good.

The joke was good.

The bit was good about homeless people.

I'm not going to ruin it.

But like the pacing to do that big an arena, that's how I'd fail.

I would just do my club pacing.

The pausing perfectly to soak in the setup, it was another inspirational.

Just fucking, I learned from him.

That's what you get in New York.

I know he's an awesome guy, but that's what you get in New York.

New killers all the time teaching you things.

damn this is going on too long

and i mean we're getting drunk in the back on day one i was gonna do something day two

and i told tony i was like oh by the way buddy if this is getting too much like you know i you don't have to and and tony's like bro just the attitude was like no i need you to do something you're part of this show

are you nuts you're part of the show

I did clear my schedule.

As soon as he found out he booked it, before he even announced it, I cleared my schedule.

There's a couple things I did before he was announced.

Cleared my schedule for Kill Tony before they even announced a sale.

And I invested heavily in Spotify when Rogan told me he was going to take that deal.

Made a lot of money.

I made a lot of money

investing in Spotify.

God damn, that turned out good.

He told me, and I was like, whoa,

it's going to do something to the stocks.

He says, yeah, probably.

And I was like, oh, called a couple of my Jews.

Fucking bank.

Where was I?

Yeah, he's like, Yeah, I gotta have you do it.

I'm so glad I cleared my schedule.

Rogan did too.

What a fucking baller to take a private jet down there to work for free.

Trump was shitting on Rogan because Trump in real life has been shitting on Rogan.

So Trump is like

Shane as Trump was shitting on Rogan.

At some point, Rogan comes up from the back behind him.

He goes, Donald Trump.

Oh, sorry.

He's like, Joe Rogan, what a coward, terrible guy, what a coward, coward he is.

I can't really do impressions.

And then, and then Joe Rogan just comes out of the back.

They don't know he's there.

He hasn't been there the whole show.

This is like 30 minutes left.

Terrible guy, real coward.

And Shane hears the applause.

He comes up from the back right behind him.

Shane hears the applause and just keeps going.

Terrible guy.

I tell him to his face, what a terrible dude.

I don't know what he said exactly.

Coward, real coward.

And then Joe just stands over him and he looks and he goes, Joe Rogan, what a guy.

What a guy.

Great guy, Joe Rogan.

And then Joe holds it.

He holds it.

Dude, the timing on that was so fucking good.

Joe's timing of that was so he just kept staring at him.

This is what you got to wrestling is all about cutting promos and stuff.

So when they run out and they're going to say, fuck you, you know, whatever, Undertaker, I'll kill you.

They have to run out and like pretend to heavily breathe while they wait for the applause to go down and then go, fuck you.

In real life, without cutting a promo, you just come out and go, fuck you.

Joe just holds it and holds it and holds it.

Finally dies down and he goes,

and then he does that.

Joe Rogan, what a guy, what a guy.

And then he goes, buddy, I'm not mad at you.

I'm not coming at you.

I just said I like how the RFK doesn't attack people.

I haven't ever endorsed anyone for president.

I don't do that.

And he goes, but you know what?

I would like to endorse someone today.

I would like to endorse them.

And I'm getting a fucking lump in my throat.

I'd like to endorse the greatest guy that's ever been on this planet.

And he's here today.

I'd like to bring him out.

My nominee, my endorsement for 2024 president, Joey Diaz.

And this place,

this place erupted.

I mean, you couldn't hear the person next to you.

You couldn't hear the person next to you talking how loud it was.

And then Joey comes out and he's like, and I, wow.

And then he did time.

He's talking about Massacre Garden coming when he was a kid on Quelludes and fucking all that shit and fucking watching the fucking

fucking trapeze artists get dragged out by fucking clowns because they were too janky back then.

He was so great.

And he was.

So then he sits in there, Brian Holtzman comes out, which is all our favorite comic at the comedy store, late night, fucking angry vibes.

He comes out and just does comedy store.

And I'm sitting next to Steve Simone

and Steve Renazisi.

And we were right back

to being Door Guys at the comedy store watching Brian Holtzman saying, Fuck you, Billy Joel, you should kill yourself, Billy Joel.

You suck.

All these people here have quit because you fucking work every night, angry in a fucking great way.

And we're just, it's like we're in the OR, just watching Holtzman crush out a late-night set in front of 15 employees and eight customers.

And then we turn to our left,

and there's 20,000 people laughing.

I mean, what a bonding moment for me and Renazisi and Simone.

There was no chance, guys.

You don't understand what comedy was like.

It wasn't going anywhere.

It was a couple A-level club headliners.

You know, Rogan didn't even sell out every show in Austin.

This is during the Fear Factor years, I think, when I was open for him.

I remember Sunday he didn't sell out.

Or maybe Thursday he didn't sell out.

And then

it was a 300, one of those days he got to 80% full.

I was like, wow, four sellouts and a and an 80%.

That's great.

That's where comedy was.

That was Joe Rogan on Fear Factor.

Nashville Zaneys, he didn't sell out every show.

And now it's in this place that it's in.

And I was like, we were all talking, me and Steve Simone and Steve Renazisi.

We're like, nothing could have gotten us here.

We couldn't even imagine it.

And one guy got us there.

one guy got us there

the king of evil

it was so fucking epic it was so fucking epic i'm getting teared up even thinking about it

it was so fucking epic so chill

I mean, Tony and I talked about what we were going to do, and we kept getting like, can't do it, can't do it, kept getting no's until 10 minutes before showtime.

And he had so much shit shit on his plate, but he was still taking time to fucking come to me and like, how are we going to do this?

What's the bit?

How are we going to do it?

And

it's not about me.

I was very happy with how it went.

I got to go big in a room in 20,000 people.

It didn't hit me until the next day.

Didn't hit me till the next night.

I had finished the comedy cellar.

I was went up at the Village Underground.

I got an applause when I went on.

I'm doing all new August, so I don't have have any material, so I'm going to put my name on lineups.

So it wasn't on the schedule.

God, it fucking sucks the all-new August.

Challenged myself, though.

And I got an applause like I've never gotten before in New York.

No, one other time.

One other time I've gotten this kind of applause.

It was my first setback after that Kobe Bryant stuff.

The New York Comedy Club had a show with zero people, zero

on a Tuesday, zero

reservations, and a fucking

bomb scare.

And they're like, ah, let's just cancel the show.

What's the point?

All Things Comedy took me off a show at the stand.

They said, you can't go up.

The stand doesn't want you there.

Then the stand called me.

I was like, 100%, we want you here.

Come on down.

The stand's always been on the side of standing up for comics.

Come on down.

But then All Things Comedy would not let me go up.

They said it's dangerous.

I was like, I was outside on the phone, literally by myself, talking to Steve Simone.

This is not a thing.

They're like, the stand doesn't want you here.

I'm like, you're lying.

The stand stand actually called, like,

you know, the Italians called me, said, please come to me.

We want you to come down and perform.

Anyway, so then two nights later, I think it was Thursday after the Sunday of everything that happens, my first set, it was in the upstairs room.

I wasn't even on.

They're like, do you want to go on?

I was like, yes, I need to go on.

I need to do this.

I need to get through this on stage.

And they went on and it was like a minute-long ovation because comedy fans know they don't allow people to take one away from us for for what?

For what they know is a joke, like it or not, they know what it is, and most did like it.

A minute-long ovation.

It was second to that at the Village Underground.

It was like, wow, I was like, Jesus Christ.

There were 35,000 people that went to those shows for those two days.

And they went to other shows all around the city.

It was a buzz.

The stand at the after party was fucking great.

Everybody was there.

It was one of the best after parties I've ever been to.

No one was, I was on the upper level, but not the upper, upper level.

Not that many agents and managers around.

No one was trying to climb or anything.

It was just a fucking fun party.

They brought all this buffet food with

toothpicks in it.

And I sat by there.

And every time somebody picks up with a toothpick, I just grab it out of the toothpick and eat it.

People were so mad, but Mike does a ton.

Go get another one.

God, what a time.

What a time to be alive in comedy.

Joe Rogan said it.

We're all talking about about it later with uh with our fat friend brad and um and him and our used to be fat friend tim

and and burt was like i feel like i missed out and joe was like i'm so glad i went and he goes he said it wasn't just a comedy show it was a celebration of comedy of this whole

thing

We needed someone to get us to the garden.

And Tony Hinchcliffe, the door guy who used to walk to Mel's, he's the one who got us there.

We wrote his fucking coattails.

I am never going to forget that.

So, this is what hit me the day after.

So, after the Village Underground, came home, got high in the walk home, like I often do, walked my 30 minutes home, especially in the summer, it's the best time to be in New York.

Streets are your own.

Piss on the sidewalk.

and uh,

yeah, I somebody got me some flowers.

Like, congratulations on the garden.

I'd seen him a few times,

but then I saw him again, kind of fresh for the first time because I had done it, and I saw, I noticed it.

Congratulations on the garden, and it hit me like I was walking back to get

something to put some like leftover food and some sesho on, and it hit me like

I played Madison Square Garden

and it was great,

It was great.

I fucking crushed it.

I'm on the front monitors to this rain of fucking applause.

And

I've never felt this before.

This many people screaming their support for me.

And I'm on the front of the monitor and I'm just standing up there in a fucking handmade suit by David August that Rogan got me because he's a fucking baller.

He's a fucking G.

This three-piece beautiful suit and I'm just sitting up there soaking it in.

Gave the double fingers to this whole MSG audience before I even started my fucking thing.

It hit me, and I was like, damn, bro.

I don't do this much.

I don't like soak it in much.

But I soaked that one in right then in my kitchen alone with Bandit fucking on the couch.

And it was like, I played MSG and I fucking blew the roof off it.

And it was, what a feeling.

Anyway, forgetting a bunch of stuff.

That second day was a blur because I was so focused on getting ready.

So that's the episode, everybody.

That's the episode.

I had to tell you about it.

I'm sure you've seen it by now.

I had to tell you about it.

New York City was buzzing with comedy.

Way more than the Comedy Festival in New York when it happens in November.

Way more.

It's our show.

We all have a tiny bit of ownership in that show.

It's the Green Bay Packers of stand-up comedy shows.

Except instead of monetarily owning it, we fucking, you know, mentally own it.

Thank you, Harlan Williams, for leaving your gift bag.

I hung out with some New York Jets afterwards.

They were all fucking cool.

Comedy's so big.

I met Marcus King afterwards, and I was like, hey, good set.

He goes, oh, look, a big fan.

I'm like, what the fuck is this?

What is this world?

Does give me hope, though, that I can maybe now go just DM people and go, Do you want to be on You Be Trippin'?

and see what they say.

Could work.

Maybe, if they know me, maybe they would.

So that's the episode.

Thank you very much, your mom's house, for producing this.

As always, Alan.

No, this one's by

Chris Larson, edited this one.

Thank you once again to Tom Shar for coming in.

Congratulations on a silver fucking medal.

Forget about being one of the best Burt skateboarders of all time.

What a fucking fun, fun, fun

time in Paris.

You really fucking milked it right, bro.

You really milked it right.

Sign up for the uh for the Patreon, you be trippin', patreon.com slash you be trippin'.

Help me support me doing this.

We're gonna send someone around the globe for a year with the money we get from Patreon once we get to 2,000 subscribers.

Um we're also gonna do fun stuff.

I wanna I wanna do is take a fucking dart, throw it to the globe, throw it at a map, and then get on a plane for, let's say, five days, something like that.

Three to five days, three to seven days, and just do that live on the Patreon, and then go and then check in a couple times, tell you how it's going, only on the page, and that's it.

We're going to do a live one maybe in October, we'll see.

Details will come, but that's it, I don't know.

My vinyl is

should ship in a week.

AriShafir.com for all that, grinders and everything.

And guys, that's it.

I got nothing else to tell you.

You'll be tripping pod on Patreon.

Subscribe wherever you're listening.

This is a fucking epic podcast.

Next week,

one of the best comics in the country, Greg Fitzsimmons, is coming on to talk about Ireland.

He's got a special coming out at the same time.

And that was a fucking great, great trip.

It was him as a kid.

I think it was a 19-year-old driving around Ireland.

It was a fucking great one.

These are some of my favorite ones too is the old old times.

It's fun when they're fresh off a thing like Tom just did.

And it's fun when they're like talking about an old, old old version of themselves like Greg Fitzsimmons is going to do.

I'll tell you next week is Greg Fitzsimmons.

Sean Patton after that on a great one about Cuba.

A great episode.

And then

September is

yeah it's just going to be great.

Shane Gillis will come on in September.

Hopefully

hopefully

Andrew Schultz, pressure him.

Hopefully Tim Dylan, pressure him to come on.

Joey Diaz is coming on September.

Got a lot of shit planned for you guys.

Subscribe wherever you're listening or watching.

And that's it.

I'm Ari Shafir.

It's been a great time.

Thank you for tuning in.

Till next week, Bonjour.