Chasing the Lord

So here we were. A couple of Skandos, Arto and I, in the land of palm trees and empty swimming pools, trying to connect with the legendary Lord. I’ve been on many sessions with Salba, so I know he moves fast and through many pools in a day. You have to keep up and get your tricks quick, if you want to skate all the pools he’s gonna show you. He doesn’t like to be a sitting duck in a pond for too long. And with good reason. At 62 years old, who wants to have run-ins with the police over skating backyard pools. After all, most pool sessions involve trespassing and damaging private property, if you look at it from a legal perspective. In fact, we added burglary to the potential charges, at one of the pools we skated, because our crew saw some unused toys and an old portable TV they wanted to grab inside the house. The house, although abandoned, was in a nice neighbourhood and once you went in, there was no quick way out of the backyard in case the cops, or an armed and angry homeowner, showed up. Salba had been there the day before to sniff out that pool and check the situation. Maybe he sensed the danger. Maybe the vibe was off. Maybe he’d skated it years ago. Too risky. Who knows? So, he passed on meeting up with us, at this particular pool. We got in, cleaned, skated, grabbed our stolen toys and got out. Afterwards, the pool looked better than when we arrived. With Grant, Hugo, and Jesse Alba at the helm, we’d done a damn good job of draining and cleaning the pool, so in our minds we’d done the homeowner a favour, even without Salba there.

All this occurred on the day we had arranged to meet up with Salba, so the chase began. We rushed through the LA traffic. Salba had told us about another pool he seemed a lot more fond of. It was in Altadena. One of the neighbourhoods, supposedly full of empty swimming pools, that got destroyed in the recent California wildfires. As we arrived at the pin, everything seemed dead and quiet. We did a visual scan of the area. No one was there in the torched landscape of a once nice suburban neighbourhood, except for a work truck and some construction workers slowly moving around at a nearby plot of burned land. Everything seemed a lot safer than the pool we’d just come from. As our eyes gazed, one house stood alone on the hillside. Next to it, a construction fence formed a small circle. A red dot was buzzing around in the enclosure of the fence. Could this be it? Had we caught up with our inspiration and pool overlord? Yes indeed, the red dot moving on the hillside was Lord Salba’s vintage Pro-Tec, carving and grinding around the fenced off pool. A pool that had certainly been the main attraction at hot summer BBQ’s and kids birthday parties, just last year. We had succeeded. Or so we thought. Before we had even got done admiring one of the best pools I’d seen in many years, Salba was already talking about traffic and having to get home in time. “In time for what?” we wondered. Mind you, this is at 1pm on a Monday, so we were not picking up on the immediate rush. This was a dream pool. However, a couple of runs later the Lord is leaving. He asks if we want to borrow the drain cover, which, as many know, is an important piece of pool skating equipment. Without it, you have a deadly hole in the middle of the pool. Well yes, of course we wanted to keep it, thinking this is our key to locking in yet another session with Salba in the next couple of days. As he went on his way, he exclaimed, “don’t forget the drain cover”. This drain cover was definitely of a certain high quality and of special sentimental value to him. Hugo vowed that he would look after the cover and make sure it was returned later in the week, so we proceeded to skate the pool. Stoked to have felt the presence of The Lord, we skated for a good hour or so. This pool was special. With its perfect transition and painted coping, it was no wonder Salba had chosen this pit, over the one we’d just come from. This was a pool worth risking it for, for the veteran pool master.

As we left to go find the next pool on our daily quest, we could only dream that he had joined us. With us though, we all carried the stoke and energy of his brief presence from only moments before. And here comes the catch. We may not get to skate with Salba every day, but we all carry a piece of his spirit with us, whenever we skate pools. His years of experience have been passed down through all the people he has touched and skated with over the past 50 years.

He may not share all the pools he skates with you, but he’ll share the knowledge and tricks of the trade he has gathered throughout the years. The mastery and comprehension he possesses from the countless backyards he’s snuck into, the run-ins with the cops, the dead animals he fished out, the junkies and homeless encounters, the buckets and pool pumps, the foot chases, the permissions and goodhearted homeowners, and all the Salba-sauce all add up to an unbelievable amount of skill and expertise, that makes only him worthy of the title, Lord.

As he continues to grind and carve his way through a large part of Southern California, I hope that the pool code that already lies in his legacy will live on forever. So, the next time you skate a pool or grind a piece of pool coping that’s been blessed with the magic sauce, be sure to thank The Lord.

If you want to see this article printed on paper, get our Rune Glifberg issue.