Now that the results of the 2024 QS Readers Poll have had 72 hours to sink in, we passed the data along to our correspondents, Big Hen Dawg and Joey Pops at The QS Sports Desk 🏀, to break down how they stacked up to their expectations.
(The fact we’ve had emails being like, “You guys should’ve included _____” — no, motherfucker, you should’ve included ______, because these aren’t OUR exact picks, check the methodology to see democracy at work…)
Humidity ❤️ via Greg Navarro 📷
Quick thirty second Hardbody commercial with Antonio + Hjalte is giving video magazine ad vibes. Told E.J. this was too short, and his response was, “Well, the last video was too long.” New Hardbody stuff live on their shop + your local.
“Interstate” is a sick eight-minute video by Spencer Newman and the youngs, based around Stamford, CT, but with a good bit of New York footage in it. Yelled at the screen @ the slam on that new brick thing by Domino Park + it’s heartwarming to see the “Sphere” [Gold & Platt by CIA Ledge] endure through two decades of homie videos. Titles are coming back, baby!
“If you’re listening to all this hip-hop, why the fuck are you editing your videos to Joy Division?” Farran Golding profiled Paul Young for Closer as he was winding up production on Down By Law + included a video supplement on the art of selecting music for skate videos.
Young goat Enzo Kurmaskie teamed up with other known goat Ryan Mettz to bring you a 2024 close-out part from the Limo-verse. All Paris and New York footy, with a lot of time spent in the city’s jaggedest corners that bring out your inner concerned parent every time he goes into traffic: “Where is the person on look-out duty?!” Something about the ender feels very Barley-ian in the best way possible.
Cameos from pretty much the entire Limosine team, and fellow Oregonian, Aidan Olmstead. Run back Enzo’s part in LAND by Cal’s Pharmacy out in Portland once you’re through with it. (First full part after the credits.)
After 10,000 hours of watching skateboarding this year, these are the ten clips that brought the most joy / dropped jaws / conversations at the QS Office. Maybe your office spoke about completely different clips a lot more, but that’s your business ;)
It seems like skateboarding swung towards really gnarly kinked rails in 2024, even more than recent years, and the countdown is kind of …not really reflective of that trend. Then again, our biases are clear: three of the ten are in New York [four if you count New York State], and those took precedent over like, idk, the really Gnarly Wallenburg Trick from the Primitive video.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, the kinked rail trend coincided with probably the highest rate of sacks in the intro compilation pre-roll, so…there’s that.
The #QSTOP10 desk will be on vacation for the next two weeks. The countdown will return on Friday, January 3. Thanks for watching this year, and as always, a much bigger thanks to the skaters, videographers, editors, traffic look-outs, spot repairers and knob removers that keep the good times coming ❤️
Few hours late, but life, yaknow ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
For the third Christmas in a row, Jeff Cecere and friends have brought us a video of wholesome family entertainment to heal our minds after being pummeled by S.O.T.Y-aspirant epics.
Triple Or Nothing takes the Antonio in Johnny’s Vid approach of just throwing the trick everyone is waiting for right in the opening seconds, but with the added twist of saving another wild Reggaeton Ledges-adjacent ollie for the closing minutes of the video. Zac Gavin and Johnny Cumaoglu return to build on their third-eye sensibilities from the last project (switch crook on that underpass ledge is absurd), a lot of Krooked extended family members + Dick Rizzo pop by for cameos, and Salomon Cardenas pulls through with his finest work to date. Not a bad slate for what has to now be one of the best video franchises of the 2020s.
