Rune Glifberg

Thrasher Magazine, July, 2008 by Jake Brown

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

THERE ARE VERY FEW VERT SKATERS who can transfer the speed, power, and trickery achievable on the big ramps into the unpredictably-raw realm of the concrete curl. Not only does Rune Glifberg take progressive moves into the tight nooks and crannies of backyard pools and up the vertical towers of the monster parks, but he does so with a springy step and a fluidity rare in the world of slash and bash. And now it seems he's on a mission to find and grind the most out-of-reach portions of every park and pit he comes across--like some sort of Leif Erikson of over-vert.

Well press on, you fuckin' Viking! Lead us into the New World of concrete carnage!

--Micahael Burnett

Do you like skateboarding?

I love skateboarding. But I guess that more than skateboarding, I love traveling. I think that's why I really pursued pro skateboarding or being sponsored. Traveling is one of my main motivations.

You've seen the world. What countries haven't you been to?

A lot. I've never been to Ghana. How long have you been doing it?

I started skating in 1986, so 22 years now. A long time.

Body's still good, huh?

Yeah. It's not like when you were 15 or 18. You've got to rest a lot more, but I'm still doing pretty good. I haven't seen any of these photos, yet.

Are there any photos with good stories you want to tell us?

It's been a long time trying to get this interview done. Going on some trips with Hammeke were good, going to Washington, Oregon, and stuff up there. Going out to Love Bowl with Burnett, doing the big grind out there. That was good. What were some of the factors in pulling that off?

The factors were eight- or ten-feet of vert to get up there. There's a lot of vert. The speed was a factor. Just basically getting your head around what you need to do to get to the top. The speed was there to do it a foot or two under the lip. But after that, I had to really kind of push it.

Did you Hosoi slash up there? It looks like the craters of the moon.

Yeah, the surface was really rough. It also went over vert about halfway up it and then went back in. It had a bubble in it that you had to get past. That thing's been sitting out there for 20, 30 years, you knowing Waiting for someone to get up and grind that shit. I've been wanting to do that thing since the first time I went there four or five years ago. We tried to get permits and all that. Permits didn't come through, so we just had to barge it. Dudes were saying, "Yeah, just get a motorcycle out there and get towed in," but I was all, "Nab, nah. You do that, you're gonna get hurt. Fuck a motorcycle. You don't want to be Patch flying over the thing, no way to judge your speed." I knew that wouldn't work. Halfway through the day I was starting to doubt that it was gonna happen. I'd already went through a full pair of pants.

You ripped through them?

Yeah. I went through a pair of pants, just sliding down, four or five hours of bailing. You don't want to hit your face, so you try and slide down on your ass. I had to go home, get another pair of pants, then come back and re-think what I was doing. Getting up there was all about getting the right move. So I came back and got it in four or five tries. That was a big one. I guess the other trick I'm really stoked on is the tailslide in Cayman on the over-vert. I tried that all day and it was a bit of a mind fuck. That's kind of the skating that I'm getting into now, just trying to push the limits of what's possible, trying to do things that no one else has done.

That's what we're here for.

Yeah. Try and take some tricks to some higher ground.

You've been to higher ground, haven't you?

Yeah. Not just do things on the same vert ramps, but take it to the insane concrete that's out there. That grind is definitely incredible. We just saw that photo of Jaws dropping in, and that thing is no joke.

Yeah, and props to Jaws. That's gnarly to drop in on. Pure psycho. I consider you a good friend.

Who are some of your good friends?

Nicky Guerrero. He's my buddy from back in Denmark. He's pretty much one of my biggest inspirations ever, since I was a little kid at 11-years-old up until today, because he's still progressing. He just turned 40 and he was pro in the States in the '80s. He's one person who I can say made it possible for me to be where ! am today. He really showed me that a kid from Denmark can come out to the States and make a pro career. He's a really good friend of mine. There's other good friends out there, too, like you and Vogt, but Nicky is the guy.

Was it a conscious decision to lay off the vert ramps and focus on the concrete?

Yeah, it was. A few years back when the Firm ended and Bob and Lance and Rodrigo got on Flip I was kind of trippin' for a second, because there was another vert guy on the team. At the same time, I'd always embraced concrete and skated pools and wanted to skate every type of terrain.

You've always hit the pools as long as I've known you.

Yeah, so when Bob got on I kind of decided I'd better find my own niche. Bob is amazing on vert, and I didn't want to try and battle him for the next video part riding the same kind of things. We didn't really need that on the team, either. We didn't need two guys trying to do the same thing. At the same time, I'd grown kind of sick of trying to skate the vert contests and just trying to be one of the best vert guys. That wasn't really what was fun for me. I don't like to have to drill for tricks for days at a time to get it on video. It takes a week or a few days of fall, fall, fall all day. That can be rewarding, too, but I like to just skate. I want to enjoy it and just flow and do whatever comes naturally. That's what I felt was more interesting and fun. Also, I felt the vert scene was kind of stale and that I'd proven I was one of the top vert skaters on the scene. I'd won a few contests in a certain period of time and I wanted to see what else was out there. I didn't want to learn the new nollie hardlfip 360 thing on vert or whatever it was.