Konstantin Bazhenov

When I started skating, it took me more than two months to land a halfway decent Ollie, then I started trying frontside 180s, but it was not a success, so as time passed, I began to think that it’s just a waste of time and it’s not my thing. But then, maybe a little bit less than a year after I started skating, I found Mike Osterman’s channel on YouTube, and that’s when I first learned about freestyle. I was fascinated by his flow and by unique tricks. So, I decided to give it a try, and I liked it a lot! So, I think, if it wasn’t for Mike, I would’ve abandoned skateboarding by now.

As I mentioned earlier, my first mentor was Mike Osterman, and I still learn a lot from him to this day. When I started to communicate with other Russian skaters, I realized that no one skates freestyle here. Then I found out about one person who does and does it really well. That’s how I learned about Vladislav Kanin, and I decided to text him online because he lives in the European part of the country, and I live close to China, Japan, and Korea. When I texted him, he was happy to hear that someone else is into freestyle, and he was ready to help me. We keep in touch to this day, and I hope someday we’ll skate together!

I go to Far Eastern Federal University, it’s my senior year, so I’m about to graduate, with a major in fundamental and applied linguistics. Since I started skating, I’ve been dreaming of blending skateboarding and linguistics, and I think I’ve succeeded, I’ve written two papers about skateboarding terminology and working on my thesis, which is about instructional video discourse of skateboarding.

I’m not sure if skateboarding is my hobby anymore, it’s an essential part of my life. But apart from that, I do a lot of DIY stuff, like patches with band logos for my clothes, custom skateboard graphics, or messing around with some electronics. I also like to draw a little bit and play a reasonable amount of videogames. Last year I tried bass guitar, but due to the lack of time, I dropped it. I have a dream of creating my own synthesizer (maybe several, maybe a lot of them) and playing some music with it. Unfortunately, I have not participated in any freestyle contests yet, wish me luck.