It didn’t matter if he was skating on the courses, surrounded by homies in the VIP tower or sideline chatting it up with TransWorld SKATEboarding’s Blair Alley on the Dew View live stream alternate angle, every time we tried tracking down Zion Wright at Dew Tour Long Beach 2019 he was seen… being seen.
“I came out to show face,” said Zion with a smile. “I’m here to wave and give smiles—to show everyone I’m here.”
Zion admitted to having an ankle injury while being signed up to skate double duty at this year’s Dew Tour. Skating in both the park and street events is difficult enough, but to be injured makes the mission nearly impossible. Zion explained that even though he was not able to perform how he wanted, he was happy to be at the event doing what he could.
Still, with the Dew Tour being the first U.S. Olympic qualifying event, Zion made sure to show up, skate each event and especially take time to talk.
“The Olympics is a big opportunity… Hopefully the right people get to be in it, so the world can see what authentic skating really is.” — Zion Wright
Zion hopped out of the limelight for a few minutes to share his thoughts about skateboarding in the Olympics, how Team USA will look and more, all in addition to emptying out his pockets for a lint check. Since the only things on Zion’s person were a phone and a ring, we opted to save the lint for last and start with his thoughts on skateboarding in the Olympics.
“Team USA is going to be solid, we’ve got all the boys,” said Zion.
In March of this year, Zion was announced to the first-ever USA Skateboarding National Team. To the surprise of some, he was listed to be skating as part of the park team instead of street. Regardless, Zion is nothing but stoked.
“Obviously I want to keep my skating as mellow as I can, but if I have the opportunity to push it and really gun for it—you know I’m going to do it!”
“I’m polishing up more of my park skating, because that’s not really what I skate, but I can skate it. I just want to dial that in more. Then, dial in my street skating more. I want to get some new tricks under the belt, then be able to present to everyone what I’ve been working on.”
Controversial for some, Zion sees the positive side of the Olympic possibilities to come.
“The Olympics is a big opportunity,” Zion started by stating. “It’s big for new skaters and for the skaters that have been around. Hopefully the right people get to be in it, so the world can see what authentic skating really is.”
With the Olympic understanding out of the way, it was time to talk Pocket Lint. Since there were only two items to touch on, we started with his iPhone XS.
“I love it. It has a lot of storage and good camera quality. [The case] is something simple I found at the Verizon store. It is really durable, though. Watch, I can drop it.”
Zion then dropped his phone on the table. Then he picked it up and dropped it again onto the ground. The phone was unharmed. Point proven.
We ended on the ‘$’ ring. “This represents Shake Junt, the grip tape company I ride for,” explained Zion. “I wear it to show my appreciation and love for them. Big ups to Shane Heyl—that’s the homie!”
Sound off in the comments below!