Over the past five years 500 workers have been killed in fires at garment factories in Bangladesh. Last year a fire reportedly swept through a factory that made Hawk Clothing for Kohl’s killing 29 people. ABC News used this as an opportunity to ambush Tony Hawk at a skatepark opening to see if he thought celebrity clothing endorsers should keep closers tabs on the safety of workers in the factories that make the clothes that carry their names.
“It’s tragic,” Hawk told ABC News. “I think that the safety standards need to change and I support whatever change that they can make there. . . I definitely want to follow up and make sure that it’s safe. I mean that’s the bottom line, it has to be safe.”
Nice work, Tony. Kind of a cheap shot from ABC News who obviously knows that every single thing American’s consume in mass quantities is made offshore in factories where people are paid next to nothing. But hey, celebrities sell news, right?
The world’s most famous shark survivor Bethany Hamilton got a chance to share the aloha with a group of overly large people when she attempted to teach contestants on The Biggest Loser how to surf, according to a story on People.com.
“I surprised them on the beach,” Hamilton, 22, tells PEOPLE of the episode that aired March 20 at 8 p.m. ET on NBC. “They were super excited and maybe a little nervous, but I think they were just so stoked to be there.”
Yes, sea water is reportedly good for large people. We’ve heard it makes them feel weightless plus, there’s probably no safer place to be in the ocean than surrounded by big, thick, juicy people. Click here to watch the full episode.
In the classic story of celebrity wackness, TMZ is reporting that Ryan Sheckler filed a police report on February 27, 2012 accusing friend Stacy Salazar (a women he was planning on “spending the night with” at the Las Vegas Palms Hotel) of running off with $100,000 of his jewels.
Ryan claims he fell asleep but was awakened by the sound of his door closing. He then noticed Stacy was no longer in his room. A few hours later he noticed his jewelry was missing — a Rolex watch valued at $12,500, a gold/diamond bracelet worth $14,975, a diamond and white gold ring ($63,275) and a diamond necklace of unknown value. . . Ryan called the cops, who took a report.
Salazar told police that she was being set up by one of Sheckler’s “childhood friends,” according to the story. Police arrested her anyway. Oddly, we thought two things: why roll with that much bling? And, isn’t Sheckles on the Nixon team? Oh, and girls looking to rip off more of his stuff should check out a profile of his house in the New York Times.
It looks like Tony Hawk has been doing a little spring cleaning lately. If he’s not selling his everyday family driving car, he’s auctioning off collectables from his office to raise money for his charity.
This time he’s got a slew of oddness including: an old contest trophy, an autographed Michael Jordan Jersey, a Tony Hawk Prototype Doll Head, prototype Airwalk Shoes, Five nights in dangerous Cancun, Mexico, and a golden head of Tony Hawk sculpture. But that’s just a few of them. There three pages more of the stuff.
If any of this sounds interesting to you click the link and make a bid. All the proceeds from the auction will go to the Tony Hawk Foundation. Follow the jump for the official word from Tony Hawk, Inc. [click to continue…]
This is Tony Hawk’s personal 2008 Jeep SRT8 with a Hennessey SRT600 Turbo package. This car was driven on the 2009 Gumball 3000 and featured in an episode of MTV “Cribs”. . . . This model came stock with 420 hp and Tony jumped at the opportunity to work with John at HPE on the engine. They installed the SRT600 Turbo package.
And yes, it is fast. It will go 0-60 in 3.4 seconds and turns in 11.9 second quarter miles if you’re into that. It’s currently up on a 7 day auction so you have a week to think about it.
Next Tuesday, (February 7, 2012) Ben Kweller will release a new album, Go Fly A Kite. To promote that album Bored To Death star Jason Schwartzman pulled together a little help from his friends who look more than a little alike. Watch and you’ll see what we mean.
It really transcends skateboarding and becomes a story about this group of six guys who weren’t the cool kids. They weren’t the hipsters. Some might say they were borderline nerds and, for many of them, it was a real struggle to attain the position they eventually attained and we deal with that in the film.
Click the link for the short yet interesting interview with Stacy.
Real and true and honest moments are so rare in corporate snowboard sport that when they occur it drops the bottom half of our brains out into our laps and leaves us dumbfounded and quivering. That what happened last night (January 29, 2012) when two-time Olympic Gold Medalist, five-time Winter X Games Gold medalist, Target Clothing Designer, video game character, and 2012 Businessweek Power 100 number 8Shaun White dropped in on his third and final run in the Winter X Games Halfpipe Finals.
White had already won the gold medal with a score of 94 points, edging second place finisher Iouri Podladtchikov by one point. White was perfectly set up to take a victory lap. He could have just made a four hit run of 23 foot straight airs and the gold would still have been his. But Shaun had some unfinished business. In his second run, White had gone down on his last hit. It was the unveiling of his frontside double-cork 1260 and he didn’t land it. We could tell the moment he dropped in on his final run that he was going to try it again.
As we all know, Shaun landed the back-to-back backside double cork 1260 to frontside double cork 1260 on his last two hits and was awarded the first perfect 100 point score in X Games history. And while it seems an almost too perfectly scripted finish for a Walt Disney Company owned made-for-TV entrainment event property, the truth is Shaun White’s run was one of those real, true, honest moments in snowboarding were an athlete’s performance rises above all the bullshit that surrounds the event, the marketing, and the hype and stands alone on its own screaming for everyone to hear: this is snowboarding.
Shaun White seemed as stoked as we all were. “It’s unreal. I’ve been wanting that 100 forever,” he said. “Thank you everyone here tonight. This is unreal. . . I came here on a mission. I couldn’t compete in slopestyle. I was sitting around icing my ankle. I took out a little of the anger that I couldn’t compete in slope on the pipe tonight. I was upset with my first front double 12 and wanted to get it.
For one of the first times in X Games television show history we were glad we were somewhere with cable and able to watch, because missing this was missing one of those epic moments.
Don’t think that action sports aren’t diving headfirst into a celebri-orgy at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah rolling this week. No, no, no. They were out in full force for the the Oakley Learn to Ride Powered by AT&T. This next paragraph pretty much sums up the mood of the entire event:
After drinking a Muscle Milk in the lounge area for some pre-ride protein, Sal Masekela was joined on the slopes by pro snowboarding pals Danny Kass and The Dingo. “Actors have always wanted to be athletes and athletes have always wanted to be actors. There’s a big mutual admiration in society, and Sundance is the perfect place to test that and put it together,” said Masekela. “I see Danny Kass and Lil Jon, and you would think that they grew up in the same hood. That’s how close they’ve gotten through snowboarding.”
And they weren’t alone. Skater Lauren Perkins and surfer Erica Hosseini also got in on the action with a crew of celebrities (some of which we’ve even heard of). Okay, on the count of three everyone keep your celebrity brand rolling for another day: 1, 2, . . . .Which reminds us: where was Todd Richards in all this? Oh, that’s right. He was webcasting from his garage.
Jake Owen, a country singer we’ve never heard of before, reportedly broke is collar bone while snowboarding in Colorado on Friday the 13th, according to a story on The Boot.
He got pretty banged up, but that didn’t stop him from hopping on Twitter to share the details. . . “Just broke my collar bone,” he tweeted. “Guess I charged this mountain a little too hard.” . . Included with the post was a picture of the country star with his arm in a sling.
