Nik Stain might not say much, but his skating—and the way he approaches it—says everything. Over the past few years filming for his next Hockey part, I’ve seen just how deep his love for skateboarding runs. He’s constantly thinking about it—studying Google Street View for hours, searching far and wide, driving solo for hours and hours out of the city to check spots. He figures every detail, before eventually bringing us out to shoot, even if it means staring at a spot for days on end. He skates fast, loves charging into banks and always has his eye out—not just for himself, but for others too. Skateboarding is his entire world.

Speed, power, flow, Nik brings it all together to close out Hockey’s newest masterpiece

Where are you from originally?
I was born in Moscow, Russia. I lived there until I was nine, then moved to the U.S. with my family to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. That’s where I went to middle school and high school. I barely spoke English, but at that age I remember picking it up pretty quickly.

Do you remember much about life in Russia?
I remember quite a bit. Especially those last couple of years—third and fourth grade. I was starting to walk to school by myself. I had a solid crew of friends. I was super into basketball. Moscow’s not like New York with a grid—it’s all circular, with these massive ring roads around the city. I lived right on the edge of the second ring called the Garden Ring, so we were close to the center. Red Square was like a 15-minute metro ride away.

Flying headless on the endless waves of Hoboken

What was it like when you found out you were moving?
I was bummed. I didn’t want to leave. I liked living in Moscow. I didn’t even know we were moving to such a small place compared to a big city. I just knew I didn’t want to go. My parents sat me down and told me one day: “We’re moving to America.”

Were you skating yet back then?
I didn’t start skating until I was around 12, once we were living in Pennsylvania. I think, like a lot of skaters my age, the first Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater game made an impression. I didn’t even have a PlayStation, but I’d go to the mall and play at those demo setups. Then I saw someone do a kickflip in real life, and that was it. I wanted to try it.

Do you remember your first real setup?
Yeah, I started on a Walmart board—one of those super waterlogged, clunky ones. I used that for a couple months, then convinced my parents to take me to a real shop. There was this place in the mall called Amateur Athlete. It was actually legit; they hosted demos and stuff. I got a blank or maybe a Mini Logo—just the cheaper boards, like 40 bucks instead of the 55 or whatever it was for a pro model. I skated Mini Logos for a long time.

Did you have a crew early on?
I skated alone for the first four or five months. I’m an only child, so I was used to entertaining myself. I’d skate in my driveway or the curb out front, just learning ollies and kickflips. Eventually, I met some kids, but the real crew came in high school when met my friend Kyle Dalrymple—we skated every day. I still love skating alone. I know some people hate it, but I think it’s the best—just skating flat, no distractions, in your own world. There’s a spot on a pier in Hudson Yards that’s usually empty, so I go there sometimes. It’s hard to find quiet spots in the city.

What were the first skate videos that really hit for you?
The first one I remember was transworld’s “Transmission 7.” I downloaded it off LimeWire or something. I didn’t even understand what the tricks were; I just watched it over and over. But the first video that really got me was PJ Ladd’s Wonderful Horrible Life. My friend had the VHS, and I watched that part constantly. The style and the music are perfect. I watch it all the time to this day. He was wearing super ripped éS Accels, doing flip tricks in hoodies; I wanted to do the exact same. Around that time, I also saw Flip’s Sorry and Alien Workshop’s Photosynthesis, which were huge inspirations, too. Kerry Getz was from a town near mine, and we were obsessed with him. His tricks were so clean—perfect kickflips, perfect frontside flips.

Where were you skating when you were getting into it? Did you stay local or start getting out of town early?
At first, it was just around town. I didn’t have a skatepark nearby growing up. We just skated street. Also, whatever we could build: sketchy boxes in alleyways, flatbars in driveways. We’d find different size loading docks and jump off them for hours, like, Alright, I kickflipped off this loading dock behind CVS, now I’m gonna try the bigger one behind ShopRite.

Did you ever think about going pro or trying to make a career out of skating?
No. I mean, it’s always been a childhood dream but I never thought it was something realistic. Later on when I moved to Philly, I saw Ishod Wair skate in person for the first time and it was unbelievable. I’d never seen anyone skate like that. I think he was still just flow at that point, but then within a year, he blew up—getting on Nike, Spitfire, Real, Thunder. That was eye-opening. Seeing him in person made me realize just how insane skating could be. I didn’t have that level of skill, so I kinda knew that being a pro wasn’t realistic for me. I just wanted to keep skating.

“It started raining while I was trying this front board, but I didn’t give up right away. Then it hit me, I don’t even skate rails. Why am I skating one in the rain?”

So you were still fully into skating, just not thinking pro?
Yeah, exactly. I was skating a ton in high school. It was around that time that my friend Kyle and I started skating for Homebase Skateshop—Shout out, Andy Po. To me, that was a dream come true. We used to watch the older shop videos constantly. One was called Kill the Filmer. Suddenly we’re hanging out with all the skaters from those videos. They were our heroes, and then we became friends. It was surreal.

So how did you get into Temple? Was that always the plan, or did skateboarding influence your decision?
Back then, I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I just wanted to skate. It was like college was a way to keep the high school lifestyle going a little longer. It was all about skating, doing homework and not really thinking about the future. After I watched Chris Mulhern’s video Few And Far Between, I knew I wanted to be in Philly. So I applied, got in, and just went for it. My mom had no idea I sent in my decision. She was a little upset, but I just felt like Philly was the right choice.

Did your mom know how deep into skating you were, or was it something you kept separate from your school life?
She knew I was into it, but I don’t think she fully understood how serious I was about it. I was also into music from a young age. When I moved here, I joined the middle school band, and then high school marching band. I had a pretty wild mix of friends—my band friends and my skate friends—and they mostly never crossed paths. Some of my skate friends were kind of like, Why are you in marching band? But that didn’t matter to me; I liked both.

Were you able to focus on skating while balancing school?
In the beginning, I wasn’t focused on school as much as I should have been. The university said you could just go undecided on your major, but what they don’t mention is that you have to choose it pretty quickly to graduate in 4 years. I ended up taking five and a half years to graduate. I also had this one semester where I totally went off track. I got a bit caught up in smoking weed and skating all the time instead of just doing the work. I ended up failing every single class and wasn’t able to get financial aid for that semester and the next. I ended up having to move back home to my mom’s and worked at a restaurant, washing dishes to pay off the tuition. I was able to return the next school year. It was a bit of a reality check, but I’m glad it happened. I also never smoked again.

I think a lot of people go through a phase like that. Did you ever feel pressure to focus on school over skating?
Yeah, my parents wanted me to focus on school. They would say things like, “Enough with the skating and think about your future.” But skating was always the number-one thing.

Did you meet a lot of people in the skate community at Temple?
Yeah, I met Mitchell Wilson and Conor Prunty my first week at school. We instantly became really close friends. A few weeks in, Mitchell said that his brother’s, Johnny and Andrew, were gonna come down for the weekend and the crew just kind of formed from there. We were skating together all the time, and we still do ‘til this day. It’s been like 16 years now that we’ve been skating together. I also met Dom Travis through Temple. Our friends from Jersey would come down all the time: Zach and Jordan Gesko, Sloan Palder and Kevin Winters. That was our main crew.

Front shove as the forest slowly reclaims Atlantic City, NJ

It sounds like you were surrounded by great people. Did that help push you at all?
Definitely. I remember meeting guys like Jimmy McDonald and Brian Douglas. I saw Brian Douglas skate flat, and he was doing switch tré every try. It was one of the moments that solidified my decision to be in Philly. Everyone was so good, and the skate culture was just incredible.

That’s sick. Sounds like a lot of fun.
Those were some of my favorite years, skating and partying with everyone. We finished off working on this video Totally Nector, and after that was when we started working on the Bruns video, which the whole crew was part of. It’s one of my favorite videos that we’ve done to this day. We premiered it at the Skate Jawn warehouse and it was one of the craziest parties that I’ve ever been to.

Did you ever feel like you were getting stuck in Philly?
Yeah, a bit. After I graduated, I was working for a moving company and some of the guys that we skated with started partying more, and I wasn’t into that. Our crew got smaller, and Kevin Winters had to stop filming. For a while I was just skating with my friends Sean Doyle, Joe Marchese and Mitchell. We were skating mostly at skateparks for a year and a half, barely street, just filming on our phones. I was done with college, but I wasn’t sure what to do at the time and felt a bit lost.

So, after that, what made you head to New York?
I started going to New York on weekends to skate with Johnny and his crew: his brother Andrew, Cyrus Bennett, and Max Palmer. Johnny was out in the street all the time, and it was super fun and refreshing. I wanted to be part of filming missions again. After eight years in Philly, I decided it was time to leave. My lease ended, and my friend Luke Koch—who’s from Easton, PA and one of my favorite skaters—was going on a work trip and offered me his room in New York for a month. I just decided to go for it. Honestly, New York wasn’t on my radar much. Even in high school, I’d been to New York maybe a couple of times for things like the Back to The Banks contest, but Philly was always the go-to. In high school, if we wanted to take a day trip to go skate a bigger city, we’d go to Philly. I didn’t think about going to skate New York until much later.

Google-Earthed all the way to Paris to catch a 180 into the bricks

You probably don’t wanna talk about it, but how did One in a Million come about?
No, I’m down. That’s a good one. It was during my sophomore or junior year at Temple. My friend Kyle had mentioned it the year before, like, Yo, I’m gonna send in footage to this contest that Slap Magazine is doing. That was the year Tom K was in it—he might’ve won. The following year, we were working on the Totally Nector video and I had some footage, so I submitted my best stufft. No clue how, but they hit me back.

Were you hyped? I mean, they flew you to SF, right?  
Yeah, I was hyped. I’d never been to California before. I’d been to Austin a few times in high school, but that was it. It was the first time someone else bought a plane ticket for me to go skate. That alone felt big. But also, I was nervous. Everyone else’s footage was so next-level. I was like, What am I doing here?

What was the setup like when you got there?
We were staying at Double Rock. I think we were expecting it to be like the earlier seasons—just a couple VX filmers documenting skating. But when we walk in and there’s like two or three dudes with DSLRs, mics, lights, full-on confessional room setup—reality-TV vibes. That part really threw me off. I’ve never been comfortable talking to cameras. And doing confessionals? Not really what I signed up for.

Did you have fun? Or was it just weird?  
We definitely had fun. But I felt pretty out of place. The skating was insane. Like, Forrest Edwards—that famous double-set session where he back three’d it first try and then big flipped it—that was crazy. John Fitzgerald was doing gnarly stuff, too. Reuben Barrack was also killing it, just hucking himself. It was intense. I can’t skate like that. I’d seen Ishod do stuff like that in person, but that’s about it.

Did One in a Million lead to anything after?
Not really. I think I might’ve gotten a Stereo board once or something. During that whole trip, I only got one clip I was stoked on, a back tail pretzel 270 on a bank to ledge. That was it. At the end of the trip they gave me three new boards and a pair of etnies, which was the most product I’d ever had; it felt huge.

Was there a moment where skating shifted from just being for fun to something more serious?
I think it kind of happened in steps. After the Bruns video came out, I started skating for HardTimes, which was a company out of Lancaster, PA. We always thought it was like an East Coast Antihero. My friend Dom Travis, who had started working at Nike, invited me on a Quartersnacks Nike trip to Montreal and Toronto. I was just a guest, but that was probably my first real Nike trip and I totally blew it. I only got one clip—at a skatepark—and I had to go to the hospital after hitting my head on this metal swing post. I stayed on my board somehow, but when I took my hands off my head, there was blood just pouring down. Scuba Steve had to take me to the ER—real good first impression. After going up to New York here and there, and skating with Johnny and the guys, I remember hearing that Alex Olson wanted to give me some 917 boards, and that meant a lot. When I moved to New York, they were filming for the first 917 video and I’d filmed some stuff for that. But I felt like I wasn’t taking it super seriously. A few months after the video came out, I was on set for a job and got a call from Scuba. He hit me up out of nowhere like, Hey, we wanna help you out a bit, keep you going. I think they’d been talking about it for a while, but I had no idea. I couldn’t believe it and it definitely got me sparked, and I thought, Wow, maybe this is possible. What really pushed me after that was wanting to film something more solid with Johnny Wilson. I had only ever had a clip or two in his edits, and I wanted to contribute something longer. Eventually, we made Skate Clip and that’s still one of my favorite projects I’ve been a part of.

How did you get on Hockey?
I heard through the grapevine, maybe from Skate Clip, that Dill was hyped on some of my footage. I was stoked to hear that, but I was happy with 917. The crew was like a family to me. After a while, though, the idea of being on Hockey resurfaced and I couldn’t get it out of my head, because it was one of my favorite companies. After the second 917 video came out, it felt like things weren’t moving as much with 917, even though we were still skating together. I heard from Vincent Touzery that Dill was hyped on his skating too, so we both started thinking about it. Hockey’s videos and graphics were always incredible to me. I loved the strong vision behind them, and they have some of my favorite skaters. I knew the opportunity was there if I wanted it. And once I realized that, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I remember talking to Vincent and we kind of joked like, I’ll do it if you do it. It was tough to leave because it was something I hadn’t done before. I think Logan Lara found out from Dill, and he called me right away asking if it was true. I remember being so awkward on the phone but I told him that it was. Then I met Alex Olson in Greenpoint at a coffee shop. I was nervous, but he was super cool about it, knowing what it’s like to go through that kind of transition. I also texted Cyrus, and he understood, but it was still very hard. That said, I’m really hyped about being on Hockey now.

In New York, what is your approach to skating? Are you just skating around the city and finding things with everyone, or are you always looking for new spots?
In the beginning, I was just skating with Johnny and the crew, exploring the city. New York is such a massive place, so everything felt fresh. I’d go on bike rides to look for spots, mostly in the city. The spots in New York are hard to skate with everything going on around them: pedestrians, cars, you name it. But after COVID, things changed for a bit. It felt like we had free reign over the city. It was a ghost town. We could skate spots that were usually blocked by people or security. Spots in SoHo, or Midtown or even Times Square were all of a sudden unlocked. There was a moment when we were skating CBS ledges, barbecuing, skating and hanging out there all day, every day. That only lasted for about a year and pretty soon the city was crowded again. We continued trying to skate some of the spots but I had a few meltdowns and that made me want to venture out of the city more often. As far as my approach to skating, especially for this new video, things changed a bit. When I lived in Philly, the priority was about having a session, and getting clips was secondary. However, after I moved to New York, I noticed some skaters were more primarily focused on stacking footage. Right now, my skating is very spot-based—the spot dictates how I approach skating. A lot of times I’ll find a spot that’s asking for a certain trick, and even if I don’t really know how to do it well, I’ll start the process of learning it to be able to film it eventually. I’ll search for specific obstacles at skateparks that mimic the spots as close as they can. Like, say I find an over rail into bank, I’ll search out a version of that at a park. We don’t have a private training facility, but there are enough parks around Jersey and Connecticut to practice at. It’s been fun. I can’t always keep all the tricks I’ve learned in my arsenal though. Some tricks get locked in, but others fade away. I admire people who can bust out everything every session—that’s incredible. It’s tough to keep everything sharp.

“I found this on Google Street View. It was so good I had to learn how to lipslide a rail just so I could skate it”

I know you’re always looking for new spots on Google Street View. Tell me about that.
Yeah, I definitely go through phases of doing that. Sometimes I go overboard and end up with too many spots to choose from. Last summer, I had so many spots saved that I got overwhelmed. It was stressing me out trying to figure out which one to focus on. So now I’ve slowed down and tried to cross things off the list, instead of constantly adding new spots. A lot of my spot searching is on Google Maps, especially in small towns near mountains. Elevation changes create the kind of spots I like—banks, downhills, stuff like that. I can get pretty lost in it, sometimes staying up late or even all night, just searching. When I find one good spot in a town, I’ll drive out there to check it out. Then, I just drive around looking for more spots nearby, which turns into a full day of exploring.

What kind of spots are you looking for?
I’ve really been fired up on skating into banks. There are a lot of these on the East Coast, but they’re definitely harder to find than a place like Texas. Skating into a bank feels incredible—just ollieing into one at a park, it’s such a fun feeling. Sometimes I wonder if I’ve been skating too many banks lately. But honestly, any time I see one in a video, it’s always really exciting and becomes one of my favorite clips. A manny pad into a bank—that’s a dream spot. Those are hard to come by. I’m also thinking about getting back into skating the city. Watching Ben Kadow film in Manhattan for his stuff always gets me hyped. There’s just something about New York City footage that can’t be beat.

Back Smith over the curb and into the asphalt. “It’s rare you find a ledge to bank. I’m going back this weekend”

How many times do you look at a spot before deciding to try it?
That’s an interesting question. Well, it depends on the spot. Like, say if you don’t bring your board to look at a spot, it can seem super possible just by looking at it on foot. But even rolling up to it changes everything. For example: If there’s a narrow run-up with walls on both sides, it might look fine when you’re just standing there. But once you start rolling with any kind of speed, the space starts to feel a lot smaller, and it can become super cramped. I always try to bring my board when I check out a spot and test it out a bit. Depending on how gnarly the spot is, I might even try to mess with it alone, but that can be risky. I usually go a few times before deciding to go full on with a crew. Whether it’s Johnny, Flech or you, I don’t want to drag people out for no reason. The first time I find a spot, I just put it in the vault, sit on it and think about it. Sometimes I might sit on it for a year or two before I decide I want to go back. And then, before trying it again, I’ll go back to look at it one more time. It’s never a waste of time, though. I’ll go skate a park or something around there.

What’s the most times you’ve had to drive back to a spot that was super far away to try again?
Some spots, like a few things in Pennsylvania, took multiple days of driving back and forth. There was this one trick that I was trying, and I couldn’t even commit to it on the first day with everyone there. The drive back felt awful. But the longest I’ve gone back to a spot was probably in Syracuse. I’ve been there so many times; it’s a soul-crusher. I’ve been there eight or nine times total and it’s a four-and-a-half hour drive each direction. Sometimes I’d go there by myself, check it out, but I couldn’t really decide what I wanted to do there because there’s a bunch of options. I ended up filming two tricks there for this video over the course of two years. Working on a longer video project gives you the time to think about things and take your time with it.

Do you ever get burnt out, or does going on these long missions help with that?
I’ve gotten burnt out a few times. Mostly, it was from filming in the city. Skating in places with high foot traffic, like SoHo, got me burnt out. But for this project, I was in a bit of a rut where I couldn’t land anything for a couple of months. It was frustrating. It happens to everyone, but it’s hard to get out of that mindset. I’ve had moments where I’m thinking, Here we go again; I’m not going to land anything. That can be tough. But usually, finding a new spot or trying a different trick is all it takes to break out of that rut. Sometimes, you just need a fresh idea or a new location to reignite your motivation. Skating is so spot-based, and when one spot or trick isn’t working, all you need is a change of scenery.

“I was sitting on this spot for two or three years. It’s skate stopped, but there’s no way anyone in that town skates. The ollie was terrifying”

What inspires you right now that keeps you hyped on skating, whether it’s within skating or outside of it?
Honestly, right now, I love just driving around and looking for new, unskated spots. It’s like a treasure hunt. The chase of finding something is what gets me the most hyped. I get just as excited about discovering a spot, even if I don’t end up skating it myself. It’s that rush of finding something insane that gets me. Besides looking for spots, I also enjoy seeing beautiful places. A lot of times, when I’m in places like Pennsylvania or Upstate New York, I’ll make it a point to check out the scenic views in the area. So, being out of the city right now has just been really cool. What I love about it is that when you’re at a spot, you’re often the only person skating there, and it feels so different. It’s just you, battling a trick in the middle of nowhere. There’s something about that feeling that’s special. Also, once you start finding these spots and getting a few clips, it just makes you want to keep adding to your collection. I’ve been thinking about getting a clip with a factory or something massive in the background, but I still haven’t found the right spot for that. It’s a tough one to find, but I’m still on the hunt for it.

Switch front board into an East Coast cheese grater

When did you start filming for the new Hockey video? And how did the process come about?
Originally, they wanted to do a big FA and Hockey mega video. I think we got a group text in January 2023, with everyone on the team saying, “Hey, we want to make this video, so let’s start filming.” I was really excited because, nowadays, it’s hard to work on a project like this. The best videos still take time—sometimes even a year isn’t enough. But everything moves so fast. Personally, I think the best videos take at least two years to film. That way, you have time to revisit spots and think about how to craft the part. It’s not just about filming what you can during trips, but about revisiting and refining your clips. For me, it was great to have the opportunity to work on a bigger project over a longer period. At first, I was thinking this video was going to be this massive project with everyone on both teams getting parts—making it like an hour-long video—which I was down for. However, at some point halfway through, it turned into a standalone Hockey video, which I’m very hyped on as well.

On set with Kev

Who are you most excited to see in the new Hockey video?
Dude, you can’t ask me that! Everyone. I haven’t seen any of John’s footage and it’s always really exciting to see new stuff from him. Diego’s been on fire lately. I been out with Ben and he’s done some unbelievable stuff in NYC. K-Rod, I get to skate with him in Paris a couple times a year, and anytime he gets a clip, it’s magical. Andrew Allen is my favorite skater. Cruise, too—Flech showed me some of his clips; they were shocking. I’d probably like the video more if I wasn’t in it.

Bonkers in Yonkers, or somewhere close by. Nose manual into a triple-bank bomb before hittin’ the road to find the next one. We’re lucky to have a true skate rat like Nik. Watch that part again and take an extra push next time you go out