Four x 4: The George Phillips Interview

The skater behind Four Down talks Oregon origins, ins-and-outs of Insta, and why four downs are forever dope.

George Phillips with the shaped-up tre to fakie. Photo by Squidfiles

Look, there’s value in seeing things shaken — in Paris’ tears, in lions quailing. To seeing things so often pushed aside and smothered kicking as they continue to pull breath, to tics and time loops and chanted mantras done in the service of something so simple: just dropping in.

It can be too easy, especially for the trick-challenged among us (your correspondent included), to see our best skaters as something outside of ourselves, or even beyond. To take their physics-shredding gifts and apply it to the soul and social contracts, to see something awesome and make it something ... alien. This is because, for the vast majority of us, it is; the distance between what I can do on a board and what, say, Emile Laurent can do may as well be the distance between Chicago and Cygnus. And there is fun in it! Value in that, too, in letting ourselves get mesmerized, get hyped and write a tiny hagiography to people who bring us bliss. It can inspire us.

But there’s inspiration too in seeing a pro murmur and dither and walk up and walk back and armor up and scream and fizzle and summon strength and vibrate and take the plunge. That’s dropping in, baby. It’s the same feeling you once had — or once will have — on the tipping point into that first bank, the top of that first hill, the deck of that first ramp.

Everyone’s a virgin on the edge.

‘Four down,’ as a trick family, is a broad umbrella. But one of its most basic — and base — forms is the always-awesome street drop-in. Slamming all four wheels down in a place they were never meant to be; sending, shoulder-first, into the abyss. It’s nothing but commitment, and that commitment is skating. You’re adjusting the world. That’s what a four down does for me. The drop-ins and dump trucks are my favorite, because they are courage, and because a tiny part of me thinks to myself if I’m feeling that brave, if I’m feeling that willing to slam, I can do that.

But there’s so many more types of four downs! Joining the drop-in and dump truck in the ‘fuck it let’s go’ category is the wallride and the roll in and the ollie-into-hellride. On a more technical side is the flip trick into the steep bank — or even the wall! — or narrow joiner, getting four gilding.

One of those later tricks was the genesis of Four Down, my favorite skate insta/source of inspiration. Ripper-in-his-own-right George Phillips is the skater behind the stoke, collecting for love the niche gnar. Full disclosure: I’ve been included on Four Down’s story, and it seriously made my life. So of course I had to use the ‘magazine’ as an excuse to talk to the four connoisseur.

Read on to learn about his Oregon origins, the magic behind the tricks, how the social media sausage is made, and how to do your very own 90 degree drops, you lil Raybourn wannabe you.

4ts: So the first thing I wanted to bring up — and I'd never even thought about it until I was formulating questions for this — is that the name of the ‘magazine’ and the name of Four Down are kind of similar to each other, which was my bad. But did you even notice or care that it had the four?

George: No, no. I think I saw that it was four and I thought that was awesome. I didn't really connect that together either, so it wasn't a big deal for me.

4ts: I figured when you were like, sure, we can have an interview.

George: I think there's another four down actually. It's like a nonprofit and they use the number four. [editor’s note: 4DWN is a Texas-based nonprofit founded by Lone Star legends Mike Crum and Rob Cahill; check it out]

4ts: How long have you been involved skating? Have you skated since you were a kid? Did you pick it up more recently? It doesn't look like it based on what I've seen you do, but how long have you been skating?

George: I've probably really been skating 25 years. I got my first board when I was five and it was like a cheap Kmart board that didn't roll, and so I hated it. I was like, I really want to do this, but it doesn't work. I think when I was 12 I got a slightly better skateboard for Christmas one year and my cousin came through town and he taught me how to ollie and then it was on, I was ready to go.

So yeah, I've been skating, I think pretty much since the year 2000 when the Medford skatepark opened. I grew up in southern Oregon.

4ts: That's a big one, I recognize the name of it. I'm pretty sure I saw that in a Thrasher or some shit more than once

George: I don't know if you remember the skate rock tour that they used to do. Thrasher came through Medford a few times on the way up from California for that, and the skatepark is huge. It's kind of like that early-two-thousands-construction-company-era style skatepark where nothing gets built quite right somehow there's really good flow at that park, so it's actually super fun.

4ts: Is [the park] one of those ones when you close your eyes and picture an Oregon park, with the big cement, lots of pockets and bowls and rollovers and all that good stuff?

George: Yeah, and all the street features are terrible.

4ts: It's like they want to discourage the kids like, oh, don't you want to hit that ramp over there? That looks more fun. Is that where you sort of grew up skating, was out there at the park?

George: Yeah, so I grew up skating at the Medford skatepark, met all my friends there and then southern Oregon had a wave of other parks that kind of came in. So Ashland was there when I started skating and that's a great skatepark. And then they built the White City skatepark and that's right outside of Medford and it's more street focused. And so that's kind of where I started getting more involved in street skating kind of because he couldn't really do it at the Medford skatepark.

4ts: Transition heavy beginnings there. Do you think that maybe applies to a little bit like the love of the four down? I know Campos started on the vert ramps and he was like, makes it easy now.

George: Yeah, totally. I've always loved steep transitions. I think Medford has a few of them that are almost Jersey barriers and it was always super fun to learn a new trick on something that was more normal to skate, like a mini ramp, and then see if you could do it on something super steep. So that was always super fun to me.

And part of the reason why I don't actually post a lot of transition things on Four Down is because for me it's like I understand the way that works. And then just a straight wall ride down a double set, that makes no sense to me.

Steven Reeves follows George around the hometown park

4ts: When did you start the Instagram account and was Four Down the first [way you highlighted the tricks]? Did you have any other sort of websites or blogs or anything about it before that?

George: No, no other websites or blogs. Man, I started for down a while ago. I don't remember exactly what date, but I can go look it up. I just have to scroll all the way back through.

I remember seeing Das Pinch come around and start blowing up and I thought, ‘man, that's such a good idea. Nobody's doing that kind of thing.’

There were repost accounts like Metro and Eclipse back then, but nobody was doing a niche like that. And I was like, that's such a cool idea — but Das Pinch is so technical, it's just so about being finesse and skating. I was like, there should be one that's, I don't know, more hesh than that. And I saw a clip, it was probably the first time I went, oh my God, this guy actually got all four down on a trick and it was this hardflip that [Greyson Beal] did in a street course. It was all wooden kickers and things and he landed in something that was basically a jersey barrier.

I was like, ‘that's it.’ That is what we need. We need that niche in the skateboarding Instagram world. So I remember telling my friends about it and it was a classic skate house at that time. I had three of my friends living with me at my house and we were sitting around in the kitchen drinking some beer and I was like, I should do that. And they're like, yeah, you actually should. And so I whipped up a really stupid quick logo, no designer. I whipped up that logo on my computer and just slapped it together on the Instagram account and just started going.

4ts: And you mentioned that you did have some experience in media, right? I think you said writing about video games or something like that. Do you work in media or was that sort of its own deal?

George: No, that was its own just for fun kind of thing. So I've always been a gamer. Skateboarding and gaming have been my two hobbies, [my] big passions for my whole life. And when iPhones first started getting decent games, I was like, oh, this is actually kind of cool, but there wasn't anybody really reviewing them or saying which ones were good.

Nobody was really reviewing them, so there wasn't a good place to go to get actual information about the games that you should be checking out. And so I started writing for this guy who had another gaming blog that I knew in person and he was like, ‘you should write about it.’ And I was like, all right. Yeah. I did a handful of articles, my favorites of whatever year that I was playing and kind of some genre recaps and things like that, but it kind of fizzled out.

4ts: It’s almost continuing a through-line though. I saw a cool niche in something that I love that maybe people weren't giving the attention it could have, and I can do that for Four Down. At least it's resonated with folks I would say. Is it crazy to you when you see the little number in the corner of how many people are checking it out or the likes or the comments or any of that kind of stuff?

George: Yeah, it's super wild to me. I think partially because it took so long to really take off.

I've been doing this for years and years and I remember my goal was if I could get a thousand followers that would be awesome, and it took a long time to get to a thousand. To start it was just my friends and it was like I had 20 followers [then] a hundred, couple hundred, and I still remember when I see some of the people that followed me originally, I'll see them pop up on the feed or comment on something. But then I probably got up to two or 3000 and kind of stalled for a long time.

I had a couple of posts that just went viral one day and I was actually on vacation with my wife and my phone was just going crazy and I had all the notifications turned on for Four Down — I wasn't getting that many notifications, it wasn't a big deal. And my phone was just lighting up and I was like, ‘what is happening?’ And I had a post, I think it did over a million views or had over a million views.

blunt 3 shuv to fakie; you could say we’re a fan

4ts: It's the kind trick that — the right four down I think anyone can appreciate. You don't have to be a skater to watch a dude drop in on the side of a building and be like, the fuck was that?

Have you noticed — I'm not sure how many metrics or whatever you look at — but do you have an idea of if most of the people who are following and interacting, do they tend to be skaters or have you noticed a draw from all over?

George: I think when posts go really viral like that, I get a draw from all over, but for the most part, all of my followers and people that are really commenting on the daily posts that I do are all skaters.

4ts: Does that surprise you? It's pretty, it's sort of a niche, as much as I just said anyone could appreciate especially a sweet drop in or something. It is still kind of a niche thing to even look at, right?

George: Yeah, exactly. And so I'll get a lot of random comments on videos that are going pretty viral. Typically I probably get 20,000 views on a video, but I've had several go to multiple million and when that happens, you just get everyone coming out of the woodwork.

4ts: Do you just let it go essentially when it gets like that? Because how could you possibly manage everything that comes in when that happens?

George: Yeah, I pretty much just let it go. I try and let everyone know that I've seen their comments, so I try and [like] every comment that I actually [like].

4ts: Those are real?? If you like it, people should know that you really do. All right.

George: It's actually me tapping on all the notifications and looking at all the comments [laughs].

4ts: Yeah!, he means his likes. That's going to be our one pull away.

George: Yeah, the only ones that I don't are ones that are hateful or there people that aren't skaters that are arguing about skateboarding or just something that I find wrong personally. So I won't like those ones.

4ts: Speaking of people arguing, one of the things that I like about Four Down is that you're just sort of showing these cool tricks. It's not rated one through 10 or whatever — just like here's some cool tricks. One of the things that it does show up is when you poll folks on, was it four down or not? I am extremely generous; I almost always give the four down unless it's a two down, which is still cool. Are people generous with the four down or are people pretty tough in those polls or have you noticed?

George: I would say that some people are tough and those ones are pretty vocal, so I'll put those polls up usually they're almost always on my story. I'm usually pretty generous with what's a four down on my stories because I want everyone to feel like they have a chance to get on there. [editor’s note: I’ve been on there, so literally anyone has a shot]

I'll take most clips if you got all four wheels on something. I'll generally post on my story, but sometimes when people question it themselves and they're like, ‘does this count for down? I'm not sure,’ then I'll do a poll on it asking the question. I think they're kind of cool with the poll idea.

4ts: So they normally ask that, it's not you being like, what do you guys think? It often comes from them.

George: Yeah, because I don't like the idea of judging skating like that … trying to call people out on things and it was like that was a little bit too serious for me. I just wanted it to be like, this is a cool idea. You should try and commit to getting all four wheels down [and] if you're trying, I'm hyped, right? That's awesome.

this bs cradle carve is grave indeed. Kyle Bunker behind the camera

4ts: You mentioned this idea of taking pretty much any kind of clip, especially for the story … was that sort of an idea from the beginning? Let's open it up and if you're a brand new kid and you drop in on a piece of plywood your buddy propped on the wall, that's cool.

George: Yeah, I mean I've always kind of approached the story content that way. I think part of my thinking of it was I didn't want to bum anyone out and I didn't want to be super selective, but I also had so few followers in the beginning. I wanted them to be hyped too. If they submit something to me, I want 'em to know that I saw it and I want 'em to be hyped, right? That's exciting. If you have an account that you're into and they post your content, that's fun.

So I'd rather have more fun with it than less

4ts: A good way to look at skateboarding as a whole — let's have more fun with it than less.

When you do the hard posts, you're really trying to highlight either pro level or really gnarly sort of the ‘best’ of the four downs, for lack of a better term?

George: Yeah, exactly. I try and keep hard posts the ones that make me go like, ‘wow, that would be insane to try.’ Some of the stuff like Ryan Reyes is doing, Joseph Campos —[who] we were talking about the other day — committing to that is just on another level and I try and keep the story to people that tag me in things, put me on their story, people that send me stuff on the DMs, but I try and keep the hard posts to things that are like you see it and you go, ‘wow, yeah, that's definitely a four down.’

4ts: The story almost feels participatory too in a different way, because I can tag mine and maybe it shows up in there. Does it feel valuable to be able to engage with folks like that?

George: Yeah, I mean I love that kind of community aspect of it and some people really enjoy it and they keep tagging me all the time and I love it. I have kind of gotten to know a lot of people through DMs like that. You, for example, I chatted with you via DM about all sorts of different things

4ts: Literally because four downs are dope.

Have you noticed, is there a certain type of skater that tends to gravitate towards digging these four downs? Is it the guys, if you looked at 'em you'd be like, yeah, that guy would probably drop in on that thing or has it been sort of love from everywhere or have you even noticed?

George: I would say that the people that are most engaged are typically people that would do four downs themselves. So they're the ones that are like, ‘this is the type of trick that I like doing.’ That's so cool to see it getting love. I think it was also a lot of the older crowd too, people that grew up skating that were like, ‘oh man, wallrides were so fun when I was younger and I love seeing them getting love now.’ So I get a lot of older heads that come in and they'll comment and they'll get into discussions with people in my comment section. ‘I remember doing this at this parking lot back in 1987.’

4ts: The wallrides are a big [four down trick] and maybe the one that's sort of popping the most right now, but there's also things like dropping in on stuff that you don't generally drop in on, little tail ollie pops or whatever, dump trucks, blunts, nose blunts in and things like that. What kind of things to you sort of comprise that four down umbrella, or what's at the heart of those tricks that makes them four downs? It's not just the wheels I feel like right — there's something else to it.

George: Yeah, it's kind of vague in general. The way that I like to think about it is if it would be difficult to get all four of your wheels onto the surface and if it's not just a pure transition, if there's some kind of kink to it, it's a bank or a wall and if that's kind of the more challenging part of the trick. Joseph Campo’s kickflip into that bank is insane, but the kickflip's not the trick. The bank is the trick almost.

backside flip up the ziggurat, shot by Justin Shreeve

4ts: It kind of feels like lately has been sort of something of a four down renaissance, you know what I mean? I feel like I see them a lot more places, a lot more roll-ins, wall rides, including if we extend it to drop-in grinds and shit — so big right now. Have you noticed that too? Am I just seeing 'em because it's confirmation bias or do you really think that that's sort of catching on at the moment, the last few years?

George: I think it is catching on. I think there's a couple of things there. Trends just come and go and history repeats itself, so we're going through a pretty heavy late eighties, early nineties kind of era, so people are doing street grabs again, people are doing street grab variations, the shaped boards are back. I think a lot of things that had a social faux pas associated with them are acceptable again. I don't think four downs themselves ever really became unacceptable, but people weren't doing as many wallrides for a long time and now people are like, okay, wallrides are hot, let's keep doing it. So they're kind of trending I think.

4ts: Yeah, it's funny and I think you're right, there's always been —well, I mean fucking Bam, the Encinitas sign, right? People have been dropping in or onto cool-ass shit for a long time, but I think it takes a certain type of dude to want to do that, right? Not every pro even's going to be like, oh yeah, let me come off this sign switch or whatever. [editor’s note: not many ppl are Brandon Turner]

George: Yeah, and it's funny, sometimes you'll get ones from pros that you never expected to see do a four down and you're like, ‘that's awesome.’ I never really thought that whoever would be doing that and then there's some pros that you just expect them to do four down all the time, right? Ryan Reyes, I mentioned him earlier, but half his tricks are just incredible four downs. Ben Raybourn, another great one. He has so many and they're so good.

4ts: Raybourn is one of those guys who got me interested in doing those kinds of tricks. What is that — in Houston? — where he is dropping in on the literal vertical wall [at Tranquility Park] and it's like who the fuck even saw ... he literally was like, it's a flat wall, let me skate that shit. Who sees that?

I think that a lot of the four down style tricks, especially a big old roll-in or a drop-in or something like that, a dump truck, they sort of fall into what I consider as category of always sick; how a cool frontside slasher is always sick or a front rock is always sick. Does that, I don't know, do you feel that way sometimes? A big drop-in, people are going to be like ‘nice’ no matter what I feel like.

George: Yeah, I think they're kind of timeless in that regard. If you wall ride down a set of stairs, people are always going to be hyped on that. I think whether or not it's in style is a different thing. People aren't thinking about it as much at certain points in time. It's kind of big drop skaters versus technical skaters. There's an era for big drops and they kind of come and go and I think they're kind of back right now, but I think wall rides and kind of four downs in general are like that where people aren't thinking about it as much but they still think it's cool.

4ts: As opposed to the poor varial flip [editor’s note: this was originally corrected to ‘burial flip,’ which sounds sick as hell] or whatever where when people hate it, they genuinely hate it. It's not like we've moved on; it's like fuck that trick for whatever reason, which I always thought was pretty lame.

George: I say it's not quite pressure flips or street grabs.

4ts: Right, exactly. Although those are two things I also love. People tell me they hate a pressure flip, I'll tell them to watch Cody Chapman throw some down something. It can work. It can work with the right guy.

George: Yeah, he just did one on his most recent part and it was awesome.

4ts: Yeah, it was fucking sick. Good segue actually: some of the guys that are out there right now you think that are really pushing these four downs and you love their style. Obviously Reyes is out here with this stuff doing all sorts of creative ones, Campos, big hammering ones and loving the roll-ins as opposed to the drop-ins or whatever. Who's out there that you're hyped about and doing it?

George: Yeah, I mean I've named a lot of 'em while we've been talking, but yeah, Ryan Reyes, obviously Ben Raybourn, Joseph Campos, Cody Chapman posted quite a bit recently. He's awesome.

4ts: The palm tree. The palm tree next to the freeway, you know that cutoff palm into the bank, the fucking dump truck into that for the Lakai video, I was losing my mind.

George: Ace Pelka, another one. Elijah Burle, he's been killing it too.

4ts: Did you see the Vinny Dalfio stuff in Heaven’s Gate? The hand plant into the Encinitas sign; I mean he's doing hand plant wall rides on roofs and shit. Definitely, definitely check that out. There's a lot you're going to like in that one; Kanaan Dern drops in on like, it's got to be a 40 foot church roof. He Batman’d up that shit with a grappling hook.

George: I think I saw the clip of that one. That's pretty crazy.

4ts: Yeah, sort of mind numbing when you watch it. I watched that and I was like this is Laird Hamilton shit. It looks like a big wave surfer coming down that thing.

George: I do have to toss one more name in there: Chris Russell too. Oh yeah. Less traditional of a four down, but he's doing eggplant four downs and it's hard to envision that because you think eggplant you think transition and I don't normally post transition stuff, but he did an eggplant on Garfield in Seattle.

That is insane.

4ts: The big spin back disaster too, right? Same spot. Is that what you're talking about?

George: Yeah, same spot.

ok, break it down: bs 270 power tail slide with a big spin for good measure. did we get it, Steven Reeves?

4ts: That was another one where I was like, the fuck? Who even saw that? I feel like four downs are sort of unique in that they have that sort of fever dream aspect to them, a really good four down. I think that's kind of one of the secrets. So it makes 'em cool.

George: Yeah, totally. I love it. I went to that spot [Garfield] not that long ago and looked at it in person and you have to get towed in. There's no way you're going to skate … it's so huge. It's massive. It's like three stories tall and then all of the cracks that are in it, there's all these vertical lines that you can see. Those are big enough to catch your wheels. They're not small cracks, so I think you have to have 64 millimeter wheels or something to skate it.

4ts: A lot of four downs by definition need a quirk of architecture, right? A rock, a sculpture, a sloping detail on a building. Is that part of the appeal for you? It 100% is for me; manipulating the built environment is at skating's heart.

George: Definitely! A lot of my favorite four downs are at really unique looking spots. Zane's 270 into the Sundial, Nick Garcia's BS noseblunt at Garfield, Taihou's FS 5-0. That said, a lot of really sick four downs are legitimately dropping in or wallriding a straight vertical wall. I think that's kinda the beauty of it, is that you can be looking for spots literally anywhere!

4ts: I have been seeing some of these cool [four downs], I forget who it was — it might've been Reyes, but they were starting in a feeble for example. It was on a fence to come down. And Pelka starting in a pivot and then shifting down in fakie … but to drop in that way, have you been hyped to see there’s new varieties of four downs getting invented right now?

George: Yeah, it is awesome to me. Some of the ones that I've seen that I really enjoy, it's like people dropping in from pivots, backside pivot or frontside pivot and just dropping in that way because nobody ever does that on a quarter even. You don't just walk up and throw down front side pivot and drop in like that. Where did they get the idea for that, right? It's cool. That's unique and you're not going to do that anywhere else.

4ts: One of the things that appeals to me — especially as someone who is decidedly mediocre as a skater —about the four downs and I feel is special about them in my opinion is they almost are like ... you don't want to say they don't require skill, but I feel like they need more courage than skill a lot of times and there's something almost beautiful to me about the idea where I was like, if I felt real fucking brave, I could try and drop in on that too. Do you think that's part of their appeal? There's almost a simple .. I don't even know how to put it.

George: It's a commitment thing, right? Yes, there's some skill involved to an extent, but so much of it is commitment and it's kind of like I was talking about earlier, big stair sets, right? If you can ollie a six, you can probably ollie eight, you can probably ollie 10. You just have to start committing to it and I feel like that's kind of how four downs are. You start on less steep things, you start working your way up and then you get more comfortable with it and then all of a sudden you're like, oh yeah, maybe I can blunt to fakie on this wall.

4ts: Do you get a lot of interaction with pros out there or other sort of bigger figures?

George: Yeah, I do. I get into conversations with quite a few of 'em actually, which is awesome. They're all just super rad dudes for the most part. Most of the time people are just hyped to get a repost. I very, very rarely had somebody kind of not be hyped on posting one of their tricks. I only had that happen once in the whole time I've been on four down.

4ts: Were they worried about contractual issues or you're getting stuff off my work, or do you even remember?

George: Yeah, they basically said they thought I was getting paid by reposting their content and thought that that wasn't cool.

I was like, I'm not making any money off of this. I just do it for fun and I always make sure to credit the skater and the filmer if I can, but if you want me to take it down, I'm totally okay with doing that. And he's like, ‘yeah, please go ahead and take it down. Just ask me next time. And it's cool, but take this one down.’ I was like, all right.

4ts: It does raise a good question though. Do you think that there is maybe an argument to be made or a controversy to be had around the idea of these sort of outlets being built in that kind of way, or like you said, as long as you are giving credit and people seem fine with it, then you're not worried about it?

George: I was a lot more worried about it when I first started and I didn't know how people would react. And I thought from my perspective, if I were reposted on another account, I would be hyped as long as they credited me, and if they didn't credit me, then I would probably not be hyped on that. So I kind of just took it slowly. For the most part, I tried asking people to begin with and I found that unless they already follow you, most pros are never going to see that DM.

And it was frustrating because I wanted to post that content and show people, but I couldn't without them getting back to me. So I just made a decision at one point that I was just going to try it. I was just going to repost the content, but I was always going to give credit to the skater and the filmer, and that seemed to have worked. Everyone that I've actually interacted with — except for that one case — has pretty much always been hyped.

They say ‘thanks for the love, really appreciate what you're doing. This is such a cool page.’ People always just generally seem to be hyped, so thankfully I've not had any issues with that except for the one.

4ts: And they had an understandable feeling. It sounds like you were fine with, okay, cool, I'm not going to fight you on it.

George: That's how I'll always approach it. If somebody is bummed that I posted it, I'll just take it down. It's not a big deal for me. Plus I'm on it every day and they're tagged, so they'll know as soon as I post it.

you just know this fs noseblunt stayed hands-off. photo by Spencer Morgan

4ts: I want to get into a little bit of the day-to-day operations. First off, does anyone help you out? Do you got friends who help sift through things and post stuff with you or anything like that?

George: Basically the way that it works, my friends, if they see something, they'll tag me in or DM it to me, and that's pretty much what my followers do too, which is awesome. And it was part of the idea I had with the account because it was so hard to come by content when I had just a hundred followers and it was just me. So what I do is every time I post somebody, I follow 'em. So if I hard post somebody, I follow their account and my thought process was if they did one four down, they'll probably do another.

4ts: They're addictive.

George: My feed started becoming just people that do four downs. And so I'd scroll through that and I'd find a lot of content that way myself, but I get a lot of people that DM me and they'll send me, they'll share a post with me that's like, ‘Hey, check out this clip. He has a four down three tricks in.’ [editor’s note: done this to him multiple times, including the day before publishing this]

That's super helpful too because obviously I can't be everywhere on Instagram all the time.

4ts: Yeah, yeah, seriously. And then are you the only person that ends up putting them on the page officially? It all touches your desk?

George: Yeah, exactly. I'm the only one on the account, so if you get liked or if I repost something or if I DM you, it is me.

4ts: At the size that you're currently at, I didn't know if, oh, me and my buddy both do it or something like that in a more official capacity.

George: Yeah, I've kind of thought about it, but it seems to be working fine. I'll go through phases where I don't post as much as I want to just because I have other stuff going on in life, but my goal would be to post one post a day. But it also depends on what content's out there too, right? I'm at the mercy of Instagram, who four downs.

4ts: So how much of your time does it take generally?

George: I'm probably too chronically online when it comes to Instagram, so I probably spend a few hours a day on it both as myself and as Four Down, but I actually have pretty different people I follow on my personal than on Four Down. And so I actually find clips through both. I follow only skateboarders essentially on both accounts.

4ts: Same. [editor’s note: and seals, like the animate sausage kind]

George: But on Four Down I follow all the people that I've posted. And on my personal, I'll follow a ton of people that never will do a four down. Antwuan Dixon is probably not going to do a four down anytime soon, but I absolutely love watching him skate.

4ts: I hope he does. If he sees this — Antwuan, we need it. We want it.

So you mentioned there that you're not getting paid off this thing, so what are you doing day to day, if you don't mind us asking?

George: I've been doing software sales for almost a decade now, and I get to work from home, which is amazing. So I'm in my office, but it is part of why I'm also kind of chronically online on Instagram.

4ts: When you were initially growing it, was there a time ... did you sort of have to flip a switch of like, alright, I need to post regularly, I need to use hashtags the right way. I need to tag so-and-so for such and such. Is that sort of like a switch that needs thrown if people want their Instagram to be taken seriously, for lack of a better term, if they want it to be maybe what they want it to be?

George: Yeah, totally. And it was hard for me. I realized that steady content is necessary if you're trying to grow your followers. It's about getting those posts that hit that algorithm, hit the explore page, and you're getting people that are viewing it that haven't heard of you or seen the account before. And with Four Down, that's hard.

Again, [I’m] at the mercy of who's doing four downs right now; if there aren't hard-post-worthy four downs happening, I could just have a gap of a week or I can't post. But yeah, I mean content is king on Instagram, and I think it was around the time that they rolled out reels that when I started paying more attention to it, because you had to post reels, you couldn't just post posts anymore. And I was doing photos of four downs back then and photos just died. So when I kind of started noticing those things like, okay, Instagram is really pushing reels. You have to post a lot of content. If you can get a reel that goes onto the explore page, that's when you start getting followers.

4ts: I was going to say, in a way it probably was a little beneficial because the reels get pushed more broadly. The only thing I've ever done — I don't really try, but the only thing I've ever done that had triple digits of any kind of engagement was a random bumblebee in a flower. And I was like, what in the fuck, why? And then realized that it's because they're all reels now and they get pushed in a different way. So was that almost like, between that and stories, the ability to post things that people send you regularly, do you think that sort of helped you for those two factors to come into play?

George: Yeah, definitely. Like I said, I think trying to build a community through stories and then trying to reach new people through reels was probably the way I've had some amount of success in growing the account.

4ts: As opposed to relying on these hard posts on the wall or whatever.

George: Yeah, totally.

4ts: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense actually. Interesting. I didn't think about how the variations in the media that they're trying to push at whatever given time can be an important part of that. What about things ... I guess I don't look at the hard posts far enough in, but do you have to put your string of hashtags at the bottom and stuff like that? Is that still part of the game for Instagram?

George: I think what they are doing now — it changes and it's kind of a black box, so you don't really know — but I think that what it is now is they look at the entirety of the caption, and I think they pretty much use all of that when it comes to indexing your posts. So if you say skateboarding in the caption, you don't need to hashtag it too. The hashtag works if people were to actually click on the hashtag and look through the most recent posts for that. And I mean, to be honest, I don't think that ever really happens.

4ts: No. It seems like there was a moment there where people organized things that way and that it's sort of already gone around the bend, right? But that's why I was just sort of curious about if that even plays in as much anymore.

George: I don't think it does a ton because it captures all of the caption, but for me, when I caption things, I generally just try and do the trick and so it doesn't have keywords that might be important like ‘skateboarding.’ So I still throw the hashtags in at the bottom just in case they matter.

4ts: That's a good point. The algorithm is probably not going to scrape ‘front side roll-in’ and know to associate that with the skateboarding.

Important q: Nose blunt pop in or dump truck in?

George: Oh, I prefer nose blunt pop in.

4ts: Interview scrapped! Out the window! [laughs]

Frontside wallride or backside wallride.

George: I'm a frontside wallride guy.

no lies. b2b fs wallrides with Mike Abarta

4ts: They look so fucking sick. I don't think I've ever done one. Maybe a little tiny baby one because they're scary.

George: I think they're a little harder to get into and commit to, but I feel personally like they're easier to get out of.

4ts: Do you have a favorite four down of all time? Like a clip?

George: Oh man, there's probably a handful, like 10 that hit that status.

First one that comes to mind is Zane Timpson's front 270 into the sundial. RIP Zane. But that was such an insane one. I think about that one so much. Dustin Dollin, he did a frontside flip from a stair set like … into just a wall. Maybe some of Shawn Hale or Ryan Reyes’ drop-ins, Shane Cross’ drop in on the wall. Those are all classics, probably on there too. Any just straight wall drop-in with just a 90 degree angle at the bottom, that goes on the list.

SUBSCRIBER BONUS: GEORGE’S FAVORITE FOUR DOWNS!

4ts: That shit always sparks something weird in me where I'm like, more things are possible in this world than you expect, right? If this guy can drop in on a flat wall, what else is out there?

George: Speaking of dropping it on just straight walls, my friend Rocco was looking at that and he figured out how to do it too. And he told me his secret for it and it was try to kick your front knee with your back foot when you drop in.

4ts: Oh shit! Yeah, and that gives you the classic, the Raybourn fucking Batman-dive-kick-thing. Oh yeah, that makes sense. Have you noticed what they do with the front foot? I'm like, should I put my front foot further back? But normally I like it up near the bolts to drop in, and you go light foot at the end. But when you're doing the straight angle, I wonder if it's easier to have your foot back a little bit. But they're hard to find to frame by frame 'em.

George: Closer stance and try and kick your front knee with your back foot. And then I feel like you just hit the wall and then go light.

nothin’ frail about this fs 270 crail shot by Spencer Morgan

4ts: I love that feeling. It's hard to describe to people how that one works, but that's the other secret power of the four down. I think that, and then you get to look and be like, damn, that thing it was right there. I dropped in on it.

Any people you want to shout out, thank, say what's up to?

George: All my homies here in Portland, they're all people I grew up skating with. So Steven Reeves, Johnny Turgesen, Nick and Ryan Vollmer, Justin Shreeve, Rita Allred, and then a whole crew of people that I have here that are super good friends. And then Colin Sharp has been helping me a lot with various things and he's the one that's actually helping me with the shirts, which I just started doing. We basically just print them when people order them and it's been pretty infrequent because I'm not trying to push merchandise or apparel or anything [editor’s note: we will] but they are available and he's the one helping me out with it. So big props to him.

And Liz Auvil, my wife.