3. Tiago Lemos – ‘The DC Promo’

Sometimes it’s tough to root for a superhero, but damn if Tiago Lemos doesn’t continually force the rest of us, from pros to parking lot shove-iting weekend warrior bros, to redream what’s possible with some urethane, metal and pressed wood. He was quiet for a few months there but between flying a head-high nollie backside heelflip off a Philadelphia hip and passing Fort Miley’s high bar test in ‘The DC Promo,’ and a clinic on ledges that require a stepstool for civilians to mount in his Independent part after that, Tiago Lemos probably performed more of the craziest tricks released this year than anybody else, not seeming to stress it much in the process. The DC ‘Promo’ reset has him jumping on rails and mashing through pedestrians to defy SF Pier skatestoppers in shocking new ways, to a sunny Sunday-afternoon type of number that a decade ago might’ve soundtracked a Transworld part. People talk about Tiago Lemos’ jean shorts and switch mongo in the sense of ’90s revivalism but his skating increasingly seems like it’s from a whole other planet, and the foot-off switch backside tailslide at the Mission three-up three-down shows he’s on-trend anyways with all these ridiculous foot-off landings.

Tags: Brazil, coast to coast, DC Shoe Co USA, pic-a-nic tables, shorts, SOTY shoulda-beens, switch backside tailslides that we have known, that switch b/s nosegrind pop-out also, Tiago Lemos