Joey Brezinski

If “renaissance skateboarder” is a thing, then Joey Brezinski is its embodiment. The Californian is a pro boarder, a vegan chef, and entrepreneur with several brands and investments to his name, not to mention sponsorship deals with some of the biggest names around (Red Bull, Audi, and Val Surf to name just three). A huge name on the world skate scene, he can boast well over 27,000 YouTube subscribers and close to 180,000 Instagram followers, all keen to learn from a master. He is particularly well-known for his endless variations on the “manual”, one of the most notoriously difficult tricks in skateboarding, which involves skating with your front wheels off the ground, but without the back of your board touching the floor — something requiring perfect balance.

Along with Red Bull, Brezinski co-created Manny Mania, a popular skateboarding competition based around manual tricks that ran for a decade — and at which he triumphed several times. He also founded the skate gear company Andale Bearings, through which he ran another popular competition, Wheelie Dope. He can also claim to be the driving force behind skate clothing brand Team Burrito; innovative, patent-pending footwear brand FP, and even one of the names behind Black Plague Brewing, a successful crafty brewing company that has collaborated with that other skate legend, Tony Hawks.

Despite its reputation as a young person’s hobby, skateboarding is a serious art form, and as elder statesmen (well, he’s in his early forties) like Brezinski have proven, a major industry with huge potential for people as entrepreneurial as they are talented on the board.