Born- December, 1970 Mission Viejo, California
Top 3 places to ride in Cali: 1. Huntington Pier 2. Naval Yard in Oakland 3. My driveway
Top 3 bands on your iPod: 1. G Love 2. Michael Franti 3. U2
When I first had the idea float across my brain juice, I knew instantly that it was something that I would ride one day. My cousin Josh was talking to my little brother Eric - typical conversation...girls, dirt bikes, cars, giant pogo stick - what??!! "Yeah man, wouldn't it be cool to bounce down the street like 6 or 8 feet in the air?" Hell yeah. I mean - what could I do if I was bouncing that high? Jump over stuff - foot plants on stuff, do flips - not to mention all the standard tricks, foot grabs, bar spins, etc... I knew right away that if we put some effort into it, we could build a killer pogo stick. Building stuff is something my Dad happened to be really good at. He was one of the lead designers of the F-18 fighter jet back in the late 1960's, a more than capable engineer, and also had 25 years of experience as a Fire Captain, performing first aid, and putting out fires - both of which I figured might come in handy.
The very first prototype we built was made out of stuff straight off the shelf at the plumbing supply store - glued it all together and of course it worked. And it was pretty fun too - right away I started jumping as high as I could, and just loved the hang time and adrenaline rush. We didn't really think about making a company to sell them, but had enough people try it and like it, that we thought it might be worth researching whether we could get a patent. The very first Vurtego pogo demo was at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, at the Mountain Dew Ice Village. We had 16 prototype sticks of different sizes and they all had clear tubes and color anodized aluminum parts. A couple of them were stolen from a locked warehouse one night. Everyone loved them and we got lots of media attention too - We knew then, that at some point we were going to start a company, to build these things. Fast forward a few years, and in 2006 after the patent issued, we formed a company and build the first couple thousand Vurtego Pogo sticks, by hand, in our Mission Viejo, CA shop. The V1 was the toughest, and highest quality, highest performance pogo stick ever built. 1
10 years from now? Pogo sticking is an urban activity, with a relatively low cost to participate. I believe it will grow as a genre in a similar fashion to snowboarding and skateboarding (though to a lesser extent obviously), and in ten years will be an industry with a similar size to say, wake boarding, or downhill skateboards. Competitions will continue to evolve, as will pogo technology - and riders will continue to evolve as well. Double back flips will probably be fairly normal, sticks will become lighter and stronger, and it would not surprise me to see "Pogo High Jump" in the 2020 Obama Summer Olympics (Obama is now King of the World, and sponsors everything). In any case - lots of people will be having fun on pogo sticks.
The very first prototype we built was made out of stuff straight off the shelf at the plumbing supply store - glued it all together and of course it worked. And it was pretty fun too - right away I started jumping as high as I could, and just loved the hang time and adrenaline rush. We didn't really think about making a company to sell them, but had enough people try it and like it, that we thought it might be worth researching whether we could get a patent. The very first Vurtego pogo demo was at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, at the Mountain Dew Ice Village. We had 16 prototype sticks of different sizes and they all had clear tubes and color anodized aluminum parts. A couple of them were stolen from a locked warehouse one night. Everyone loved them and we got lots of media attention too - We knew then, that at some point we were going to start a company, to build these things. Fast forward a few years, and in 2006 after the patent issued, we formed a company and build the first couple thousand Vurtego Pogo sticks, by hand, in our Mission Viejo, CA shop. The V1 was the toughest, and highest quality, highest performance pogo stick ever built. 1
10 years from now? Pogo sticking is an urban activity, with a relatively low cost to participate. I believe it will grow as a genre in a similar fashion to snowboarding and skateboarding (though to a lesser extent obviously), and in ten years will be an industry with a similar size to say, wake boarding, or downhill skateboards. Competitions will continue to evolve, as will pogo technology - and riders will continue to evolve as well. Double back flips will probably be fairly normal, sticks will become lighter and stronger, and it would not surprise me to see "Pogo High Jump" in the 2020 Obama Summer Olympics (Obama is now King of the World, and sponsors everything). In any case - lots of people will be having fun on pogo sticks.
Top 3 snacks: 1. Deca Mega 2. Sunflower seeds 3. A nice oatmeal cookie
Top 3 TV shows: 1. Planet X - brahhhhahhahhh!!!! 2. Any Laker Game 3. Dan Brown's Universe
Top 3 things about Cali: 1. Ryan Meyer 2. Year round pogo weather 3. The Lakers
Top 3 riders: 1. Dan Mahoney 2. Fred Gryzbowski 3. Mbenga Ntowe (the "Desert Spring")
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