Lucas Magoon Interview: Chatting About Getting Kicked Out Of Poland, Rescuing Dogs, Mythical Creatures, Snowboarding & Near Death Experiences.

Though just one letter away from Mr. Magoo, Lucas Magoon is still multiple rail jam golds, five tall tees, and a couple face tats away from the daft cartoon character (The snowboard and shovel face tat is the Magoon PRO Series iRollie Graphic). We got to interview Lucas Magoon & it was awesome.

Lucas Magoon hatched a completely new style of snowboarding just over a decade ago that has cemented him as one of the most influential and controversial professional snowboarders of the last 15 years.

Mr. Magoo Mr. MaGOON

Like Mr. Magoo, Lucas is all smiles, zero cares, and pretty squinty. Despite his loose vocabulary, you see frequent glimpses of his underlying lucidity & insight when he drops a poignant one-liner that challenges any prejudice you have constructed to make sense of this dynamic figure. Following a life-threatening brain injury, Lucas has defied all the odds and doctors’ opinions saying he would never function again. Now, he is back on the board and surprising the snowboard world with the return of his groundbreaking style that brought snowboarding back to the streets, & people. We got the chance to interview Lucas Magoon, see below.

First, who is Lucas Magoon? He is a 27 year old professional snowboarder hailing from Rutland, VT. He wrote the book on street snowboarding, and was the first pro snowboarders to spawn this genre. He has a snowboard style that is fluid and seemingly whimsical.

With many cheap imitations of Lucas Magoon’s trend-setting snowboard style, the snowboard world breaths a sigh of relief to see the OG (original gangster) return to the scene. The iRollie founders, Joe & Luke, spent a day with Lucas testing out his custom Pro Series iRollie and chillin’. We got to talk about a lot with Gooner. So, check it out below.

The iRollie Fam got to go on an iRollie Adventure with Lucas Magoon, and his wife, Tonya. They live out of their signature Magoon RV, featured in the video and photos, and travel the country with their two dogs. The RV allows them to live the whimsical and carefree lifestyle that comes through Lucas’ snowboarding. With the RV as their stage coach, Lucas & Tonya are the modern day Bonnie & Clyde. Instead of travelling the country robbing trains together, they’re travelling the country rescuing dogs.

Lucas & Tonya, Modern Day Bonnie & Clyde

Lucas Magoon explained to us:

“Kajj [short for casual, not cash] the black and white one, we rescued him at 6 months old. He was left outside a grocery store with a sign that said ‘please take me home’. He is going on nine years now. Celo is going on year six, and we got her three years ago from the Big Bear Lake CA Pound.”

They have saved a number of dogs over the years, some of which have passed, but Mr. Goon elaborated on the others:

“Yea, we rescued all three of them. We actually got a fourth one back in the day, named Dino, that apparently took out a Llamma. The motherfucker was bigger than Kajj (the other dog). But yea, over the years we have got like four or five dogs rescued now.”

Later in the day, he recounted a story from a friend on the subject of dogs:

“Ya know, there are some fucked up stories about animal treatment. For years, this lady and her kids were taunting their neighbor’s dogs when the people would go to work. One day, the neighbor family came back from church and this 64-year-old lady, that had been taunting the dogs with her grandchildren, shot the two dogs. My friend had seen the way the woman treated the dogs, and it was 100% provoked. Now, it is a felony for animal abuse. This woman got 12 months in jail and a few years probation. She also can never own a firearm again. It’s beautiful the law is now protecting the dawgz.”

At first glance, Lucas has more of a Mike Vick look with the tats and mean mug. That’s why this overwhelming empathy and compassion for dogs was such a surprise. Dogs aren’t the only thing that Lucas loves. Rutland, Vermont holds a special place is his heart and he hopes to be able to settle down between his in-laws and his Rutland fam at some point.

But, for now, Lucas & Tonya are livin’ the quintessential American dream. They have a built a life of roaming & rambling freedom for themselves (The same rambling free spirit that inspired iRollie). Lucas and Tonya drive coast to coast experiencing every mountain, handrail, and podunk town in between.

They have stories from every weird nook and cranny of the U.S., and experienced more life in 27 years than most people do in a couple lifetimes. These two crafted the vagabond lifestyle into one of comfort & luxury. (Seriously, the RV is really fucking nice.)

Livin’ free & without a helmet, does have its consequences. Namely, a near-death brain trauma that occurred while skateboarding in Reno, Nevada in the Summer of ’09.

Lucas Magoon Saw Death, and Said Nah

Lucas Magoon:

“Got a head injury the summer of ‘09. I got med-flighted to Reno. Had me on drug-induced coma for two and a half weeks. My brain was so swollen, they had to crack my skull to relieve the pressure. I remembered all of it, seen the light. I was skitching on that skateboard. Some homies were going to college, and all these foreign girls were gonna come over. We would always skate from their house they were renting to the pavement park down there. We always bomb these hills. So, we’re going up to the party. Johny lives was driving his old range rover. Stop at a stop sign, and hop out start skitching. This is on a regular skateboard. Tyler Lynch, and Johny asked the Rutland homies in the back like Tyler Lynch, Dylan Lynch, and matt Douglas. I remember right before it, conscious in my mind , going “you can let go now”, and replying “Nah, fuck that. I wasn’t even thinking about the skateboard, more generally about life. Like just never letting go or giving up, thinking about this girl and just life all the other shit.” It felt good before that. So, anyways going down I told myself I’m never letting go, I’m gonna snowboard forever, and then BAP, and wake up two and a half weeks later. I guess I puked blood the first day I got airlifted.”

Joe:

*sneezes*

Lucas Magoon:

“Bless you.”

Joe:

*sneezes*

Lucas Magoon:

“Bless you. There’s a whole lot of blessings today.” *chuckles*

“So, before I came back officially. I am in the room, just me in the room, in the bed. I float up to the ceiling. I go into the ceiling and it is black. Then, reminded me of some Nightmare Before Christmas shit. This tavern, a lot of skeletons, and this and that. There was a lot of bright colors. And since it’s Reno, kind of like a little Vegas, all these bright lights al these stores everywhere and flourescent lights.”

Natalie:

“This is in your coma?”

Lucas Magoon:

“Yea. Then, got carted (med-flighted) to the ICU, and I was there for two and a half months. Yea, in the coma. They said I would come back 50/50, ya know. I walk into the tavern, I am there for a bit, then leave the tavern, took a left out. Then, I’m walking and that’s when they say that bright white light, this bright white light starts to form and I am going towards it, and then these four gremlins, like jester cat smiles, come popping up, park right there. They were like “nah, you are not leaving yet”. I was like “alright” turned around and walked back into the black and saw the bed, and went down into the bed. Then, I opened my eyes. I am in the bed and I look out right through the window of the room, and a slow curtain dropped and brought everything back to reality. Then, they (the doctors) said I would be 50/50 and couldn’t snowboard and I was like “fuck that”. They wanted me on seizure medication for a couple of months. So, after the two and a half months in Reno, I went back to Rutland, Vermont. I was taking rehab classes every week at the hospital. The people with the same head injury, I guess, are on seizure medication and antidepressants their whole life because the injury was in my right frontal lobe. It was similar to like a drunk consciousness. So, the feelings and emotions were like maxed 10x. But I didn’t even crack my skull or anything, I don’t know how.”

Natalie:

“I had never heard of anyone’s experience going into a coma and having such a near death experience. It’s cool, scary, and beautiful.”

This a guy that doesn’t even talk the talk, but just walks the walk. To this day, he does not rock a helmet while snowboarding. This is just another facet of this rock n’ roll character that calls for a pause and a bit of confusion.

21st Birthday, Kicked Out Of Poland Airport

Lucas Magoon:

Yea, after the head injury in the summer of ‘09, the rehab in fall, I still filmed a part for TechNine that winter. I actually went to Poland for a rail jam, and ended getting kicked out of the Poland airport and stuck there. Story started with me turning 21 out there, we met up with these girls and we were partying with them and we got a bunch of tequila. They gave it to us, and stayed up the whole night before and just continued drinking, tryna stay up the night to catch my flight in the morning. Then, ya know I went into blackout *chuckles*. I guess I made it to the airport and its now the morning, all the way out there in Poland. My homie Cole and Taylor were telling me that I needed to calm down. So, I turned around and was like “everyone listen up, this guy is tryna tell me to calm down. He’s the Papa Bear now” Then, there was like some security in a red puffy coat, and I was like “That’s right Red Puffy what you gotta say about it? Nothing” Then, all the troops roll up with all their rifles and I just wheel my board bag out and superman on it. Then, Cole, the filmer, got a taxi and was like make sure he gets to this hotel. So, 21st birthday get kicked out of the Poland airport.

Magoon Interview: Talking Samsquanch

Also we got to talking about Sasquatch. Lucas told us all these stories he has heard about families terrorised by Sasquatch, and the amount of dense woods there are in the Pacific Northwest for them to hide. Some of the dialogue of the freaky stories.

Lucas Magoon:

“Then he hears something, and looks left and there is like a 5 foot one (samsquanch) up in the tree, and then he sees the fucker next to him standup and his head is like above six foot no doubt, and he just turns and POPS a round off at the five foot one, and he just watches it drop down. He starts running and loading up the chamber again like thinking he is going to look back and the fucker is going to be on him. He looks and he watches the bigger one go and grab it (the five foot one) and then just go and take off up to the rock cliff and take off. He stops running & watches the whole thing and he like called up the forestry and was like, ‘Yeah, you know, I might have shot a cub you know a bear cub up there” and so he’s like, ‘Alright we will send forestry over’. Its Thanksgiving, and he showed up…. Forestry is like, ‘I want to be back for dinner, let’s go deal with this.’ Gets up to the woods and he is like, ‘Yeah man sasquatch man I’m telling you’ and he is like, ‘What? No? What the fuck are you talking about?’ They went up to the bottom of the tree where he said he hit and the thing fell and there is like a puddle of blood and they follow the tracks and the blood up to the rock wall and you just see the rock wall bloodied up & he said he got up there in like seconds. The big one got up this fucking wall while dragging the other youngin’.

So, then it goes into forestry, takes photos and they say, ‘Alright let’s get out of here and you are going to be getting a call from another government organization.’ And he’s like, ‘What? What is it?’ and they were like, ‘Nah just another government agency.’

And then later that night a car pulls up & one dude in a tux in the back seat opens the door and says “Get in.” He got in the car and he is like, ‘Yeah fun day. So, what did you see?’ And he is like, ‘Yeah, a squatch’ and he is like, ‘No, you fucking didn’t and you haven’t seen nothing and you are never going to talk about this ever fucking again and then he dips out.’ So, yeah, they know it. Government is holding it back. Let’s go get the extra-terrestrials”

We are a bit sceptical as to the validity of this squatch. Either way, it would be an absolute blast to go iRollie Adventuring to find the Samsquanch. Go camping in the pacific north-west, bring some quality tobacco, our Lucas Magoon PRO Series iRollie, get elevated, and roam the woods looking for this creature of folklore.

In conclusion, Lucas Magoon is a wild man that fits no mold. As a professional snowboarder, he is an outsider that created his own subset. As a gangster dude with face tats that gets kicked out of Poland, he has a heart of gold. As a brain trauma patient with a 50% chance of brain function & a lesser chance of functioning on his own, he is back on a snowboard, still without a helmet. All of these aspects are exactly why we could not be happier or more proud to have Lucas Magoon as a part of the iRollie Fam.

Get outside, join the community, and roll that tobacco.