Thrasher Magazine

In every way, Jamie’s one of the busiest pros in the business. Luckily we got him on the line to dish on the insane lengths he went through to get game-changing, cover-worthy moves and the importance of putting your stamp on the streets. Check this extra-packed piece from our December ‘24 mag.


Foy handles closing duties with an unprecedented performance in his fourth part of the year. You can't miss this 

You’re one of the only skaters who, if I’m like, Hey, you got time for a call? You’ll say something like, “How about Thursday at 8AM?”
Yeah, depends on where I’m at. If I hit you with an 8AM for your time, I’m probably on the East Coast. I’ll still be sleeping at 8AM on the West Coast.

You sent me your color-coded calendar too. It looked like Tetris.
It’s pretty stacked up, for sure. But it makes it easy to know what’s happening for me.

Is this something new, or have you always been this organized?
It’s something kind of new. I’ve always been a little organized, but being a skater, there’s definitely a lot of chaos that goes along with everything. Things are partially organized, but they could change up at any moment. So I just want to have an outline, at least. Having a manager that keeps the calendar organized, that helped me out so much with being able to organize my time, or else I’ll double-book myself on accident or some shit. And I don’t wanna do that.

A former King of the Groms mini-ramp champ, Jamie can still toss up a mean front heel when the spot is hot

Are they hitting you up every day telling you, “Mr. Foy, you’ve got this at 11 and a crooked grind at 3”?
Nah. It’s not that in-depth, but I’ll just be checking it out. I kind of know what I’m getting into, because I set it up in the sense of what I want to do. Then I’ll just go with the flow. Recently, it’s all been chill, not running around too much with contests, street skating and everything. It’s just been out filming a lot for these videos, a lot of trips like that. It’s been a lot of fun, just rounding up these clips for the New Balance video right now.

With these videos, they’re all big, but that’s the big, big?
It’s just kind of the last part for the year. It’s funny, because all these parts, like the Deathwish part that was at the beginning of this year, and then the Dickies part that just came out, and now this New Balance part is coming out at the end of the year, they were all supposed to be coming out different years. And then things like the Dickies video got pushed back a few times. Then that kind of made it happen where this Deathwish video was already planning on coming out at the beginning of this year, but the New Balance video was supposed to come out maybe last year. It was never a for-sure date, so it just happened where all these things piled up. But it’s been fun finishing off these New Balance trips. Getting to hang out with Tiago and Westgate, it’s just such a good group.

Backing up fellow SOTYs David Gonzalez and Grant Taylor through the curves of this LA mangler with a front feeble 

So what you’re saying is, you wouldn’t have planned to have three massive video parts in a single year?
Not really. It was hard to do all that at once. So thankfully, it’s been some footage built up over the last year, two years, just working on other parts. You just got to go with the flow and see what happens.

So when you have this stack of footage, are you able to go like, Nah, that’s over here; that’s over here; that’s over here? Or is it more up to the video and marketing guys? Can you mix and match? Are you looking at a giant bank of Jamie Foy footage and you can put it wherever you want, or is that on them?
It’s a little different, just because everyone isn’t filming the same exact way. Thankfully, the Deathwish video and the Dickies video were pretty much filmed with similar cameras. Everyone’s kind of using the HPX, and then some Sony footage with Bobby. So that was a little bit of a mix-and-match where we could use whatever. But then when it came to New Balance, everything I’ve been filming with the New Balance guys is strictly for New Balance, just because it’s filmed with certain cameras with certain settings where they want it to look more cinematic. Something like that, I’m not a camera guy.




Do you give a shit if they said they were doing a VX part for New Balance? Would you be like, Cool!? Do you have a preference?
I would love to have a VX part! I would say I have a little bit of a preference in the sense that I like classic videos, classic fisheye, long lens, zooming—anything from VX to the HPX with the Xtreme, I would say is my favorite. But we’ve been filming a lot of different stuff for this New Balance video. It kind of reminds me more of the stuff I used to do with Ty when he was doing it. It’s a little more cinematic. But it’s really cool. It’s different. I just let the guys do their thing and I’m trying to communicate with them while I’m skating. Before I skate, I’m like, Hey, I’m gonna be going pretty fast. Just so that way they can knock it out of the park. I know it’s hard when they’re experimenting with different angles with gimbals and stuff. They’re gettin’ a little high-tech with the New Balance video. But it’s sick. That’s what’s gonna give it its own look. Kyle Camarillo, the head guy, gives it his touch. So it’s gonna be super sick. I’m excited to be a part of it, being in it with the boys. But when it comes to filming, my favorite style is just the classic fisheye follow lens and zooming long-lens style. You can never beat the classics.

From the courthouse to the casino, this 180 to switch crooks is like money in the bank

Yeah, give me those Baker videos.
Exactly, classic.

So spoiler alert, I’m looking at all your photos. I’m seeing your big tricks right now. So I gotta ask you some questions about these crazy-ass tricks. First of all, are you like Jaws, where instead of sending him three-story drops, are people around the world sending you the most fucked-up handrails?
They definitely have. I’ve definitely gotten mentioned in a bunch of crazy spots, a bunch of crazy big rails where it’s not even doable. Shit, someone might be able to do them, because anything’s possible. But for me, I see it and I’m like, Yeah, it’s not my cup of tea. But it’s funny, because with kids, it’s just them being all hyped, seeing a local spot that’s some big rail, and they’re just like, Yo, come hit this shit. It’s perfect! I’m just like, Oh, man, that thing looks terrible. But hey, appreciate it. I’m more strategic, calculated. I’m not going to hit some random, crazy hometown spot just because.

Back lip in bear country

How’d you find this down-across-and-up rail?
See that one was kind of on my own reconnaissance. Me and Tim Savage just kind of happened to come across that on Instagram with a Soap shoer. I swear it’s crazy. Social media makes the world so small nowadays. The rail randomly popped up. Someone maybe posted in a story or something. Maybe it was suggested, but it was a Soap shoer that went down, flat, up the rail and then cartwheeled off the end. So I saw that and I’m just like, What the hell, this rail looks insane. So then I just started going on Instagram, sharing it to a couple of homies, trying to see how many could help me find the spot. So it was like me and Tim going back and forth. And it just happened where I got into a hole, where I found one rollerblader that hit it and was commenting on the post. From that, I found their Instagram. Then they had some Instagram that was a spot Instagram that was for the area. And then boom, on that Instagram was that handrail with a bunch of photos with the pin and a caption. I was just like, No way. This is it. Found it! So it’s just like an Instagram hole, just digging and digging and digging and finding a little nugget of gold. I was super hyped, because then it just all worked out where I was in France for a Street League, and then I was about to go to Dubai for an Olympic contest and I had a week to kill. So then I flew to Germany, rented a car, just solo. Drove out there and checked out a bunch of spots that were in the area, and mainly checked out that spot to make sure it was good and it was. Then we scheduled a trip for a month and a half, two months later. Thankfully, we went out and got it done. It was super sick to have it all come together at the end of it all. Me, Tim and everyone, we were super hyped on the process. That’s what makes getting that clip all that much better.

Take an extended look at Jamie's gift from the Soap gods. Backside 50-50

Yeah. It’s like CSI: Handrails going on.
Yeah, it’s funny. Saw it on Instagram, I was just like, Man, who makes this shit? It’s a perfect down-flat-up rail where you don’t have to do anything to it. It’s over a little ravine-type thing in Germany, so it was super beautiful—a lot of greenery and such a cool area.

So who has the secret spots? I wouldn’t even think of a Soaper. I thought they were dead.
If you’re thinking big handrails, a lot of times you can find that with random Rollerblade posts of people. Rollerbladers love giant handrails, also BMXers love giant handrails, big kink rails, or big gaps and stuff like that. Sometimes you gotta stretch outside of skateboarding and try to find something that maybe someone else has hit on like a bike or Rollerblades. There’s even really gnarly scooter riders out there that hit giant handrails. You can find a spot through anybody, and just be like, Hey, man, this thing looks dope. What’s up with it?

Are they usually down to give it up? Or do they play hard to get?
Every time, so far, everyone’s been pretty cool. Just be nice about it. If you’re going out there, and if they’re local, just at least let them know. Like, Hey, I’m gonna go check this thing out, if you’re around or whatever. You just want to be respectful of everything. Everything so far has been super chill. Sometimes skaters are a little more secretive with spots, but it makes sense because you’re giving it to another skater. A BMXer giving a skater the spot, they don’t got to worry about nothing.

When they saved the Brooklyn Banks they had no idea that Jamie Foy would shut it down again so quickly—fakie flip back lip   Photo: Colen

So did the Soaper come kick it when you did the rail?
I didn’t hit them up. Just because that was probably a year, maybe a year and a half, before I got there. We did link up with some local homies in Germany that were showing us around. There were definitely a bunch of cool people out there that showed us around a lot of sick spots though.

Was that probably the most elaborate mission for a single spot? Have you gone even crazier than that?
Having to go there by myself, stay in Germany for two nights by myself, just go check out a bunch of spots and check out that spot, that was one of the most elaborate ones. Getting all those clips and showing all the boys around made it that much sicker, just because I was there a little bit before them and got some eyes on it. So it was super cool.




I got a couple more spot questions from these fucked-up photos. This gap to fakie back lip, how sketchy was this?
Pretty scary. That was a super cool spot. That’s a Tim Savage spot. It’s up in the Boston area. Anything in that area, he’s got it on lock. He took us there. I think Westgate front lipped it before, and he had no Bondo. I Bondoed it a little bit. There was a little crack where it goes from asphalt to concrete. Then I just had to get used to going fakie at it. I took the worst route I probably could doing that. I would fakie ollie and bail the whole thing to flat. And it was kind of at a weird time where I was skating a good amount of contests, so I wasn’t really in my comfort zone with pushing my limits with tricks that I do, rough ground and just being confident in myself. That was one of the things that got me back into getting clips as much as I can, just getting the confidence. It was like, fakie ollie, bail the whole thing, gap to flat. I probably did that five to seven times, killed my feet. I was like, Oh, man, this is way worse than just trying the trick. So after doing that a few times, I was like, Alright, my feet can’t take it anymore. I gotta start trying it. And then, thankfully, that worked in like four or five tries. Once I started actually committing, slid a few, stuck one or two, then I ended up landing it. I got a hot pocket when I landed it. I kind of knew right when I landed and I got a hot pocket, I was like, Alright, stand up. This is it. It’s underneath me. I was super hyped that one worked out because it was my biggest fakie back lip, and one of the coolest ones I’ve done. I always wanted to do one on a gap to rail. That’s just one of those crazy-setup rails where it’s like, That’s the one to do it on if there is one.