Well, this evening my days of playing Tony Hawk Pro Skater became a semi-reality! My wife, brother-in-law and I were walking home from the Torchlight 5K in Minneapolis, and ran in to Bucky on his way to find a late night bite! He said he loved Mpls every time he came to town, and I told him how much I enjoy his build videos on YouTube, and of course following his skating and rally career. He was insistent on me checking out his latest build video - he's building an old WRC car. Should be great! Really nice guy, and happy to chat for a couple minutes. This may have been my Ambassador peak. Also saw this, which made us laugh. Great evening.
Is he as high energy in real life as he is on tv? From all that I’ve seen I’d be exhausted just having a five minute conversation with him.
I ran into Bucky at a car meet in San Diego back in 2002 or 2003 or something. I want to say he had a BMW M3 at the time. He was extremely chill, and was very obviously trying to hide his identity, so I greeted him and left him alone.
I'd agree with readymix - He was super chill and was super nice. I really enjoyed seeing him light up about Subaru and being able to hear about his L project for a few minutes.
Yeah, when I bumped into him, he had dark sunglasses (it was night time) and a ball cap on. There were people from the club leadership that knew who he was and we're starstruck whispering about it. He was obviously trying to just enjoy a car meet and not be gushed over. He was hanging out with a group of about 8 of us, talking about his car. Seemed super cool, very down to earth...and this was in the prime of Tony Hawks pro skater, so everyone was a fan. He didn't give any sort of celebrity vibe, which I was impressed with. In fact, I was more impressed that he was standing around talking cars like a normal dickhead to the point that someone had to tell me after the fact that "dude, you know who you were just chatting cars with? That's Bucky ****ing Lasek!". I was like, "neat, leave the guy alone, he's having a good time."
Cliff's Notes: I talked to Bucky Lasek about cars for almost an hour, had no idea it was him, and he was a super normal dude.