Jay Adams (born February 3, 1961) is an American skateboarder most conspicuously known as among the first members of Zboys skateboarding team. He’s known as “The First Seed” of the sport and considered among the very powerful skateboarders ever.
Jay Adams was born in a portion of Santa Monica, California known to locals as “Dogtown”. He grew up along with his mom and his stepfather, Kent Sherwood. He started skating and surfing in the age of four. Sherwood worked at Dave Sweet’s Surf Store under Pacific Ocean Park, where Adams was introduced to skateboarding by most of the surfers who seen. Adams’ skateboarding was significantly affected by Larry Bertlemann, an expert surfer who had been known for pulling his hands over the waves as he rode them. The Z Boys became a skate team when they learned about the Bahne-Cadillac Del Mar Nationals in 1975. Jay Adams was the primary member to join the contest, held in Del Mar, California, taking 3rd place in the Junior Men’s Freestyle. His volatile vigor and low, daring, surf-like moves qualified the design of the Z Boys and varied using the original style of the age, that has been still based around tricks invented in the 1960s. Based on Bones Brigade creator Stacy Peralta, Adams “is likely not the best skater ever, but I will declare without anxiety about being wrong he is undoubtedly the archetype of modern day skateboarding.” Much of Adams as well as the remaining Zephyr team’s popularity is due to Craig Stecyk’s “Dogtown posts” in the relaunch of Skateboarder magazine in 1975. The Dogtown posts were a number of magazine articles that chronicled the experiences of the Z Boys. Sherwood and Adams created the brand and team EZ RYDER, which switched its name to Zflex six months after.