Doobie.

Fire it up! In celebration of @doobieornodoobie’s take on the Old Skool release, we decided to give Doobie a call to discuss the Village GOAT, Finland, bomb shelters and more… FIRINGTON BOYSKIS.

Doobie, known as Victor Pelegrin to no one ever, aside from the French Government.

Doobie as an incontestable cornerstone not just of the Vans team but of European skate culture in general. Doobie is larger than life in every sense of the word, from his unbelievable hair to his laugh, and is well and truly the life and soul of the party of any situation he finds himself in. Doobie embodies the sheer essence of a core skater, he’ll slam, battle, secure clips and do it again, and again and again. So, with the release of Doobie’s take on the Old Skool, we decided there was no better time to give Doobie a call to discuss the Village GOAT, Finland, bomb shelters, scoring weed in China and more… Fire it up!

For those that don’t know you, can you give a little introduction.

My name is Victor Pellegrin, everyone calls me Doobie and I’m 32. I come from Livron-sur-Drôme, it’s a small village about an hour south of Lyon. Beautiful place but not that much to do. I’ve been a skater for 22 years. Right now I live in Helsinki.

Talk us through your journey in skateboarding.

It’s been a solid 22 rips! I’ve been on Vans for 15 years and have been travelling the world with skating and I love it. I turned pro three years ago for Antihero which is a gift from god. I started skating because of my brother, my brother is a poser and he really wanted to be a skater but didn’t really have the skills, or the lifestyle. He was going around the village with his skateboard and mainly sitting on it... One day he brought his friend and I saw him ollie a coke bottle, I was mystified – like “what the f*ck is this?”

Every Thursday in our village was the market, I used to ask my dad to take me as there was this guy Jean Charles - JC – he was the GOAT of the village and he was skating there every market. I would go there to watch him. Back in the day our village had a big skate scene, all the French magazines were covering it, it was insane. From there I left when I as 16, I went to Nimes, started skating everyday – that was where it all started for me. After there I went to Lyon and started to get to a good level and introduced to a scene or “the scene” of skating in a big city. It was fire, mixing up with bigger names skating the Hotel de Ville.

Talk us through your move to Helsinki…

I have the same story as all the skateboarders who are not from here… I was on a trip a few years ago and I met this beautiful, lovely, sweetheart who is my girlfriend today. I love the city, the mentality, Eniz lives here who has been a great friend of mine for a long time, so I have a good crew here - a good feeling.

How’s the local scene in Helsinki?

It’s really cool. They are super open and it’s insane how good they are at skateboarding, they are all so talented. They are simple, they don’t f*ck around for nothing - they get straight to the point. It’s a huge scene, there are so many skateboarders you wouldn’t believe it. The winters are pretty tough, maybe the worst country in the world to be a pro skateboarder. But it’s cool, there’s no light, it’s -20 outside - I never experienced that. I go to the indoor skatepark every day, it’s a bomb shelter 100 metres underground. We skate all day, you can’t smoke in there - which is annoying – it’s like proper sport practice.

Not just to be pigeonholed as a skater, you like to surf and snowboard as well. Do you feel the three cultures have been more aligned in recent years?

I love it. They are a lot closer than they used to be. Back in the day I feel they would hate on each other, skateboarders were the hobos, snowboarders were ok but surfers wouldn’t get along with skaters. These days I feel like in surf there are so many moves that come from skate, they watch a lot of skate films and there’s more respect. It goes both ways, now there are some skaters pulling out some surf moves – we get along. The punk scene in surfing is back after a little hiatus which is a good scene, I back it. Snowboarders we have always related to as it’s the easiest thing to relate to and approach as a skater. Their mentality is more similar to skaters as they party pretty hard, they ride hard, they go crazy…

Who are some of your favourite people to surf or snowboard with?

I love to snowboard with my friend Mehdi Soltane, he’s the best, as well as Lenny Oliver. I also have a good crew in Helsinki that I ride with as well as the Declerck twins from Belgium, they ride really well and taught me every trick I know. Surfing, my all-time favourite is Willy Aliotti, he’s also my brother too. I love this guy so much.

Talk us through your fishing passion.

I love fishing, you have no idea. I love it as much as I love skating, it’s so complimentary. Skating can be so intense; you need to chill for a bit. Fishing gives me that chill time, but it can also give me the hardest time ever. You can be casting, grinding your ass off for hours and hours without getting a single bite, it’s horrible. It drives you crazy, until you get that bite, then it falls off the hook. There’s frustration, there’s joy – just like skateboarding. It’s a mental game with so many ups and downs.

I only started six years ago, so it’s quite recent. I had fished before with my friends but never really got into it. At some point I was partying too much and needed a break so started to go again with them and immediately got hooked. I think about it every day. I watch fishing videos. It consumes me.

Let’s talk about your new shoe!

So stoked, so f*cking stoked. I’m stoked as f*ck. I’ve been repping them for the past months and I’m hyped on them. How they feel, how they wear in, the stitches, the Nubuck, the materials are super nice – softer than the normal Old Skool, I feel the stash pocket on the tongue makes a little extra padding which makes it comfier. I’m in love!

And the campaign shoot….

Wow. I’m not going to lie, it was INSANE. I’m usually not keen on stuff like that, but I turned up with no expectations. It was like a full movie production, I was freaking out but having so much fun. The whole thing was a big job, long days filming and long nights partying but I’m hyped on the results. The crew was amazing, the English guys… we had such a good time. When we finished, we partied our asses off. Those Blokes guys are amazing. If you have a chance to watch their films, Blokes and Blokes 2 – definitely watch it.

Your catch phrase is ‘fire it up’, but what gets the Doobie Master himself fired up?

Life experiences. People. I like to go places and see the scenes, experience different cultures. I’m hungry for life. I don’t like to follow people and stuff, I like to carve out my own existence. I like simple stuff, hanging out with my girl, watching the world go by. There’s time for everything.

Any last words? A message for the internet? A message to your former self?

FIRINGTON BOYSKIS. And always tell your friends you love them.