Marc Frank Montoya Owns The Block
Feb 07 2007 / Los Angeles, CAPro snowboarder MFM continues to build his second empire as the snowboarding hotel The Block debuts its own reality show January 15th on G4.
Most professional snowboarders would be absolutely thrilled to have the credentials that Marc Frank Montoya presents on his resume. Numerous rail jam and slopestyle competition titles. A recent cover shot on Transworld Snowboarding magazine. And since turning pro over five years ago, MFM has competed in 3 Winter X Games, missing last year's event due to a knee injury.
Yet despite all the accolades this gangsta on the mountain has accomplished as a pro snowboarder, many people are hearing his name a lot lately for his other major accomplishment: The Block, a hotel owned and designed by MFM and catered just for snowboarders. MFM's idea for the hotel came to fruition over three years ago when him and his brother in-law, Las Vegas Hotelier Liko Smith, opened up The Block at Tahoe.
And now, with a second Block hotel up and running at Big Bear (and many more opening at numerous resort locations around the world), The Block is about to debut it's own reality TV show, appropriately titled 'The Block.' The first show airs Monday, January 15th at 10 pm on cable-channel G4. The reality TV show focuses on MFM and the antics that goes on with the workers at the hotel (including many beautiful women hand-picked by the snowboarding gangster himself).
I was finally able to catch up with the man wearing more bling than any other rider gracing the pages of your favorite snowboarding magazines as he was about to take off for a photo shoot in the backcountry of the Rocky Mountains. Marc Frank Montoya talked about growing up as a skateboarder in rough settings, using snowboarding to achieve huge success, rebounding from a knee injury to compete in this year's Winter X, and the upcoming reality TV show focusing on his second empire, The Block.
Lat34: You're the gangster of the mountain right now. On top of the world. Just recently I saw you on the cover of Transworld Snowboarding. Now though, everybody's seeing you on TV. You've got this new reality TV show coming out based on your hotel The Block debuting January 15th on G4. I'm seeing you and the show advertised everywhere. ESPN, Comedy Central, the works. What's the show all about?
MFM: Things go crazy at the hotel all the time. We pitched the show for a while, trying to get the reality going and everything, just to blow up the hotel and things like that. We talked to G4, and G4's all excited, they're just doing it up. Doin' it big time, like with advertising and it's going nuts man. There's just so much stuff happening at The Block that, you know, creates good things.
The show is mostly about the crazy parties that go on, and the snowboarding at the hotel. It's all about the employees, and the girls that we hire, and things like that. We've got like six cute little girls there, and a couple of snowboard dudes.
Lat34: I've stayed at your hotel a few times, and you've taken good care of me. It is definitely the spot, especially with the girls you've hired to work for you. Besides the themed rooms, it's all about the vibe. It's like a Euro-Hostel. You go there, party, and everyone's cool to meet up and hang out together. How did the whole concept of the hotel start? How did you get it going?
MFM: I'm a snowboarder. I travel around all the time, and we're always staying at these little busted hotels and stuff like that. We don't even like to hang out at the hotel because they're always so uptight, and always nickel and diming us to death, all greedy. They're always looking at us like we're going to break something, treating us like s—t. And I hate that. I'm tired of that. And I had all these ideas about what I'd do if I had a hotel. I was always trippin' on how they always treated us.
So one time at a BBQ, I was with my brother in-law, and he's a full hotelier guy from Vegas (Liko Smith). We were rapping about what he does, and what I do, and we just started coming out with all these ideas. I started rambling about what I'd do if I had a hotel, and he's like “Let's do this! Let's make it happen!” And I'm like, “Alright, sure dude!” And I didn't think he'd really do it.
Then two weeks later, we found a hotel up in South Lake Tahoe, and it was really a perfect spot for our first one. It's a party town, that's a crazy little town right there. We got a little hotel 50 yards from the back entrance of Harvey's and Harrah's just right there in South Lake. Perfect man.
Lat34: And now you guys have a bunch of hotels all over the place. You opened one up at Big Bear, what other Block hotels do you have coming out?
MFM: We have one at Bear, we're working on one at Keystone, Mammoth, plus prospects all over, like Chamonix, Japan, Switzerland, Whistler, all over the place. Wherever the good party resorts are.
Lat34: You're one of the top riders in the world. I look at the way The Block is going for you similar to the way Tony Hawk makes more money with his video games than he does with skating. Eventually The Block could be your retirement plan!
MFM: (Laughing) No doubt, no doubt. That's the plan! I mean, I love snowboarding. I want to be able to ride even without having to ride pro and all that stuff in a couple of years. The Block's one of my backup plans. I also have a couple of companies coming out, things like that. Look out for it!Lat34: Out of all the ads I see in all the snowboard mags, yours are the most classic, mainly because you're blinged out, just straight G. I love it.
MFM: (Laughing hard).
Lat34: How did you start though? Your roots in snowboarding are different from most others. You didn't really start on the mountain, but on the street, right?
MFM: Well, I'm from Denver, just an hour and a half away from the mountains pretty much. I started skateboarding, and saw snowboarding in a skateboarding magazine and was like, “Damn, I wonder what's up with that? It looks just like skating, but bigger and faster!” So I made it out to the mountain, and my high school, North Denver High School right in the city, they had a program where they'd get city kids up to the mountain for a packaged deal. That's the way I started getting up.
The first time, I just basically caught on real fast, and once I got out of high school, I just did whatever it took to get up to the mountain. And I got hooked. It's just like skating in that I couldn't stop.
Lat34: Before you got into all that, who was Marc Frank Montoya in high school? Were you a trouble-maker, or a decent kid getting good grades?
MFM: (Laughing) Before high school, we were all thugged-out little skaters. We'd go downtown and pick on the rich kids that came out. All the suburbanites that came downtown, we'd kinda mess with them, take their boards and skate off. Stuff like that. (Laughing).
And then, once high school hit, pretty much all of my homies turned into little gang members and all that. A lot of them were bloods, and northsiders, and I don't know. They all went gangster, and I loved skating, I was good at it. So I kinda got new friends, and stayed into skateboarding. It pretty much saved my life 'cause a lot of my homies are barely getting out now, like eight, ten, 12 years later. I'm running into all kinds of them, and they're all happy for me. They could have been where I'm at. I wasn't the best one. Pretty much all of them were the same as me, pretty damn good. Back then, being a little gang member was cooler or something.
Lat34: Knowing you, I think you earned everything you have. You have a big heart. Winter X is coming up. You competing?
MFM: I'm going to be in X Games, I'm pretty sure. Last year, I was not in it because I got hurt in a contest right before.
Lat34: I remember that, what happened?
MFM: I've been hurt a long time. Pretty much all year. The whole last year I was hurt. MCL or something, a little detachment. I got on this crazy juice though, called Monavie Juice. I swear this Monavie Juice helped fully heal my knee in a month. I tried everything, but this crazy juice worked. (www.mymonavie.com/mfm)
Lat34: You also have a myspace page that's huge. (www.myspace.com/MarcFrankMontoya)
MFM: (Laughing) Yeah, I'm trying to work it out, I don't even know how to do it! They built the space for me, and it's cool. I gotta work it out though. (Laughing) Myspace is nuts. I have 6,000 friends already on there, and I don't even know how to click in!
