Terron “T-Stacks” Frank used to have to beg people to come to his favorite skate rinks around the country, including his home base, Rivergate Skate Center, located just outside Nashville, Tennessee. But these days, they’re showing up without prodding—a welcome sight after months of rink closures.
“I’m seeing skaters I haven’t seen in five or ten years come out,” says the 32-year-old, Riedell-sponsored rhythm and dance skater. Even on the hardwood, it’s easy to mistake Frank for an ice skater or a ballet dancer with his athletic grace and viral-ready moves. He can bust out choreography worthy of a music video or twirl endlessly on the toes of one foot. In one YouTube video, Frank dizzyingly spins no less than 25 times, a performance that echoes an Olympic-level ice skating competition. There’s a reason why Frank has more than 28,000 followers on Instagram.
Growing up in Virginia, Frank visited his first rink when he was 12 years old. From there, he was hooked. After moving to Tennessee in 2010, Frank began attending underground skate parties across the U.S. and quickly became a fixture in the community, traveling to different states about 20 weekends throughout the year.
During a trip to Los Angeles three years ago, Frank met Moxi Skates founder Michelle Steilen—a legend in the roller skating community, known to followers as Estro Jen. Steilen introduced Frank to park skating, and after he returned home to Tennessee, Steilen mailed him a pair of quads better suited for the concrete.
“He is by far the best dance skater I have ever seen,” says Steilen. “His skating is genius. It’s pure impulsive creativity.”
For the past year, T-Stacks Frank has refined his skills in the park.
© Don Wiggins
As rinks began closing due to the pandemic, Frank started hitting the parks all the time. It didn’t take him long to adjust to this new turf. On his first try, he managed to nail a trick he’d already mastered in the rink—a 540. A year and change later, he says that toggling between the rink and the park has made him a better skater. “The rink translated to park skating, and park skating transferred to the rink,” Frank says.
But the switch didn’t come without challenges. “My park skates are heavy,” he explains. “I had to learn how to throw that weight around, but that helped me do certain tricks at the rink, too—like more spins and slides.”
These days, at the Two Rivers Skate Park in Nashville, Frank can be found on his roller skates, dropping into bowls with the ease of a veteran. In a video posted this past January, Frank jumps over the barrier between two double bowls, carves up the opposite side, does a handstand on the side of the second bowl and then drops in backwards. It’s common to see him get several feet of air as he exits and reenters a bowl.
Frank, one of only a small handful of Riedell-sponsored rhythm and dance skaters, says one of the biggest highlights of his career was skating in a park in front of Steilen. When he was in L.A. this past May, he got the chance to show off his recently upleveled skills, just three years after their first meeting. For Frank, it felt like a full-circle moment.
“Michelle is the best,” Frank says. “Sending me skates was not a waste.”
“He got good so quick,” Steilen gushes. “He has an incredible amount of talent, but it’s the practice and commitment that makes him the pro that he is.”
Now that rinks are reopening, Frank is enjoying a return to his first love. But not every facility survived the pandemic. In the past year, many culturally significant rinks have closed, unable to pay the bills without customers. Yet Frank says the renewed interest in outdoor roller skating and inline skating gives him hope. He’s optimistic that the renewed interest in these sports during the pandemic—which caused worldwide shortages of roller skates and boosted skaters like Ana Coto to TikTok stardom—is here to stay.
His skating is genius. It’s pure impulsive creativity. It’s magic.
“When Roll Bounce came out, people said, ‘Oh I want to do that!’ ” Frank says, referring to the 2005 film about a roller- skating crew in 1970s Chicago. “We haven’t had a skate movie in so long. Then the pandemic happened, and people were interested again. It really needs to happen for the rinks, too. They can’t afford to stay open.”
At least in Nashville, the roller rink, street and skatepark communities seem to be thriving, according to Alyssa Kontos, who rolls with the group Skate Nashville. Kontos says Frank is an integral part of what makes Nashville’s skate community so welcoming and special.
“T-Stacks is one of the best roller skaters in the world, but he’s our friend,” she says. “He’s not gatekeeping at all, which is really important for the health of skating.”
Indeed, Frank doesn’t put on airs or boast about his skills, even though his peers marvel at his talents. Whether he’s in the rink or in the park, roller skating is his lifelong passion, no matter where it leads him.
“When I’m not working, I’m skating,” Frank says. “I didn’t ever skate to be sponsored; I skated because I love it.”
Steilen for one hopes that bigger things are on the horizon for Frank: “T-Stacks really deserves to do this professionally full-time. He is the king, and he represents what it is to be a roller skater.”
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