We all met at Crisis. Dave was a little later so Fuzz and I played on the red curb in his shop for awhile. Nothing serious, just kinda doing different slappy stalls and stuff. Then we piled in Dave’s car and headed to Denver. First spot was the bank to curb behind the church on Broadway. Perfect warm up spot. We played a game of SK8 that kind of dissolved, but was fun and full of basic tricks (until Dave started doing eggplant variations). Fuzz learned a nose stall body varial. Fuller learned the Rattray River Dance trick. And since I don’t have a good name that starts with Fu (although I’m sure you can think of one) I did the typical Glen kickflip pivot thing (although it was more back smith). We were laughing pretty hard at times. Fuzz did a nose stall revert that had a late extra revert. Things like that get us laughing and stoked. We pushed on, ended up at 18th & Welton. The barriers had snow on them. The ledge had a bit, but Dave put his gloves to use and cleaned it off. He then proceeded to do super long boardslides then worked on boardslide to fakie. It took him a minute, but he put it down. That’s a ridiculous trick. Fuzz and I were struggling with the boardslides and switch boardslide attempts. Fuzz had some sick slappy back 50s though. I got me a fun feeling run of slappy feeble stall, wallride a barrier then kickflip a steaming manhole (man that sounds bad) cover. I tried another line coming the other way of back 180 off the curb cut (man I suck at back 180s), switch mongo push (yeap Jack), sw 180 up the curb then front 5-0 the ledge. Never got the ledge trick. We moved on. It’s all kind of a blur for awhile. We hit a bunch of different parking garages. Dave did some really long boardslides. We almost got locked in a stairwell. We did some 50s down some parking garage curbs. We rolled by the elevated bank spot and all got ollie up to frontside wallrides first try. So we left. Spot destroyed. Hit another plaza for a bit. Fuzz went for a crazy ollie up then manual, but didn’t have the hops. Dave and I tried some boardslides. I got kinda close to crooks. It was pretty crazy with all the christmas lights shining all bright everywhere. We ended up at the Chase garage with the good manny pad. That place has crazy flat lighting and it was messing with me pretty bad. Dave was the only one to land a legit manual. I got a kickflip up, no comply 180 off. Fuzz was kinda chilling. Then we hit the granite two stair area that is one of my favorite spots in Denver. Fuzz did the rad little grind on the skate stopper. Dave did a cool wallie. Last time I was there my knees sucked and I could barely ollie up a two. This time however I felt great. After taking a bit to get a front shove down a two I had a rare streak of skating where I actually felt great. Did a run of front shove down a two, ollie up two and then back 180 off two. Simple tricks I know, but felt so good. Then for one of my favorite lines ever. First try kickflip down two, ollie up two, back 180 down two, roll a bit, turn around, heelflip on flat and then come back and almost backside flip a two. It was so close. I got back to the b/s flip one more time and didn’t get as close. Also came really close to kickflip up a two. Got switch front 180 down and was gonna try to line out til b/s flip again, but we got the boot which was kind of a blessing as I was breathing heavy and tired. That is the best I’ve felt on a skateboard in a long time. Made me really happy. I guess I haven’t done tricks down anything in a long time as I felt like I was landing really hard. Like my body would get jolted all crazy. This is only a two stair. Ha. Oh well, need to keep street skating like this. It’s the best.

My picks for parts of the year and stuff. The online stuff is easy to post, but a real part on a DVD still counts the most to me. So part of the year goes to Cory Kennedy in Pretty Sweet. Video of the year is the 5Boro video.

Best online part – Mark Suciu – Cross Continental.

Best not-a-full-on-part part – Austyn Gillette – Quik.

Honorable mention – PJ Ladd – Cruising NYC

All in all a pretty good year for skateboarding in my opinion. Now if only people would stop supporting the mega corporations.