Posted in Skate Journal on December 12th, 2015 by corpo
Had an extremely lazy day full of resting and chilling. It was wonderful. During the day I changed my setup in a couple ways. First I switched out baseplates to the regular baseplate. It doesn’t set the axles as far apart. I haven’t been super hyped on how my trucks were turning and seemed to recall them turning better when it’s set back a little. Who really knows. I also put some pretty much brand new spitfires that were in my garage. I’m not sure why i swapped them out awhile ago. So yeah. I spent more time switching my setup then I did skating. I basically just did tricks until I almost fell and then went inside. It was still very fun. Nose manual, nose manual both 180s out, front 180 nose manual 180 out, switch too, back 180 nose man 180 out. It’s all so fun.
A photo posted by glen gillinghammer (@corpoglenny) on
Nate and I met John, Blake, Rob, Dave and Matt at the Lafayette park on a cool, but nice Friday around noon. We were the only ones at the park. This park rules when there aren’t a bunch of people there. Everyone kind of did their own thing to warm up. It seemed like there were quite a few people in the toilet bowl. Matt was front boarding and back lipping the bump to flat bar though. He’s good. Dave seemed to be on a mission. He was doing back 50s across the whole manny pad ledge and slappy crooks on the shark fin, he would eventually 50 up the whole thing too. So gnar. I got a couple front 50s to manual, but I was kind of plagued with that slow feeling and not very confident again. There was a ton going on, so it’s so hard to remember what everyone did. Eventually a hubba/ledge session would transpire. It was rad. Nate had boardslide and feeble down the round rail. Matt front lipped it, but that was probably too easy for him. Dave worked up to it and then did a bunch of boardslides to fakie with a ton of style. Blake had some moves down it too and did front 50 shove off the enlarged Pier 7 replica. I would eventually get a little noseslide on that too. Rob boardslide the whole bump to ledge, Nate 50’d it, Matt back tail’d it. John, Nate and Matt did ollies over the round hump in the snake run. We played a game of SKATE that Blake would eventually win with a 360 shove it. I had done decent earlier in the game until acquiring a bunch of letters from Rob tricks that I should probably have learned by now. Cab, backside no comply 360, and a couple others, but I was hyped to actually land a backside 180 one foot. After the game most of us tried 360 shoves for awhile. I think most people would get it. Then it was kind of a free-for-all and at one point Nate did a 360 shove, then John did an impossible and I followed with 360 flip. Fun times. Then it was off to eat with Rob and Nate which was awesome. Well, except there wasn’t much for me to eat, but hanging with those guys was cool at least.
After that Nate and I stopped at Arapahoe Ridge for what we figured would be a 5 minute skate before realizing we were too sore to skate. But nope, Nate shredded. I didn’t do much of anything, but after seeing Nate nose manual down the long 3 stairs I was able to nose manual down one set. Then I filmed Nate for awhile get the double down nose manual as well as a banger going up. Manual to nose manual to nollie shove up. Sick! Stubborns!
A video posted by glen gillinghammer (@corpoglenny) on
Feeling sore and tired from the Crisis premiere Nate and I went to Thornton park. Nate was super hyped as I suspected because this park rules. We pretty much had the park to ourselves and Bernie showed after about an hour of skating. Everyone skated decent it seemed. I was still in a bit of a funk, but skated better. The noseslide to manual to back 180 out hyped me up as did Nate’s line above. Nate did back 50s over the manny pad all easy, had some cool manuals/nose manuals across the slant. Bernie showed. We took awhile to do the kickflips/180s above. I made the physical challenge of 10 tricks on the ledge at the bottom of the bank above. I started off really sucking, but would eventually get to 10 or more. The back 50 was the scariest. My legs didn’t want to pop at all. Bernie and Nate did some bangers. Bernie had front smith 180, almost front smith kickflip out. Nate had back 5-0, back nosegrind, back smith. My “better” tricks were front 50 back 180 out, front 50 shove out. As much as I sucked it made me how rarely I skate a ledge like this. I need to do it more. We played a “no mercy” game of SKATE that I think Bernie would eventually beat Nate with a cab flip. I couldn’t back nosegrind the tiny ledge. Good session.
After some Chipotle we met Matt at Safeway ledge. I was beat. I got a couple 50s then just hucked front crooks for awhile before giving up and walking over to the auto parts store to get a new headlight. Matt and Nate ripped it up. Nate did a fakie back tail, front tails and some other tricks I’m forgetting. Matt did all of the basics going fast. Front 5-0 180, fakie nosegrind 180, front 5-0 shove, front tail front shove. So good.
A photo posted by glen gillinghammer (@corpoglenny) on
You know those people that you skate with really well? That you always have fun with. Nate is one of those people. I picked him up at the airport after working a half day. It was very nice out. I didn’t have a real plan and we ended up going to Commerce City park on a whim. Man that park is awesome. Especially when no one is there. We both just kind of carved around for awhile before the ollies and grinds started flowing. One of the first things we tried was to manual the long backside ledge. Neither of us got it, but for different reasons. Mine was that I couldn’t comfortably ollie that high. Ugh. Nate’s was that he couldn’t drop off that far. I went on to suck at back 50s, and well all grinds and slides. Nate on the other hand was totally ripping. Back 5-0s, back nosegrinds, front 5-0s, front tails to fakie, front lips, all easy. At one point he did a fakie back 50s first try. Ripping. I got close to a few nosegrinds, but basically didn’t skate the ledges worth a crap. Nate and I both kickfipped and back 180’d up the euro.
We hit this little manny pad for a bit too. I manualled it first try which beat Nate to the manual. But then I couldn’t nose manual it to save my life. Nate however, got to nollie nose manual shove out and I filmed it. Radical
Then we went to the DIY spot and Carleigh and Lazer met us. Nate was ripping and hungry. He did lots wallies over the smaller qp, boardslide transfers, blunt transfers, wallies, ripping. Lazer did quite a few tricks on the qp. Carleigh was kind of in chill mode for obvious reasons (Crisis premiere a few hours away). I posed wallies. After awhile Carleigh, Lazer and I tried 10 tricks on the QP. Carleigh and I started out with the same few. Lazer rattled off a bunch of cool ones, the pivot on the side into the steep was rad. I was fishing for ideas for a 10th trick when Lazer suggested kickflip to fakie. I posed it. It felt doable. 50 tries later I landed it very poorly. It hyped me up. Off to dinner and the Crisis premiere!!!
