I decided enough was enough. No more caring how bad my arthritis was. So I went out into the garage on a rainy evening and rode the putter (7.5″ with 42mm wheels). I started by doing all 8 shoves. Most of them incredibly poorly. I got nervous when it was time to kickflip, but they came easy. Obviously skating such a small board makes them easier, but it still felt good. I went on to get a few other tricks. The treflip felt great whether or not my heel was on the ground. I’ve never landed a nollie tre in my garage, it’s just not enough speed to do that trick. It was still fun to try though. Glad I can still skate some flat if I make an effort.

(setup garage putter NB# 344 white 11.5 superfeet 3/4 insoles with adidas insole on top)

After a fun filled family day in Fort Collins I rolled to Saul’s around dinner time. There was a good sized session going on. Nick, Saul, Eric, Justin, Peewee. On my first run my foot slid off my board and I fell. Great. Getting used to the orthotics is harder than I thought it would be. Saul was ripping. He gets faster and grinds longer every time I go there. He also had a nice front slash on the brick. Peewee skated a lot. He makes long grinds look easy and had some cool lip tricks. I swear Nick nollied into a backside grind at one point, so sick. Justin makes really long grinds look easy too. Eric was in a zone of trying axle stalls on the qp then cali grinding into the bowl. He got really close. Some others got it, but not going as fast as Eric. I got a little one after a front rock on the qp. It was quite fun. The qp is a great addition. I think it helped me finally have a couple okay runs, but still nothing new and not as good as runs I’ve had before.

I had kind of sat around at the end of the session for awhile. My legs stiffened up, but I still wanted to skate some flat so I went to the parking lot near red curbs. But oh wow was I stiff. I couldn’t kickflip in like 10 tries so I threw my board then broke it. Something about pumping transition kills my knees. It sounds weird. I think I need to stretch or something. Anyways, the flatground session was super depressing.

(setup 8.5 Null Ollie deck, venture 5.8 wides, 3 washers outside each axle, Venom 88a bushings, 52mm Spitfire F4 conical 99a pink/purple wheels, bronson bearings, New Balance Numeric 344 white superfeet 3/4 insoles with a thin adidas insole on top)

While still recovering from a nasty flu I set out for a short one on a wet day. My skating was worse than I thought it would be. I basically just did a few slappy crooks, the slowest front 50s imaginable and struggled to cleanly ollie a parking block. I also got some 180s over the parking block, couldn’t quite halfcab flip, did a couple slow kickflips, bailed some slappies on the yellow parking block. Called it a day.

(setup 8.5 Null Ollie deck, venture 5.8 wides, 3 washers outside each axle, Venom 88a bushings, 52mm Spitfire F4 conical 99a pink/purple wheels, bronson bearings, New Balance Numeric 344 white superfeet 3/4 insoles with a thin adidas insole on top)