On a cold-but-not-super-cold Saturday I went to meet Dave and Sean at Wilville. Dave and I arrived around the same time and started dorking around the blocks and manny pad. It was colder out than either of us though. Oh yeah, I forgot I had skated the curb across the street for a few minutes. I had done a few 50s, kickflips, slappy crooks. Then I went to Wilville. It felt good to push around a whole spot rather than being confined to the garage like most of the week. I had put an old 8.25 back on. Sean showed and it started to really snow. That’s when we did the lines. Dave had gotten close to the first roll in, powerslide to fakie, switch roll in, but the cold and cracks got him. The lines were fun. It felt fun to skate in while it was snowing. It was funny because Jack had texted asking how the weather was and I was like “cold and snowing”. And he still came! That’s a Stubborn for you. Eric also met up with us for a bit. He did a first try heelflip like nothing. At that point we were mostly lining out the knobbed ledge to the manny pad. Dave and I were digging the metal grate as a manny pad that you didn’t have to ollie onto. I got a nose manual pretty quick which I only really mention because I struggled with one later on. The knobbed ledge dorking was really fun. Dave tried to film me do the weird shove up the ledge thing for awhile and said “Do your shove trick now” which then became a joke for awhile for everyone. Sean was sitting out this part of the session. Eric and Jack were jibbing the trash can. Dave’s 180s were funny. Jack’s balance is crazy. He also manualed the whole knobbed ledge all the way to the manny pad. Eric took off. We weren’t sure why with so much fresh snow. Ha ha. After that it did stop snowing though and would eventually kind of dry up. I filmed on the manny pad for awhile. jack’s no comply 180 fakie manual halfcab was crazy. He did it several times. Sean made kickflip nose manuals look so easy. Dave took 4-5 tries to tic tac up the bank and it was hilarious how hard it looked. The one where he slipped out right when he got to the top was so funny. Sean took off. I was freezing from standing around in the cold, but once I got moving again I felt alright for a bit. I was actually trying flip tricks, but not really landing them. Jack did the pop shove nose manual. Dave did a couple NBDs for him. Switch nose manual 180 and halfcab manual. Incredible. He had also relived his Stubborns part and did a nose manual then powerslide buttslide. I tried a few kickflips manuals, but had started to get sore/cold again and like everyone else was over it. Fun day with a fun crew.

(setup 8.25 null lazer deck, venture ftc 5.8s, venom 91a bushings, bones stf v1 pj 53mm wheels, new balance numeric 379 tan size 12, thin rubbery adidas insoles)
(pain level 4/10 from the cold)

On a not-as-warm-as-it-looked Friday I met up with Dave for a lunch session. Both of us struggled. I was going to say we struggled early on, but really we struggled throughout the session. I was immediately not happy with my decision to go with an old 8.38 deck. It felt huge. Dave had some slams on pop shoves that were pretty uncharacteristic, but some good long lines with cabs, no comply 180s, switch no comply 180s, front shoves, switch front shoves, kickflips, etc. I struggled to get a halfcab flip, heelflip, b/s flip, almost got a real fronside flip. Dave was trying a line of nollie front 180, halfcab flip. Took awhile to get the halfcab flip. Dave had the most epic f/s halfcab flip. I had showed him how I setup for them with a front 180 first and so he tried doing that. But it put him in this awkward squat where he almost came to a halt then did it. It was hilarious, epic and amazing. I had kind of given up on landing normal tricks and started hucking cab flips. They got closer and closer and I started committing. Even just committing to them felt great. And then one happened. And it felt incredibly smooth and shot a jolt of stoke through me I haven’t felt in awhile. It wasn’t a perfect one by any means as I mostly did a halfcab flip where I landed on my nose and rotated, but it was definitely a cab flip. After that I went back to work. Dave stayed for a bit. He had been trying cab flips too and it seems within reach for him as well. Glad we skated.

(setup 8.38 null atomic cowboy deck, venture ftc 5.8s, venom 91a bushings, bones stf v1 pj 53mm wheels, new balance numeric 379 tan size 12, thin rubbery adidas insoles)
(pain level 4/10)