After a 5 hour drive from Pagosa then a quick nap I went right to skating. Oh, well I mean after a setup change of course since the previous session was so bad. I put an old 8.25″ deck on and lower forged baseplates. I got to a dry Southern Hills around 6 and skated for a little over an hour. I had very little confidence and skated poorly the whole time. A warm up run felt okay. Noseslide a bench, kickflip on flat, front 50 the low stair, boardslide another bench. Also did some crooks, noseslide to fakie, back 50s the step. Oh yeah, I had worn some 212s as my 379s had a hole I didn’t have time to fix. They felt good. Then it was time to try front 50. Never got one. Not even close really. I got onto the ledge a couple times, but it was pretty miserable. I did get a halfcab noseslide at least, maybe a quick switch crook turn around on the step. I focused my old board and left.

(setup 8.25″ null lazer deck, venture ftc 5.8s v-lights, doh dohs bushings (blue 88a barrel boardside one, yellow 92a roadside) no boardside washer, bones stf v1 pj 53mm wheels with all washers on the outside, new balance numeric 212 b/w size 11.5, stock insoles)
(pain level 4/10 still some sharp knee pain and no confidence whatsoever)

Feeling sore I went to the Pagosa park by myself as the family chilled. We had just ate a big breakfast and I had way too much coffee. It didn’t seem like it while we ate, but man I was jittery and agitated. There was one other skater there and a couple little kids on scooters/striders. The other skater was kind of a typical small town punker skater doing a lot of no complies and nollie shoves. He was cool. The park flows alright. The hip seemed cool, but there was snow/mud near the landing on both so I avoided it. I did some back 50s on the qps and took way too long to get kickflip and bs kickflip on the bank (far left in the photo, actually a great bank). I kind of ran out of ideas for the park pretty quickly. I did some front slashes on the qp, but that was about it, I have no motivation for transition anymore. So then I went in on the ledge. Crooks and noseslides went quick. I struggled with some front 50s, got one or two and then could no longer do one to save my life. I was so incredibly frustrated. I left.

All in all I would say this skatepark kinda blows. It has some redeemable features at least. The ledge is good although it’s plopped in the middle of the park. The bank is good, the main transitions are good. But the flow is kind of boring, the retainer wall banks are just stupid. The super steep bank to curb didn’t even look worth trying to hit. I didn’t skate the big bowl although it looked alright.

(setup 8.5″ null lazer deck, venture ftc 5.8s, doh dohs bushings (blue 88a barrel boardside one, yellow 92a roadside) no boardside washer, bones stf v1 pj 53mm wheels with all washers on the outside, new balance numeric 379 all black size 12, stock insoles)
(pain level 5/10 kinda sharp knee pain and coffee jitters)