skate journal: campus with ollie and dave (april 11, 2020)
On a really nice day Ollie and I headed to campus. We parked up by the hill. We were in front of the student center to begin and there is a new rail that can be hit with one quick push. I kinda tried it, but never committed. I would like to go back for that, but not sure I’ll be able to be quick footed enough for it. Then we hit the area up by the tunnel to the hill. Ollie leaned cab rocks. It was cool. he was also doing manuals down the hill, ollieing onto the narrow crack paths and making it around the corners. He did the little slappy wedge bonk too, but off the side. I was really struggling, it became apparent that the 8.25 for street skating felt incredibly small for me. I couldn’t ollie onto the narrow path before the gap or do side rock flips out. I did get a few lines though. Slappy wedge, noseslide, wallie. Noseslide to fakie then fakie front side rock. Crook then something. Couldnt get halfcab noseslide. Got a line of switch front noseslide then cab rock. That line hyped me up. I had a funny slam trying the cab rock as Dave rolled up. I basically dove off the side of the loading dock. Dave was quick on the slappy wedge and did the back 180s all steeezy too. The front boards were good. He had a kickturn on the bank after. Ha ha. It was funny. He was going for 540 kickturn, but just did 180. I should have put that in slow motion in the edit. We moved down a little and hit this curb/ledge/step. Dave had a cool line we should film for stubborns sometime of wallie nollie, 180 onto a two stair and ride off, front board pop out. He also had some nice boardslides. Ollie had some cool drop down manuals and some clean ollies up the curb. I sucked. I got a first try crooks and then couldn’t do another. Then we cruised down the hill to the fun area on the corner with a 2 stair, benches where Dave did the transfer thing, Well, normally it’s fun, but I was really struggling. Slammed on a front 180 off the two stair, slammed doing front 180 on the tiny gap, and a real painful slam on a halfcab flip attempt that bashed my ankle so hard. Ollie had some cool manuals down the hill then front 180s off the two stair. Dave did a cool ollie to street plant thing off the ledge as well as the transfer. Then we moved to the upper stadium bank. I took awhile to land a trick. Pop shove to fakie, awhile to land kickflip to fakie. Dave was rattling off tricks. Front shove fakie, kickflip fakie, fakie flip, sex change, switch back 3, close to fakie sex change. Ollie had f/s halfcab, f/s ollie and tried kickflip to fakie for awhile. I hucked varial heels for awhile hoping to find some benefit to the smaller board. I committed, but it never flipped enough. I took awhile to get the sex change too. Then we headed home. I struggled, but still had fun. I credit the crew for that.
(setup 8.25 null curby deck, venture 5.6 cast baseplate with hollow hanger, 52mm bones easy street stf v5, 3 speed washers on the inside of the each axle, bones medium bushings, jessup ultra grip, new balance numeric 288S jack curtain size 11.5, no insoles at all, incrediwear knee sleeve)
(pain level 3/10)