skate journal: neil visit day 1. library spot, dog park and random street spot (july 12, 2025)
Picked up Neil early after his overnight flight then went to breakfast with Cass and Rob. We drove by dog park, but it was soaked and Valmont lived up to the “toddler park” nickname. So we ended up going to the library spot. It had been a little flooded so it was harder to skate than normal. I started slow, felt really off. Neil though, man he was charging. Manuals, nose manuals, crook shoves, noseslide shoves, boardslides, front 50 shove, front tail, nollie lips, front 50 the curved bar. I had a couple front 50s on the taller ledge, some good feeling crooks, long boardslide on the flatbar, close to kick back 50. Cass was ripping too. Crooks, crooks shoves, back 5-0s, front 5-0s, no problems popping. Rob sat this session out.
Then we went to dog park. Paul and Luzius joined. Neil continued his ripping streak. Halfcab then quick shove, manual, super good no complies to tail, nose manuals, one foots over the grate, boardslides, etc. Cass and I tried to crook the upper tier. We both got into some crooks, but nowhere near the whole thing. Cass had back 5-0s, tailslides, poppy kickflips. Rob skated, had some good manuals, nose manuals, back 50s, back axle and no comply to tail on the bank to curb. Saw Dave casually front and back 50 the benches. I switched to my 8.25 indy setup and liked it more. Got a sloppy fakie bigflip, good feeling kickflip, some slow 50s on the lurb, some fun front slappies.
Then we went to a random street spot off east Pearl. It wasn’t all that, but we skated it a bit and everyone did their thing. Rob would do trick of the day with a long manual drop down to manual. Neil and Cass did some manuals too. I did a couple noseslides on a tall bench. One floppy b/s flip on the sidewalk that hyped me up. Neil couldn’t quite get boardslide. I ended on a silly front nose stall turn around manual for a couple feet.
(setup 1: 3/10 8.3 thunder team hollows 52 spits, new balance numeric 272 green size 12 half insole currex runpro insole)
(setup 2: 6/10 8.25 null time warp, indy 144 titanium, 53mm bones stf v1, 272 green size 12 half insole currex runpro insoles)
(pain level 3/10)