After hitting 303 Kevin and I met up with Rob and hit Redder curbs. Kevin and I hit 303 because we had recent struggles and it’s never our fault, but instead our setup’s fault. Ha. I went back to 8.5 with 8.5 Ventures, but traded in some large 51mm wheels for some narrow 50mm wheels. I’ve never really done the big setup with tiny wheels before. Well, not that I know of. Kevin was also switching back from Thunder to Venture. We woke. We had intended to meet Rob on campus, but the snow was starting to pick up so Redder curbs it was. Warming up didn’t seem too bad for anyone. Rob was on the back 50s and no complies right away. Kevin was figuring out his setup with switch flips. My trucks were way too loose, but I was having fun. Slappies worked well and kickflips felt great. Almost had some fun b/s flips out of the little kicker. Kevin and Rob had nice back 180s. Rob and I had some wallie nollies, Rob had front tails too. Jack showed and quickly did impossibles, treflips, popped kickflips. He is so freaking good. Then he went on to learn f/s halfcab back 50 in a few tries, did like 10 of them in a row and casually added the no comply flip over the mega gap in a few tries. He also learned slappy crooks (of course doing shove out second try), did the most popped no comply 180s and fakie tre’d over the little median. Rob learned slappy front crooks! I ended up doing my first slappy crooks shove (i’ve only shoved out of regular crooks before). I also did a b/s flip over the little hip. I got kind of close to kick back tail on the curb. Near the end I started trying nollie back tail shoves. Most of them weren’t close and were embarrassingly slow and awkward. But out of nowhere I did one and it felt quite amazing. I may have even slid it a little. Kevin joined the learn slappy crooks party. He also took top honors in the slam department. He tried a no comply 180 and went down soooo hard. It was brutal. He also ollied the parking block gap, back lipped the parking block, halfcab bonk the median like it was nothing. Dave showed near the end still riding his putter. He went into noseslides, tails, quickly. I had kind of tuned out at that point and was ready to go. Dave apparently skated for like 2 more hours ha. So awesome.

(setup null 8.5 plant life deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.8 trucks (red cast baseplate titanium hanger), venom bushings (88a big one no washer, 91a small one flat washer), spitfire f4 classic shape 99a 50mm wheels, new balance numeric 212 mustard size 11.5, footprint mid elite insoles)
(pain level 4/10 mostly the cold causing the problems)

I had about an hour to kill before an old guy curb session I brought LGJ out to a dry asphalt parking lot behind the research center by Foothills Parkway. I wanted to do at least 10 ledge tricks in an hour. It sounds easy, but LGJ is hard. Sorry I forgot to take a photo again. I am not good at quick ledges. Especially when they aren’t short. I started off terribly. Oh yeah, I had a new board. A 303 CLFX deck since I’m out of 8.25s and I want consistency these days. I had new wheels too. Spitfire 52mm F4 classic shape. I am hoping I this wheel flips faster than the radial slim and I like them this time around so I can stick with it. I should find a better parking lot, but this one worked. I got boardslide, noseslide, noseslide to fakie quick. Front board. Almost a couple good front noseslides, but instead I settled for a really bad one. I tried to do a line of fakie flip, halfcab noseslide, b/s flip. I got all the tricks, but the halfcab noseslide was super hard for some dumb reason. I had put a plastic pad under LGJ and it helped prevent it from sliding away. Got a switch front nose or too, switch backside was hard I kept moving the ledge when I’d get in. I had a good slam trying fakie nosegrind. Got a couple incredibly slow front 50s. Lots of crooks, a crooks to fakie. Couldn’t get close to halfcab crooks. Got halfcab noseslide to fakie. Landed a terrible treflip.

Then went and met up with Eric, Saul, Ed, Jake at Glenn Close. Miles from Square State would randomly show up as well as a young kid. It was fun. The classic shape wheels definitely slappy easier than a more square shape. Since Jake was the first to leave I’ll start with him. He was going in on slappy shoves for awhile. I tried some too and we were looking for motivation so I jokingly said if we don’t get it in 5 tries were doing 20 pushups. We both did 20 push ups. Jake had bluntslide, may have gotten the slappy shove, frontside slappies, slappy crook shove. Ed has one stylee slappy and was ripping some energetic lines with pops off the curb cuts and manuals. He ended with such a good front slappy. We can all thank Saul for shoveling the spot earlier in the day. He bashed the scary spork deck into the curb for some good slappies both ways, did the hook, I think got slappy crook. Eric was on heelflip tip. Off the curb cut, over the tiny bank. He had a good slam off the curb cut on one. I’m not sure if he even hit the curb, but he did go for a few long manuals. Miles was fun to skate with. He had a mean kickflip and treflip. I had my normal slappy tricks, but couldn’t get slappy front feeble or the slappy shove. I came close to switch front 50. I was inspired to get a better treflip than earlier so I tried a line of front slappy (or slappy front crook) then a slow treflip. I needed to get going after that as did everyone else. Fun crew. Wish I would have taken a photo of all of us together.

(setup 8.25 303 clfx spirt deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.8 trucks (cast baseplate titanium hanger), venom 88a bushings, 52mm spitfire classic shape f4 99a, 3 washers on outside of wheels, new balance numeric 212 blue/gum size 11.5 stock insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

Snuck out for some lunch break fun on a gorgeous day to meet Dave across the street. It was a fun one. Since I was so sore I wore my 288s. It may have helped. I didn’t really try many flippers, but slappies went well. Dave got some really good slappy front crooks to fakie. I got some to regs. We tried to switch it up, but he couldn’t go to forward and I couldn’t go to fakie. Dave had an amazing slappy crooks or two. I got a few little switch slappy crooks to forward and followed one with a kickflip off the curb cut to the parking lot. I was doing some good regular slappies for me and trying to follow them with kick back tails, but never got it. Dave was working on switch slappy front crooks and getting into them so good and grinding them. I didn’t see him land one, but he was there for awhile after me. He drove by me “working” on the front stoop shirtless soaking up the sun. Ha. That was a fun session.

Later on I went to Frederick to meet Skelly, Mike, Sean, Hayden and more. Donnie ended showing after awhile. The park wasn’t very crowded initially, but would get kind of crowded, and then totally clear out while we were there. I sucked it up. Like I can’t even describe how depressing this session was for me. There was only two things I did okay. I noseslid the bump to ledge easily and I did the pull up loop second try. Honestly the loop was the most fun thing I did all night. The 8.5 killed me all night. I couldn’t kickflip the hump and I couldn’t b/s flip the hip. I think it was less than a month ago I said to my friend Josh “I would rather skate a 7.75 than 8.5”. So how did I end up on 8.5 again? Well, blame the pandemic and the board shortage and my idiot self. I never got a nose manual, did some of the worst crooks of my life on the ledge, couldn’t halfcab noseslide. On top of that I was finally getting the slightest bit of confidence to back 50 the lowest ledge in the park and my wheel fell off. That was a sign I should have left, but did I leave? No. I did manage a slappy front crook on the bank to curb when Donnie showed. He was hyped on that. Sean was funny. He said “I don’t know if I can 50 this bump to ledge” then did it perfectly with the most casual style ever. He would go on to 50, ollie, 5-0 a lot. But he couldn’t f/s flip the Glen hip. Ha ha. It was great seeing Hayden skate a park again. It’s been too long. He rips everything. The alley oop fakie 50 down the corner qp was so good. Back smith, 5-0s, tailslides and blunt the bump to ledge, f/s flip the bigger hip, fakie 5-0 halfcab out the little ledge. Mike was charging. He always does. It’s been awesome skating with him again lately. Slappies, wallrides, wallies. Skelly popped some good ollies over the big hips, back 180s and almost bigspin the smaller ones. Donnie charges. Front 5-0 the steep wall, unreal slappy survival tricks on the yellow curb I can’t describe, showed up the BMXers transferring from bank to bank and so much more. Oh, near the end of the session after hucking a front heel over the little hip ( I had no business hucking, but that’s what I do when I don’t want to commit to tricks) I was going towards the manny pad and things felt really weird. I carved a little and knew exactly what happened. Yup. Broke my kingpin. A dude there said “It is not your night” and he was right. I had fun skating with people. I was hyped to see everyone ripping. But my god I did not skate how I want to in any way and it really depressed me.

(setup 8.5 null plant life deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.8 titanium with custom hollow cast baseplate, venom 88a bushings, 52mm spitfire F4 101a radial slim, new balance numeric 306 foy navy size 12, nike sb zoom air insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

Kevin and I rolled to Loveland hitting LOCO and Sk8 Ratz on the way before first hitting the awkard vectors of Loveland High. Kevin hadn’t been there before. I was wearing cupsoles to help the pain, old PJ 533s. They felt good until later on. Loveland high was kind of whatever. We tried some stuff, but nothing really stuck. I got remotely close to a frontside cab over the hip, slappy crooks from the driveway onto the pad, beanplant into the bank and the lucky first try 5-0 on the round bar we found. Kevin had some fast ollies up the curb to noseslide the curb, switch back 180 the hip, a bunch of ollies and then tried that line for a while with the pop shove. He got robbed.

We went to the nearby skatepark next. Kevin destroyed the ledges. Him and my skating were night and day different. I kept doing 5-0s instead of 50s. I had some okay crooks, the terrible front 5-0 shove, kickflip over the hip and close to b/s flip over the hip. I was quite unhappy with my ledge skating. Another skater showed and asked to play SKATE. I said yes and another dude joined and we played a couple fun games of SKATE that Kevin won. I was out quick in the first game on Kevin’s round of switch/nollie flips. The second game I did pretty well and matched a few tricks like heelflip, varial flip, halfcab flip and was only at SK with everyone at SKAT. I should have ended with fakie bigflip, but instead I took two turns trying 360 flip (landed on both at least) and by then it was over. I was hyped to do a front 360 even though it turned out I was supposed to do it switch. Those games were fun. Then we headed to Sean’s.

(setup 8.38 null plant life deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 custom hollow baseplate v-hollow axles, stock bushings, 52mm bones stf 103a v1, new balance numeric 533v2 PJ grey size 13, thin xero insoles)
(pain level 5/10)

After an insanely busy day at work I went to an old spot with a new complete on a really hot day. I put some wax on the ledge, but it just melted. So I kind of avoided the melted area and did stalls. I should have rub bricked it. But stalls were fun and I noticed the bigger wheels helping me get up on it. I had done some axle stalls and went in on some more. Front tails felt cool and since it was a stall why not shove out. Kickflip axle stalls didn’t really work, but still felt cool. Flip tricks went okay, nothing special though.

(setup 8.38 null plant life deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.8 92 custom hollow baseplate, stock bushings, 54mm spitfire f4 99a radials red/yellow swirl, new balance numeric 306 foy b/w size 12, thin 533 insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

Another day wearing glasses and trying to avoid sunlight I went to campus before work for some flatground.  I went to the flagstone ledge area and mostly hid in the covered area.  I downloaded some random skate dice app to use as a warm up.  It did some basic tricks to start with like nollie back 180, switch shove, helipop, etc.  It was fun.  Then I tried halfcab flips for way too long before getting a couple really slow ones.  I ollied onto the ledge after and came remotely close to dropping into cali grind on the sidewalk.  Took a while for heelflips too.  I hucked a lot of nollie/switch flips and were close to both.  Committed, but didn’t get my feet on.  Couldn’t get a treflip which is always depressing.  I think the tighter bushings I’ve been rocking hurt treflips.  Man did I even land anything else?  I did a crooks or two, noseslides.  Ended trying kickflip then front 50.  I got into a couple front 50s, but never grinded and landed one.  Argh.  I wasn’t too depressed when I left skating, but upon writing this I am. I really hated how my kickflips felt. I wasn’t popping the tail.

So after work I tried low trucks again. And I loved it. I warmed up with some slappies in between some longboarders then skated some flat on the side of the school. I had some new wheels and bearings too. Spits 51mm. They felt great. My kickflips felt sooo much better. I was 3-3 on heelflips at one point too. I had a few initial tricks that felt good, then kinda went downhill. I mostly hucked all kinds of tricks without really sticking to or landing much. It was fun though.

(setup 1 8.25 null archway deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.2 custom hollow cast baseplate v-hollow hanger then venture 5.2 lows, bones hard bushings, bones stf v1 51mm 103a, new balance numeric 212 b/w/yellow size 12, nb abzord insoles)
(pain level 3/10)    

After a long drive from Steamboat and some chilling at home I ended up at Southern Hills on a warm evening. I had put some new wheels on. I think the old 54mms proved they help me get up on things, but the wide ones were hard to flip. So I am trying some narrow 54s. STF 99a V3. They felt good on the disintegrating concrete at Southern Hills. I haven’t been there for awhile, there were pebbles everywhere, but the benches were in good shape as was the step. I did what I always do there, line things out. First one was pop shove, front 50 the step, noseslide to fakie a bench. Then kickflip, back 50 the step, front nose to fakie a bench. Fakie flip on flat, switch 180 to front 50 the step, crooks the bench. Ollie up the two, no comply 180 into the handicap ramp, switch noseslide a bench. Then the line that darn near killed me. Ollie up the two, kickflip into the handicap ramp, front 50 a bench. To my surprise I got most of the ollies up the two. It felt great, like the taller wheels were a cheat code or something. I was able to flip them too. I would try flippers on the way back or at the start of lines. Got first try halfcab flip, treflip in under 10 tries, super close to nollie flips. I would get into a few front 50s, but not land them. I was so tired I guess from the drive. Anyway, I would eventually land the line and it felt awesome. Like really awesome. I know it’s just a front 50 on a normal size ledge, but that is a battle for me these days. I wanted to also try a line of halfcab noseslide, frontside flip, switch crook on the step, crook the bench, but I couldnt get the halfcab noseslide. I hucked a few front heels that were really close and felt good. I got a little switch crook to forward followed by crook on a bench and it made me feel good so I left on that note. Fun motivated session even if I was overly tired for some reason.

(setup 8.3 null spanbauer pro deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.8 cast baseplate titanium hanger, bones medium bushings, 3 washers inside each axle, bones stf 54mm v3 99a, new balance numeric 288s navy, no insoles)
(pain level 2/10)

A little after 9am on a Sunday I went over to the school as Dave F said he was gonna be there with a friend. Tony. He was cool. Total surfy style going fast on slappies. I had a new board and wheels – Enjoi Wallin deck with Franky Villani graphics and Spitfire F4 51mm radial slims. It’s crazy how good the F4s felt compared to what I’ve had recently (blanks and classic formula). Those guys were already warmed up and trying feebles on the double sided curb. Dave had a nice front board. Tony did a rad noseslide over the drainage hole. I had some okay slappies. I had put the lows on again with a riser. They flipped nice. After awhile we were mostly at the hook area. Dave and Tony were doing amazing noseslides through it. I slowly worked up to some front slappies through it and they were so incredibly fun. Tony ollied the gap to the sidewalk a few times. Dave would end up doing a no comply over it. I was trying to line out, flip trick, slappy, gap. I got halfcab flip then front slappy, but missed the ollie. Then I did one of the best fakie bigflips I’ve done in awhile, got a questionable front slappy and missed the ollie again. Then I took awhile to do a switch front 180 up the curb cut then kickflip off, missed the front slappy but still rode away then tried a no comply flip over the gap, but didn’t get it. Fun morning.

Then I met up with Garrett and Jack and we met up with JJ, Sean, Jeff, Ryan, Cass, Ted, Joe, Brian and probably more I’m forgetting. We went to that new ledge school on Tejon. Well, the old school with the knobbed rail that now has tons of ledges. People were hitting the ledge over the gravel gap. I felt very out of place, and failed at noseslides forever. Jack casually did front tail front heel and back lip shove. Sean did a bunch of front tail variations, but not the one he wanted. Garrett did crooks and crooks fakie quick, but no halfcab noseslide nollie flip. JJ tried to run into the wall. Jeff did nose manual nollie flip and a textbook switch tre. Man it ruled seeing Jeff skate again. Joe did the slowest and most chill back 50 ever. It made me jealous.

Then we went down the block to skate a bank to rail. But Ted and I got distracted by this and stayed there for awhile. Okay a long while. I never got the boardslide, I was skating so timidly. Ted front 50’d it. Cass joined after awhile and got close to the boardslide, but like me struggled with how inconsistent that side was. Jeff would show up and front 50 it casually. Then Brian showed up who I haven’t seen in forever. He looked as good as ever on the board even though he apparently hasn’t been skating at all. He front 50’d it then went on to front 50 to front board like Ted did.

Last we went to the steep stadium bank. I dropped in once or twice near the top then Garrett was ready to go so I started filming. It took awhile but he got a Janoski flip! It was sick. Joe and Brian tried some tricks too, but never got their feet on them. That was the day. I felt terrible after, I guess the heat got to me. Argh.

(setup 8.25 enjoy wallin, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.2 awake lows, 1/8″ riser, 3 washers inside each axle, 51mm spitfire f4 radial slims 101a wheels, new balance numeric 306 foy blue size 12, nike sb zoom insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

On a nice morning I had gone for long walk then decided to skate flat. It was still pretty early, around 10am. I was armed with a list of 15 tricks. I wasn’t limiting myself to a certain amount of tries, but if I wasn’t close at all I would stop around 10 tries. I had warmed up with a few kickflips and was skating the 8.25.
Halfcab flip – came quick and felt good
Backside flip – took close to 10 tries
Fakie bigflip – around 12 tries
Heelflip – came quick
Halfcab heel – didn’t get it, but it was close and I committed.
Front heel – not close. Feels doable, but never committed
Treflip – got a really bad one 20th try.
Nollie varial flip – can’t land this to save my life anymore
Switch flip – not very close
Switch heel – they flipped really well, but never committed
Varial heel – committed, got close, but never landed on the grip
Switch tre – not even remotely close
Frontside flip – got a decent one for me, but it was really slow
Nollie bigflip – not as close as I hoped
Heelflip body varial – the last trick was originally rick flip, but I swapped it for this one to try and get Dave a trick. I was close before I turned on the camera, and not that close once it was on. Doh.

After lunch I went to Rocky Mountain to meet the Daves. Max and Will would come about 30 minutes after us. The parking lot was almost completely wet from the melting snow. The drains from the roof sounded like rivers. The sidewalk was mostly dry except the ledge area which now had a pretty water gap added to it. It would let up later on and sound more like a babbling brook. Max laughed at that and said I should crook over the babbling brook. Ha. I did a little line of kickflip up the curb then noseslide to fakie over the water gap. Dave L was doing some good manuals. He had a nose manual that bonked off a grate then back to nose manual. Dave F had the sickest boardslides to fakie over the water gap and skates the banks like they are doable. Max and Will are on another level. They were doing really hard tricks immediately. Max had b/s flip over a median on the bank, ollied the bank flat gap, slammed super hard on front heel over a median, did a lot of manuals/nose manual spins on the median that shouldn’t be possible, back tails over the water gap so much more. Will was a little more low key, but was killing it too. Front 3 over a median, back tail the water gap. I’m forgetting other tricks right now, which is a shame. I managed to cleanly ollie onto the narrow ledge by the entrance. It hyped me up. I failed at crooks over the water gap. I blame my new wheels, narrow trucks and lack of skill. Dave had a nice front 50 over it as we were leaving. I wish my legs didn’t lock up at the end so I could have tried too.

(setup 8.25 null curby deck, venture 5.6 v-hollow trucks, stock bushings with flat top washer, 53mm purple swirl orb wheels classic shape, new balance numeric 288s jack curtain size 11.5, no insoles, incrediwear knee sleeve)
(pain level 5/10 – it was fine playing skate early, but gradually more sore at the school)

On a really nice day I met Kevin at Broomfield park by 11. It was just us there initially, but it would fill in quickly. I felt pretty blah and rusty and it stayed that way. Kevin chipped his brand new deck right away. He did switch manual before I ollied. I got a fakie nosegrind pretty quick, but other then that I stunk it up and felt bummed. I had a few crooks, switch front noseslides, couldn’t halfcab noseslide, didn’t land much for flippers. Kevin ripped although took longer than normal to get tricks like nollie nosegrind, back tail. After awhile Sean showed and we went over to Emerald. Kevin quickly went to work on crooks bonk. I lined out a dorky noseslide to fakie then creepy spin over the ‘hip’. Also got a nollie front bigspin (dave’s latest challenge), but I gotta do it on something better. Sean worked on back 3s. Kevin did nollie cabs, Janoski flip. Fuzz showed. Sean did a crazy ollie. Then we chilled. Great seeing Fuzz again.

(setup 8.25 null curby deck, venture 5.6 cast baseplate with v-hollow hanger, venture white bushings no bottom washer and bones flat top washer, 51mm bones stf v1, jessup ultra grip, new balance numeric 306 foy white/gum size 12, nike sb zoom air insoles