Went up to my Mom’s house in Buena Vista because my brother was in town. We got up super early, ate breakfast, then went out, got some caffeine and dropped my mom off at a quilting class. Steve knew I would want to skate the park with him a little so he didn’t even try to skip it. We had fun. I had brought an extra board for him to skate and he made due. He carved around the park quite pretty good for only skating a couple times a year and trying to act older than me. Other then a carving around his only trick was a little 50 on a weird corner thing (yes that really is the best description of it). Click here for the quicktime of it!

I forgot to mention how cold it was. 18 degrees. With the sun it didn’t feel that cold, but when the wind would pick up, brrr. I was still really sore from the long red curbs session with Dave, but I knew I wouldn’t have much time to skate so I tried to get it all in. I bet the kids in Buena Vista were hyped on this rainbow rail until they realized the would have to drop in on a kinked vert wall to get to it. It was really fun to grind over though. And considering I gave up grinds on flat bars a long time ago it made it even more fun. Maybe I should try again. I found some little lines in the park cruising around. Here’s a movie I didn’t know my brother was taking (otherwise I would have done a frontside invert). For all the stuff that’s packed into that park the small tranny section really is hard to keep speed. My favorite line was a little front scratcher on the noping wall behind Steve above, roll into the roll in, pump over the roll in hip, slappy the rainbow rail, then front rock the little qp above it.

This one took me a bit. Front 50 that I would turn to front tail then drop in. It’s the only ledge in park (there is a backside one too). It has square coping and it’s really weird to go into tranny off square coping. The funniest thing is this wasn’t the only tranny with square coping. Whack. Some of it is even placed level so you grind on a corner of it (like a diamond). Anyways, this was pretty frustrating, but the only real trick I did.

Last thing I really tried was a little scratch grind on this wall. I think it goes to vert. I carved tile a bunch, and got the wheels halfway onto the pool coping, but couldn’t quite get a grind. Doh. My brother took the photo with my delay ridden phone and that’s the closest he got me to the top. I may have gone past my welcome as Steve was wanting to go pretty bad so I finally left.

I’ve finally skated the Buena Vista Skatepark. Yippee. My review of it is a 3/10. The reality is it sucks pretty bad considering todays skatepark standards in Colorado. Square coping on tranny? Whack. Kinks all over the place. I can’t even imagine what the crash up derby factor is as we were the only ones there. No flow. The funny thing was two high school kids were skating the old park. In most ways the old one is better for beginner skaters so I could see them avoiding the new park. That and there is basically no street stuff at this park. And the few “street” oriented obstacle have tranny in it anyway. For a town that has no street stuff to skate I imagine the kids are pretty bummed. Well, the kids that want to skate anyway, I bet kids with BMX bikes are hyped.

Had a really tough day. Was busy at work and trying to finish up Brian’s front rock edit while at work. It was stressful, but it all worked out. I got out of work and headed to Crisis. Was gonna do some bidness, shoot the shit awhile then go to Lafayette park before Brian’s birthday dinner. But it started raining. Since when did it rain in Feb in Colorado? Oh well I’ll take that over snow any day. It was still cold though, in the upper 30s. I still had some time before dinner and decided to hit Red Curbs. Fullertron said he was down to skate there and a super fun session ensued. I got there first. I warmed up with mostly some slappys. Dave showed up. I got a line of slappy front tail, front lip, 360 flip on flat. Hyped! Dave went to work on slappy crooks and laid down some really good ones. He stands up on them way better than me. I tried kick front 50/5-0s for awhile. Got close, but no cigar. No kfbsts either. Dave had some good 5-0s, long boardslides to forward, fakie or 270 out. We hit the manny/grind corner section for awhile. It was fun. Dave did front 5-0 to nose manny. Manny to back 5-0. I got manny to tail (no slide), manny to front 50, nose manny to front lip (sketchy), manny to switch crook stall, back 50 to nose manual to slam my back on the edge of the curb. Ouch. We just kept on skating. Dave got 180 nose manual and switch 180 manual. I slammed on a 180 nose manual where I probably only had about half and inch left to manual. We wallied the rock once or twice. It was funny because Dave had to put some styrofoam in the rocks in front of the big rock as he was scared of the gap. He would end up getting it without the styrofoam in the end though. I might have wallied it in a line with a nose manual. I ollied some styrofoam boxes for a bit. Got kinda tall for me. I should try to ollie stuff more often. It’s hard. We skated a newly waxed short edge by a pillar for awhile. Dave got front lip and back 50. I got back 50, back 5-0 and a good slam. Dave tried halfcab boardslide combos for awhile while I tried kickflip up / b/s flip off. He landed a bunch. I didn’t get the b/s flip. That was pretty much it for me. A few more failed kfbsts. Dave was grinding the rougher curb (above) and got a back 50 back 180 out. Of course he was flying when he did it. Turns out we skated over 3 hours. Awesome.

Had a new board since I cracked mine really bad the day before. My first Null Future! I was hyped. I met Jack and Carleigh at one of my favorite spots in Boulder. We ended up skating there for a long time. Carleigh posted up some front tails and hucked some kickflip noseslides coming kinda close sometimes. I got a handful of tricks. Front 5-0 back 180 (90) out, weird kick back tail, kick back 50 almost front tail shove. Jack did a new trick, back 270 front tail to b/s flip out. Whoa! He also did a bunch of crazy stuff like nollie heel front noseslides. He also ollied above the ledge into wallride then four wheel drived out through the ledge as we were getting kicked out. So sick!

Then we ate, saw the new Meta and rolled over to the Wells Fargo mini qp where we would once again stay for a long time. My arthritis was pretty bad again and kickflips up the curb there were hard. Carleigh did a back tail and learned backside blunts. Sick! Jack did back noseblunt to fakie, a bunch of old guy tricks, pivot fakie, bigspin pivot, wallie 50, wallie crooks, whatever he wanted to do on his board. I had a line of slappy crooks, back blunt, slappy front tail. Tried a couple lines starting with kickflips up the curb, but never got front blunt or front tail shove out. I blame the big metal thing sticking up. Gonna go gluten free for awhile and see if it helps my arthritis.

On another nice February day in the 50s Ollie and I picked up Jason then headed out to Lafayette to meet Brian, Jake, Neil, SSK (Square State Kids), Fullertron and probably some more I’m forgetting. I didn’t feel like filming anymore and Brian totally understood. Ollie was in his typical shy stay in a corner mode or would just follow me around. We kind of messed around for awhile. Jake, Brian, Blake, Brandon, Alec and I did a six man front rock on the mini bank to curb. I punched Brian in the stomach on accident in the process. Ha. Blake was a good sport and filmed Brian for the most part rattle off another 10 or so front rocks. He was killing it again and took some super hard slams at the end trying to do a double front rock with Jake. Kudos Brian. Looks for the birthday montage soon. As far as skating goes I skated kind of ok, but was feeling very clumsy and arthritic. I dropped into the shallow end of the vert bowl a couple times. If only it wasn’t so slippery I would try to get tile on the vert. As it is though I just suck up all my speed and barely make it out of the waterfall. We sessioned the manny pad thing up top for awhile. Neil killed some front lips and front lips to fakie. I got a few tricks. Front 50 back 180, front 5-0 shove, manual. It sucks you can only skate it frontside. Grinding granite is really fun though. On the way back I got a couple treflps. Then I skated the double down section in the street course. Ollied the 3 then noseslide the hubba. Also got halfcab flip into the first bank, then noseslide the hubba. There was ice in the path of the frontside way so I couldn’t really hit that. I tried to get on in the flat, but didn’t have the pop to do it. Argh. It kind of bummed me out. At one point I tried to do a manual out of the little qp then boardslide the granite ledge, but I basically just ran into it and cracked my board really bad. Had to leave. Pretty fun session. Jason seemed to have fun watching. Trick Factory in effect. Oh yeah, I had new shoes. Lakai Brae. Neat. The Supras were some of the best shoes I’ve ever had, but had finally worn flat on the sole.

Up pretty early on a nice saturday. Played basketball with Ollie then hit 303 and met TF at Arvada park. The plan was for Brian to do 40ish birthday front rocks there then go to Lafayette. Jake, Lazer, Neil, Brian, Brett, Carleigh, Jack, big crew. But we were way out numbered by little kids on scooters and bikes. It was a joke. I played warm up for a bit as Brian was running late. Everyone seemed to be skating pretty good. Brett did a blunt shove to rock fakie on the little bank which surprised me. Jake got a noseblunt on it. I got a kickflip up the blue pod, kickflip off. Then I filmed for a long, long time. Brian rattled off most of them pretty quick, but the desired ender teased him for a long time before he had to finally call it quits. We ended up delaying Lafayette for later and I skated for awhile. Getting warmed up after a few hours of standing was tough. My side/back was wrecked. Riley’s homie Cale from Sioux Falls randomly showed up and we skated the small bowl. He destroyed it. Long 50s on the pool coping section and an insane switch front disaster. I did some grinds on the small steel coping section and one stupid front disaster. Then Carleigh, Jack and I started playing a game of SKATE on the blue pod bank that turned into us all just trying whatever we wanted. I was 2-3 on halfcab flips and started posing cab flips having wanted to do that trick for years and years. Some of them felt doable then out of nowhere it just happened. Lots of pivot, but no tic tac. Man I was so hyped it was crazy. Jack even laughed at my happy giggle. Then it was dinner with the entire crew.

After work I stopped by Chipotle and chowed a yummy chicken burrito. Then I stopped by SOL to skate the ramp for a bit before he closes, but ended up playing foosball instead. Then I went to meet John at the Street League park. Upon arrival it felt really cold and all of the warm up tranny had snow on it. Great. I was the only one at the park when I showed. I cruised around for awhile doing nothing but cali grinds and tiny ollies. John showed. A rollerblader showed. This was John’s first time at the gym (I mean skatepark) so he looked at all the stuff too big for us to skate. We finally started kinda messing around on the smaller bank to curb with noseslides. Rather then slide them I just did a few stalls to get comfy with it and then managed a couple with slides. Cool. Rather then get my back John moved on. He did some front shoves to fakie on the top bank then fakie ollies into the next bank. We both noseslid the bump to bench kind of and skated the long ledge on the far side of the park for quite awhile. I got front 50, front 50 front 180, front 50 back 180 out, back crooks, front 50 and 5-0 front shoves (way after John left though). John got into some front crooks. I got a couple noseslides down the smallest rail which is kind of more a ledge. John left. I had the park all to myself for awhile so I made myself ollie down the step up from the tall part and then do it in a line. Ollie up the bigger step up in the little section, turn around, ollie down the step up, then kickflip off one of the curb high kickers. It was dumb, but it hyped me up. Then Meta Colin showed up with a couple friends. One of which was destroying the park so hard. I tried a few dumb things, but never really did much until near the end when I did a crooks followed by a kickflip to fakie from one of the middle kickers down to the lower kicker. That hyped me up enough to do a treflip on flat and call it a night. It was like 22 degrees by this time. Brrr.

Haven’t skated with Brett in forever! I went out to Rampy before he showed to get warmed up a little and ended up skating Rampy harder then I have in awhile. Got lots of my tricks pretty quick. Brett showed and it’s always fun watching someone skate Rampy for the first time. He did pretty good actually. We had a pretty long/fun session. Lots of chatting catching up on things, but lots of skating too. He has a few of the b/s fakie pivot tricks like me. Tricks I was happy to get since it’s been awhile were fakie pivot fakie and hurricane. I tried halfcab to front feebles for awhile, but didn’t get very close. Near the end Brett hung up on a wall, took a step then dove into the other tranny hitting his head on the coping. It wasn’t bad, but whoa, sketchy.

I’m not sure what’s up or why, but I’ve been super motivated to skate lately. I’ve been watching more skate videos again, obsessing about it at work all day and planning my days better to feel less stiff and be ready to hit it. I love it when I’m in these type of zones. Skating is the best. Rather then hit Rampy to warm up I chose the “Watch Mark Suciu’s part in Sabotage 3 and do some jump rope” route. I had been thinking about this garage all day and even though it was only in the upper 20s I went there. As you can see the parking garage isn’t completely sheltered from the outside. It was above freezing though as there was some snow piles from cars that were melting kind of. Anyways, I wore my winter jacked and started off with more energy and speed then even I was expecting. After some parking block ollies and manuals my first line attempt was back 180 over a parking block, halfcab flip on flat then manual. Got it in a couple tries. Whoa. Was feeling so good the next line was switch front 180 a parking block, heelflip on flat, kick back tail the curb (top photo). Never quite got all three together, but did get all the tricks. Going back I would come close, but not land treflips or start posing a frontside halfcab flip front boards on the parking block in the middle photo. That is the main reason I was thinking about that garage. It’s a trick Jason told me to do years ago, but I’ve never tried it. It seemed doable. Another line I was trying was nose manny (middle photo), treflip, front tail shove. Never got the treflip. Ugh. It’s funny that part of my desire to switch to low trucks was to supposedly get better at treflips. Not the case so far, but everything else is going good. I posed the fs halfcab flip front boards a few more times then started committing to it (bottom photo). A few tries later I landed one. I giggled in stoke. It was incredibly slow and bad, but I don’t care. I wanted to try some more, but it added to the treflip crack in the middle of the board I already have going so I let it be. I went for some tricks over a parking block for awhile (top block in middle photo). Managed a few front shoves and one turned into a marathon line. Front shove, treflip, slappy front tail to fakie, halfcab flip, kickflip a parking block, bail something. I also got a fakie ollie over the parking block (although it was mostly at an angle), halfcab over, no comply over and technically a b/s flip, but it was more of a 90 flip, stop, turn the rest of the 180. By then I was getting kinda beat and just went over to the curb in the top photo and posed some weird tricks. Tried fakie bigspin front tail, but didn’t get very close. Front shove back 50. Kinda close to that one. Kickflip front tail. No where near that one. Back 180 nosegrind to forward. Not really. Fakie 50 b/s halfcab out. I’m not Connor. I posed some flip tricks too, but not much went down. It was getting really cold at this point and trying flippers in a bulky jacket isn’t all that fun. Either way though, incredible session. I should skate this hard every time I go out.

On a snowy night I went out to Rampy with the intention of skating about 20 minutes to warm up then go to a parking garage and skate flat. I struggled more then I thought I would and was reminded that Rampy is ridiculously quick. I didn’t really care though and went to leave, but Liz was said Ollie was really bummed out and wanted to watch the Nuggets game with me. I was pretty tired so fine with that. It was halftime though so I went out to Rampy and sessioned for another 20 minutes pretty hard. Didn’t land many more tranny tricks, but got a 3 flip on flat as Ollie opened the door to tell me the game had started again. Sweet.

After driving home from the mountains in some sketchy snow I took a brief break, watched Sabotage 3 then headed out to Valmont for a solo session in the night after such a warm day. I haven’t been here in awhile, but this spot is still amazing. I wanted to mostly skate the ledge and that’s what I did. Nothing came easy at all. I kept skating though. I only got a few tricks even though I skated almost 3 hours. Front 50, front 50 front 180 out, front 50 front shove out, front nose, front nose to fakie, halfcab back nose, back crooks, back nose, back nose fakie, crooks and back 50 (which was way too hard). Could not do front tail, came close to kick back 50. My favorite thing was going fast and ollieing up onto the ledge where the grate is then doing a front shove off about half way up. Although even that took a long time. I tried a bunch of flat ground. Nollie flips, nollie heels, nollie tres, none were even close. I got into a phase of trying fakie front 50 and when I would not land it I’d turn around and try varial heels. I landed on a couple of those that might count in a few months when I’m 40, but I’m not 40 yet. The fakie 50 took me forever, but when I got it I did f/s halfcab out, did a flatground heel then did the ollie up/front shove off thing. That made me feel good. I got a few 3 flips, b/s flips, fakie flips, heelflips, etc. I skated like crap, but I skated hard so I felt good when I went home.