Whoa, Ollie wanted to go skate! I mean it was still my suggestion to go skate, but he was down! We went to the Valmont area. We started at a super mellow bank. Ollie did first T fakie pop shove and after watching me do a no comply bigspin almost landed a no comply. He didn’t get is front foot back on, but for never having tried that trick it was pretty crazy. I tried a little line of nose manny on a weird curb high manny pad that I had to go in an 90 and turn out real quick. Took me awhile. When I didn’t land it I would try nollie f/s flips on the way back and got somewhat close. Then Ollie started doing the coffin run you see above. He would do that to the mellow bank, stand up and try pop shove to fakie. He got it near the end. I started trying a line of front 180 off a loading dock, fakie flip on the downhill and then fakie tre on the bank. I managed to get it although the fakie tre had both hands down. I was most hyped on the fakie flip as it was downhill which was scary for me. Next run I went for was ollie up the loading dock, front 180 on flat, fakie tre. Didn’t get fakie tre. Last line was manual on the sidewalk up top, a fast kickflip (or not so fast depending on your standards) and then a treflip fakie. Didn’t get the treflip. We got back to the car and ollie threw tennis balls into the trunk while I tried treflips over and over until I landed a bad one.

New board with Jack quote regarding Trick Factory and how we suck now.

And new shoes! Vox Duece in “steezy light gray” (Josh Steele). While I waited for Dean and Carleigh to show I skated flatground for awhile. I was feeling super clumsy initially with my new stuff. That and it takes me a long time to warm up anyway. I had fun though, posed some nollie/sw flip variations that I’ll never land. Landed a 3 flip poorly. Dean ended up going on a photo shoot for a bit so Carleigh and I checked out a ledge spot that ended up not being accessible. So we went downtown.

We started at St Julien. Pictured above in high quality smart phone greatness. For those that don’t know, the far side of the ledge isn’t as tall as this side, it’s only a few inches tall. We started with the typical ollies down. I found a box and we put it on the ledge on it’s side. Carleigh ollied it first t. I took 3 tries. Then we put it upright as Dean showed up. Carleigh committed the most times, but bonked the box a little every time. I managed to ollie it once. I would love to see a photo of it because I’m sure it was rocketed as can be. If only I could level out ollies I wouldn’t have to ollie so high. Ha, I was sincerely hyped though. Dean kinda went off for awhile. Front 180s up and down. Ollie up to stall transfer on the far side. No complies. It was rad. Carleigh and I got some front tailslides on the ledge. By “slides” I mean we each only got one ledgit (get it? ha) slide each. And by “ledgit” I mean just a few inches. Dean had some good 50s and tailstalls. We had some up the ledge, turn around, down the ledge lines. Dean front 180’d up over the tall part like it was nothing. I could barely ollie up it, but I did manage to turn around and back 180 it (with lots of pivot and tic tacs).

We left and went to a nearby covered yellow curb spot at a bank. Carleigh mostly chilled as she had just finished a big school project and was tired. Dean and I started with front 50s around the corner curb. Super fun. Then tried some tricks off the curb. I got a line I was hyped on of ollie onto the curb through the narrow opening, front shove off the curb, kickflip a crack to grate gap, front 50 around the corner curb. Super hyped. At this point I started to realize just how great I felt skating. Probably the best I’ve felt since the crazy reactive arthritis started back in October. So hyped. I got a few back 50s around the curb corner which was hard with the crack where it is. Dean was coming super close to kickflips off the curb and no complied a median. I tried another line of kickflip off the curb, manual a median then kick back tail. Didn’t get the last trick. Almost a first try line of front 180 off the curb over a flower pot, f/s halfcab flip (more like a quartercab flip) then kick back t. Messed up the kbt again. Dean left so I just settled into slow kick back tail attempts and ended up getting one eventually. It even slid a little bit. Super hyped my body is letting me skate. And a nice topper on the evening was watching the Nuggets beat the Lakers. Didn’t expect that.

Carleigh and I stopped at Crisis for a minute to tell Fuzz we’d be at a nearby bank spot. Both of us thought we’d be tired and not really capable of much, but both of us seemed to skate pretty good initially. I did a bunch of different stalls on the bank to lower stair. Most of them first try even. Carleigh kickflipped the grate on the sidewalk and ollied into the bank. I dorked around for the most part (imagine that). Then it started to rain. We tried a few more things. I slammed trying to wallie up the two a bunch. I ollied my gatorade bottle a few times and manualled this weird little cement corner. Did a f/s flip on the bank with a couple tic tac’s. Then the rain really set in and Fuzz showed. Dinner time.

After a fun morning watching Ollie’s flag football game (He got MVP proud papa alert!) and celebrating with him I met up with Carleigh mid afternoon. She has been finishing up a crazy project for school so didn’t have much free time either. I had thought of a spot I saw on her blog awhile ago, but hadn’t skated. It’s a school out on east Araphoe. It’s got a bunch of curbs, some hard to skate ledges and some gaps all packed into a small little area. I loved it. Carleigh was getting kind of pissed initially, but things worked out. I can’t believe how hard it is for me to ollie up 3 curbs in a row. I was hyped to manual the main ledge though. It has kind of a tall drop so coming out of manny was something for me. After some messing around Carleigh insisted on filming me try a dumb trick. Gap to axle stall to manny. I never got it. But I did get gap to axle stall then b/s flip off the next curb. I even tic tac’d like crazy out of it to make it dumber. After that I filmed Carleigh get a banger line. Ollie up the curb, boardslide the ledge to big drop, kickflip off a curb. Hyped we filmed after all.

Got out of work early on a super warm and sunny Friday afternoon. Carleigh had suggested St Julien and I suggested Boulder ditch. After some indecisiveness we ended up at the liquor store with a six pack of wine coolers (Mikes Hard Cranberry!!! ha ha) and went for Boulder ditch. There was a new qp on top of the ditch aimed right at the flat bar which is kinda pointless. It’s also missing some layers in spots so it’s kinda scary to drop in on, but super fun to do so. We took it easy for a bit. Carleigh got a bunch of boardslides on the bank to ledge. So good. Jack and Dean showed up. Jack proceeded to slam from as high as he could straight to his elbow. It looked HORRIBLE. He then went on to kill it all over the place. Crooks 3 shove out on the bank to ledge was ridicurous. Back T, back willy (ha), back hurricane, maybe back smith too. Dean got a boardslide on the bank to ledge. He worked at it for awhile, but the one he put down was super clean and easy looking. I got a little run of axle stall on the taller qp, tiny ollie over the hip, then horrid noseslide on the bank to ledge. I also got front rock on the taller qp with a quick kickflip to fakie on the hip. I’ve done that once before. So fun. I struggled with front D for awhile and eventually got it. Stoked! Then I checked my phone and realized I was way late for dinner with the family. Doh. Liz and I had a few drinks that night as they all watched a movie and I watched the Nuggets beat the Lakers. Fun day! Carleigh might have some photos eventually ..

In a good mood and not super tired for once. Dropped off some stuff for Max and Jack at Meta then rolled into campus. Omi was at the hill ledges (imagine that). I said I, he said hi, then he did a long noseslide on the bottom ledge and I moved on. I did some carves/warmup pumps (yeah I kind of have to do that these days) on the little curb cut down the hill about two buildings. After that I got into a zone of trying a line down the sidewalk. Fakie ollie up, halfcab flip, b/s flip off. I struggled with every trick involved. I tried going faster than normal for the fakie ollie and you know how speed and me get along. I got the line twice, but the first time every trick was so bad I even I couldn’t count it. The second time the b/s flip was the only trick that I felt wasn’t up to par. But I hit a rock right before I ollied and somehow still landed it so I left it at that laughing. I was dorking across the way on an angled loading dock trying to do side rock ‘n roll kickflip out when Max, Sean and Dean showed up. Max offered me $20 in five tries. Got it on the fifth try! Getting paid yo! In reality though Max bought a board and he owed me $20. Ha. After that I ollied the crappy crack ridden 3 stair above it and did the side rock flip out again (way less perfect this time). I wanted to do flippers and forced myself to land a treflip in this weird section of sidewalk. It took a long time and I put a hand down on the landing. Oh well. Last stop was the hill ledges for a it. Did front 5-0 on the top one, back noseslide on the downhill one and tried to 50 the bottom one, but couldn’t gather the motivation/courage/pop to get on a normal sized ledge. Ha. I had a blast though. The weather was great, even a little humid and it felt good to be out skating, sweating and listening to some good tunes.

A little breezy, but otherwise a perfect night out. There was a big crew going to Broomfield, but I couldn’t get into the idea of a crowded skatepark on such a nice night. Carleigh was down to skate local too so I picked her up and we went to the 30th & pearl bikepath ledge/little bank spot. Warming up didn’t take forever. That ledge is really fun to noseslide. It’s a downhill ledge, backside for reg footers. Somewhat quickly I got a noseslide on the ledge then kickflip fakie (kind of a b/s flip) over the little hip below. Fun. Carleigh went straight to tailslides. She got quite a few good ones. She even backed one up with a backside flip over the hip with an extra steezy carve around the circle art. So funny. I had some really bad back 50s. Some ok crooks. Got no comply big spin over the hip. Tried regular f/s bigspin, but didn’t get close. Last line was noseslide to fakie then fakie flip on the bank. Felt rad and I even pushed switch (horribly) in between. Before leaving I said we should do 5 flatground tricks. I started with shoves both ways. Carleigh struggled with kickflips for about 5 tries then landed one and world peace was restored. She went on to do fakie flip, shoves both ways, halfcab flip and close to b/s flip. Sick! I added heelflip, treflip (took awhile), f/s halfcab flip and fakie bigflip. Fun session.

I could lie and say I just felt like skating flatground, but no, after watching this a few times I wanted to skate flatground. Both these dudes kill it, but as you all know PJ is one of my favorites. Ok ok, my favorite. This game hyped me up a lot. This might only be the second time I’ve skated flat for real since the whole tendonitis experience and rehab. It started slow, but went decent. I had my ear phones in which totally helps solo sessions. I started with the basics, tried to skate a little faster than normal which led to a great feeling heelflip, but lost steam when I got stuck on treflips. Took a long time, but I ended up getting a good one. Fakie bigflips are still super fun. Then started battling nollie treflip as the only trick I normally kind of have that I haven’t done since the arthritis kicked in in October. I got one! Was super hyped on it. Then went inside and watched Harry Potter with the kids, ate a lot of popcorn and stayed up too late waiting on word from Dean that Four was uploaded to proofread.

Carleigh, Fuzz and I went to the 303 warehouse on a beautiful night that would eventually turn to rain as we skated and skated. We met up with Darren, CJ and a guy who’s name I forget. When we first got there the miniramp was all that was skateable. Those dudes were killing it. The were working on tricks like back tailslides, back smiths and other tricks I can’t touch. I felt really disoriented and dizzy. It was weird. It went away though. I got a few of my basics on the ramp. And by a few I lterally mean like 3 tricks total. Fuzz ripped. Carleigh what seemed like a good warm up run and few runs, but then she disappeared into the corner and stayed quiet the rest of the night. After awhile we moved to the limited options on the street course. Basically roll down the bank, kickturn then a trick on the bank, bank to curb or ledge. Darren was getting roudy. He was getting into back noseblunts across the lower one. He was sliding them. He kind of even landed one with one foot. It was amazing. He’s killing it. Fuzz and I more skated the bank to ledge for stalls. It’s way harder to skate than it looks. I tried a bunch of kickflip 50s which are normally easy on stuff like this. I gave up and went for some easier tricks like front 50 stall, front smith, front tail, back fitty before eventually getting a kickflip 50. Felt good. Fuzz had some cool around the world staple gun combos on the bank, front pivot 270 out. Near the end we tried some kickflips at speed which was fun, then Darren and Fuzz started the kickflip, heelflip, treflip game. Darren was first with an extra revert on the treflip. Ha. I never got them all, but I did manage a couple good treflips for me and some other flippers. It felt great to land those treflips. Funny how we can skate an entire park and my favorite thing is the flatground. Maybe that isn’t funny, maybe it’s a problem. But it is what it is. Overall a fun night except for Carleigh not having a good one.

Jason showed up at my house to get some DVDs to review for Four magazine. He heard that Carleigh and I were interested in skating Valmont for a bit and he wanted to come. AWESOME! President Obama was giving a speech at CU and after picking up Carleigh we somehow managed to be the last car on the road before the Obamacade. It was pretty epic. Jason drives pretty slow and we were laughing that we were gonna get run over. We ended up getting almost to Valmont loading dock before finally having to pull over. We watched him roll by. Pretty sure he saw us waving.

Going to Valmont with Jason was a trip down memory lane. This was one of our favorite spots with so many great sessions. My arthritis was kicking a bit, but there was no way I was going to complain. Jason chilled out, shot some phone photos and used the loading dock to stretch in ways that he hasn’t been able to in months. It was inspiring to be there with him. I warmed up with some noseslides and front board attempts, but never got one (poser photo #1). You can see Carleigh in the background. She warmed up the hard way trying to ollie all the sets of cracks coming down the ramp.

After that Carleigh started skating flat like I’ve never seen her before trying tricks I’ve never seen her do. She landed on both b/s flip and halfcab flip, but didn’t quite ride away. I was hyped to see her trying new stuff (although I guess she has landed a halfcab flip once).

I love doing my little crook jibs here. I tried a bunch where I’d push up to the curb to the right of the fence (see Carleigh’s photo above) and try front smith stall kickflip out. I got really close. I had a few bad halfcab noseslides in there too and some back 50s where I come in at 90 angle. Jason told me I should stand up more on my crooks so I tried. Kinda hard, may have gotten one.

Apparently I’m too old to ollie up onto the taller part of the ledge now and land a trick (poser photo #2). Oh well. I setup a little pallet to ollie over and Carleigh and I tried some lines. She ollied it then did noseslide shove real quick. I tried ollie then front 50 shove and never quite got it. Carleigh got close to some kickflips over the pallet, but kind of lost her mind at the end. Doh. That was the end of the evening anyway. Seeing Jason for so long was awesome.