On a nice day I went to dog park and met Rob, Dave and Ed. Warming up was pretty brutal. Especially because lots of talking was going on which was rad, but not the best for skating. I started to feel the effects of a big board which I think was more because I was quite tired and sore. Boardslides were fun as always. I’ll start with Rob since he bounced first. He definitely got into demo mode with some long lines. I was impressed with decked boardslides on the tall bench, crooks the new bench, back 50 back 180 out, ollie over wallie world, fakie bigs and a lot more I’m forgetting. It was rad seeing Ed skating. His ollies have so much pop and he gets his back leg up all good. He had good manuals, boardslide to fakie several parking blocks, rad tweaks off the little mountain launch ramp. I didn’t skate very good, but also not terrible. I was happy to get a first try front 50 to front board on the cinder block ledge, front 50s on the black angle iron ledge, halfcab noseslides felt way better with the big board, some okay crooks and slappy crooks, f/s halfcab flip but couldn’t get heelflip, treflip or halfcab flip. Dave continued his recent destruction with back 5-0 back 180 out, front 50 180 and 5-0 the beam, switch crook and front crook the cinder block ledge, sex change, long slappy feebles and much more. As we were winding down local ripper Andrew showed up and put on a demo that was fun to watch. Franky grind!

(setup 8.75 null spanbauer night deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 6.1 with stock bushings no big washer, spitfire 53mm conical full f4 99a red/blue, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12, footprint elite mid insoles)
(pain level 3/10)

Got to the Stephen Day park shortly after noon on a crisp day after a terrible night of sleep. Rob and Dave were already there, but had been chatting so we all started skating at the same time. Warming up seemed to go alright for everyone. Dave was right to tailslides over the hip. He would go on to do it switch which is pretty mind blowing. I tried to ride over the hip switch and pretend to go into tailslide. It didn’t even seem possible. Rob had manuals, no comply shoves. I started with a few things like tailslides over the hip and kickflips on the bank before posing ollies over the rail. I would get close and committed a few times, but never get too close. Rob did the cool nollie big then no comply 270 pretty quick. Dave did the line with switch front tail over the hip, cab kickturn, ollie to boardslide down the rail but I missed it. So he redid most of it then just the boardslide again. Rob and I chatted for awhile then he bounced and I had the park to myself for awhile. I did some selfie cam for a bit to get the stoke going again. Started with front tailslide over the hip, then halfcab flip on the bank. The halfcab flip where I fell really showed me the benefit of the wider board, I can’t believe I was even close to somehow riding away. I also tried a few fakie bigflips on the bank, but I would need a longer bank. The boardslide around the C is so fun. Then I made myself front 50 the C which is so scary to me. I did it in a line where I came back and halfcab noseslid the straight part of it. I also ollied up the tall rounded ledge once. Then I went in on the treflips. I did them all after nosesliding the bump to ledge. I would get 3 of them. The first felt great. Then I turned on the phone, did it again, but with a good tic tac. Then a 3rd time and it felt great. Some scooter kids had come and I somehow handled it rather well. Also another young skater who was really nice. Fun day, landing treflips hyped me up.

(setup 8.75 null spanbauer night deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 6.1 with stock bushings no big washer, spitfire 53mm conical full f4 99a red/blue, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12, footprint elite mid insoles)
(pain level 3/10)

On a very nice morning I arrived to an empty NorthGLENn park. Then Dave and a bus full of Square State kids arrived. It was fun though. Simon and Jake would show too. Then Brian with another bus of kids! I had a new setup:

8.75 Null Jack Night Skate deck, big Ventures and big colorful 53mm conical fulls (yikes!). Why a change after so long on 8.25? Because I haven’t been landing anything on 8.25 anyway so might as well ride a board that actually fits me and enjoy the ride more. It was funny how mad Dave got at the crowds. But it really wasn’t bad and getting to skate with Brian was awesome. My warm ups went decent considering my huge setup change. I did the kickflip on the bank and then noseslide pretty quickly, had some fun 50s both ways on the noping bank, enjoyed some hip ollies. Everyone seemed to be up in the handrail area so I joined. Jake did some solid no comply 180s into the first bank, front rock and pivot on the barrier. Simon boardslid the rail, to manual, to fakie, noseslide too. I think he did stuff on the barrier as well. Dave boardslid it then front boarded it, boardslide and feeble transferred into the bank and probably did tricks on the barrier too. Jake got going with bluntslide and noseblunt. I got stuck filming for awhile. Brian almost got some ride on bluntslides then the crazy dropin. Simon and Dave did all kinds of tricks on the noping bank. Daves crook fakie and Simon’s bluntslide rock fakie were so good. Dave also got switch front crook fakie (I think). Earlier on Dave had done one of the best lines I’ve ever seen him do. Feeble transfer into the bank, ollie the kicker gap, lipslide the top qp, back 180 up the euro, switch crook the bank. I tried a bunch of front feebles and only got one which didn’t really grind. Near the end I wanted to relive the blunt to back d on the little noping qp. Much to my delight I followed it up with a fakie hurricane. Dave did the 180 switch crooks and we bounced to Ambulance ditch where Dave did a quick hammer for Stubborns 2. I hucked nollie tres. Some of which felt totally doable. But Dave had to leave so we left after about 15 min.

I stopped by Broomfield park on the way home, but it was super windy and crowded. I went to the nearby Safeway ledge and it was somewhat protected from the wind so I skated. I thought I would be too tired, but I kept going and skated for a good hour. I made myself do 10 back 50s which took awhile considering how bad I’ve gotten at that trick. I also did front 50, front 5-0 (accidental of course), front 50 180, front smith stall, front tail stall, got into a few switch crooks, took too long to do nollie back tail and couldn’t get very close to kick back 50 with the big board. Long, fun day of skating.

(setup 8.75 null spanbauer night deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 6.1 with stock bushings no big washer, spitfire 53mm conical full f4 99a red/blue, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12, footprint elite mid insoles)
(pain level 3/10)

Some Saturdays I wake up feeling some weird pressure about skating. This was one of them. We were headed to the Springs with no real plans of where to skate although I had thought of two tricks I wanted down there. The gap to noseslide and the noseslide 270 shove in a line. Sean, Kevin and I went right to Manitou, but the shop was closed. So we ended up at the high school with the perfect long ledge, good flat and it’s the spot with the gap to noseslide I wanted to do. So the pressure mounted quickly and I just felt kind of weird. Sean and Kevin were getting it quickly with noseslides, crooks (Kevin), 50s. There was a weird wood object that worked perfectly as a wallride initially, then we rotated it for wallies. I didn’t have much success with flippers, but did noseslide, noseslide fakie and maybe a crooks jib on the ledge pretty quick along with some fun frontside bank rides. I couldn’t ollie up onto the ledge, but I did pose a few gap to noseslides which didn’t feel quite as possible as before. Sean’s back 5-0 was so good. We probably would have skated there a really long time, but Jake came and brought security with him. Ha, not really, but we did get kicked out right when Jake showed up.

So we drove halfway back home to meet Jack, Joe, Bo and Hayden at a school in the north part of the Springs. Jake was so bummed when we pulled in and it was a rail spot. I felt bad. So rather than go check out the rail Jake and I went to look at something we could skate. And we found a fun little loading dock area. I mean it’s not a destination spot, but it would offer some fun for the time being. Hayden, Sean and Bo would join us. It’s funny looking at a spot initially and then what happens after a few minutes of skating it. At first we just did tail drop springs off the loading dock into the “bank” (which was really almost flat). Hayden, Bo and Sean had some ollies up to manual that looked hard. I had a nose stall to fakie that was kinda fun. Sean and Hayden did the quick boardslide drops. We setup a wallride. Man Hayden had some super smooth wallrides. Jake and I ended up doing some fun lines. Mine is above. Just riding off that loading dock with speed was hard because of a crack, but it was fun. The wallie took me a few tries. Jake would go on to do it with a 180 wallie was was pretty sick. Then we went and watched the hammer fest on the rail which unfortunately ended with Jack hurting himself.

Then we went to Broadmoor ditch. That thing sucks. Ha. I tried nollie bigspins for a bit, then gave up and filmed. Joe would also get frustrated by not landing tricks. I don’t think Sean actually landed anything either even though he was close to a banger. Hayden quickly did halfcab, cab then battled beyond a cab for the sickness. Kevin would battle nollie flips to fakie forever followed by switch front 3. He was so close to giving up, but luckily he didn’t because he ended up doing it oh so good. Bo did a ride on front 5-0 then battled kickflip out for awhile. And he was really really close! Then we had dinner. I got home late and sad about how terribly I skated, but had fun with friends.

(setup 8.25 null spanbauer deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 cast baseplate v-hollow hanger, bones medium little bushing ace big bushing, spitfire f4 52mm tablet shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12 with footprint mid elite insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

With rain in the forecast I met up with Sean and Rob around 10:30 at Broomfield park. For the most part it was actually pretty nice and warm until the end. I was sore from a hard workout in the morning, but after some warming up felt pretty good. Rob and Sean were already ripping. We did some talking about the King Sooper tragedy, but got to skating. I’m not much in the writing mood, but I will say that Rob did a first try front 50 to front lip and it was awesome. He also had a lot of his normal trick like crooks, halfcab noseslides, fakie bigspins followed by nollie shoves, front tails, back 50 180, super steezy no comply back 360, kickflip, cab, back 3. Sean was landing lots of flippers. He would do some other stuff, but mostly tried a line of kickflip nose manual then nollie back heel then fakie back tail then switch heel. He would do it, but not to his liking. He would get it again, but not to his liking. Ha. Then he settled for halfcab nose manual first and did it. It’s weird, I really didn’t so much. I landed some of my flippers and I did some of my ledge tricks, but not many. After Rob left Sean and I played a game of SKATE which ended up being fun. I had thought about calling it a day, but glad we kept at it. Sean got me with halfcab heels, back heel, nollie back heel and treflip. Argh, treflip again! I had gotten a couple letter on him, but it was a fluke like halfcab flip. Then we tried our lines over and over rotating with our phones. Sean got his line first. I got mine kind of. I hadn’t done fakie front smith fakie in a long time, so that felt kinda cool. But seeing the footage I look like someone that doesn’t know how to balance on a skateboard. Sigh. Thank you skateboarding for being able to distract me temporarily from the stupid mass shooting near my hosue.

(setup 8.25 null spanbauer deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 cast baseplate v-hollow hanger, bones medium little bushing ace big bushing, spitfire f4 52mm table shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12 with footprint mid elite insoles)
(pain level 3/10)

After struggling for motivation because of the shooting Dave got me going and I met him at Frederick. As I rolled through the nearly empty park I saw Dave do kickflip to fakie then sex change on the mellow bank. After a quick hello he also did varial flip to fakie! 3 tricks in a row, pretty amazing. My warm up was whatever. I didn’t skate bad, but never quite got a nose manual. Had some fun crooks, switch front nose slides. Dave was doing some rad ride on tailslides on the C ledge. He did that awesome dump truck 180 transfer. I attempted to line out the b/s flip over the hip with kickflip on the steep bank and noseslide the bump to ledge. But didn’t get the kickflip. The noseslide was fun though and the b/s flip felt really great. Sean showed up. We all chatted about the shooting and just how terrible it is. Dave was doing slappy front 50s to fakie. I was trying front heels on the mellow bank until I got one. Sean warmed up with kickflips to fakie. Then Dave left. I fizzled out. Sean did a sick line of the front 5-0 to 180 nose manual, front 50 up the escalator ledge, front nosegrind a hubba. Then I was like “hey Sean think you could ollie this?”. Well, yes, he can.

In some special news today marks one month with no real setup changes 🙂

(setup 8.25 null spanbauer deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 cast baseplate v-hollow hanger, bones medium little bushing ace big bushing, spitfire f4 52mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12 with footprint mid elite insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

After a frustrating day trying to find motivation after the tragic events near my house I figured some anger management slappies were in order. And boy did it deliver. I skated about 45 min. The first 20 I did nothing but slappies and they felt great. Just charging into concrete and not really trying tricks. Then I started doing some lines and flippers. My board felt really good, flip trick were coming easy. Kickflip, fakie flip, f/s halfcab flip, b/s flip, heelflip and even treflip all within a few tries. I hucked a few front heels that felt close. Also nollie big heels. It was a fun session that lifted my mood.

(setup 8.25 null spanbauer deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 cast baseplate v-hollow hanger, bones medium little bushing ace big bushing, spitfire f4 52mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12 with footprint mid elite insoles)
(pain level 2/10)

On another cold day with flurries I met Sean at the puddle riddled dog park. I was trying to channel the anger towards the shooting into skating. It kind of worked. At times I skated hard with more drive than I’ve had in awhile. Sean was stuck on front nosegrinds on the new bench which was funny because he ended up doing like 20 in a row. He was trying lines to bump over the orange barrier. He would eventually get front 5-0 180, fakie nosegrind, halfcab manny the crack pad, kickflip a parking block, then heelflip from the decked wedge over the orange barrier. Sick line! I had got one that sounds pretty good on paper. Crooks the new bench, front 5-0 the cinder block, ollie the wedge to barrier. I would later almost get crooks, front 50 180, halfcab flip, ollie the barrier. But I had taken a weird turn and didn’t really have the speed for the ollie and kind of did the classic Glen of wallieing up and down. Some flip tricks had worked like fakie bigflip and halfcab flip. I took too long to get a halfcab noseslide. Not sure how that trick has gotten hard for me. At times I really wanted a bigger board, other times was super happy with the 8.25. Sean made himself get 4 heelflips over the barrier which wasn’t always easy with the breeze. I got into a couple switch crooks on the cinder block that would have made my day. Sean and I ended with a game of SKATE just before the snow started up again. It was one of my better games in awhile. I got kickflip, fakie flip, halfcab flip, f/s halfcab flip, 360 flip, defensive fs flip, bs flip, but since I was playing Sean I clearly still lost. He got me with halfcab heels both ways, back heel, back big and ended me with switch front shove.

(setup 8.25 null spanbauer deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 cast baseplate v-hollow hanger, bones medium little bushing ace big bushing, spitfire f4 52mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12 with footprint mid elite insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

After hitting LOCO and MRKT I met with Hayden, Bo and Andy at Northside. I had changed back to cast baseplates and but washers back in my trucks to make them stiffer. It felt weird. The park was pretty wet and limiting making it not as fun as normal. We mostly hit the little metal manual pad. Andy and I took a few tries to get nose manual. Bo manualled to drop down manual up to a pallet. Hayden all kinds of 180 manual combos. I had some kickflips on the bank, but didn’t commit to kickflip fakie. Hayden and Bo played a game of SKATE so Andy and I did too. But mid game I got a call from Liz saying there was an active shooter at the King Soopers near our house. She said her and the kids were safe so at that point it seemed like I could keep skating. Andy and I finished our game getting tricks like halfcab flip and heelflip that didn’t come easy. Then Bo, Hayden and I went to Fossil. Warming up again went alright. I had some crooks, Hayden back smiths and back tails and all the frontside tricks. Bo brought the energy. Then reports started coming in that the shooting was really bad and I understandably lost my desire to skate and headed home.

(setup 8.25 null spanbauer deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 cast baseplate v-hollow hanger, bones medium little bushing ace big bushing, spitfire f4 52mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12 with footprint mid elite insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

On a cool day with clouds forming quickly I met Rob, Sean and Kevin at Broomfield park. Sean and Kevin had already been there and were shredding the black ledge when Rob and I showed at basically the same time. Warming up I felt better than expected, but I would never actually do much of anything for awhile. Sean had gone deep into his ledge bag and was doing fakie 5-0s and nosegrinds. Kevin nollie nosegrinds and the Gish. Rob would get into demo mode pretty quickly. There were a couple rare tricks that came out like nose manual followed by no comply back 360 and lots of his other manuals and grinds. Near the end I really wanted to do a back heel on the mellow bank. I tried and tried and used various lines to get there, but never got it before the snow settled in. I couldn’t get a decent front 50 on the black ledge, couldn’t back 50 the blue lurb, couldn’t halfcab noseslide the black ledge. Man, it was a struggle! The funny thing was I did a kickflip axle stall nollie shove out on the low part or the brown ledge. As dorky as that was it was probably my highlight.

(setup 8.25 null spanbauer deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 cast baseplate v-hollow hanger, bones medium little bushing ace big bushing, spitfire f4 52mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 cake size 12 with footprint mid elite insoles)
(pain level 3/10)