Was having a good morning getting ready for skating when I got called for work. It wasn’t a bad call, but it took a few hours and it kinda killed my skate motivation. And it showed when I arrived at the dog park. Kevin, Dan, Sean, Mike were all trying varial flips. But my body wasn’t up to try them quite yet. I cruised around trying to get warmed up, but it never really happened. Those dudes were all ripping. I was hyped to see Dan skating. Sean and Kevin were doing some lightwork over the barriers. Sean had nollie back 5-0, ollie, backside flip the wallie, turn around ollie the hydrant then front 50 the picnic table. Dang that’s lots of hopping! Kevin did switch nosegrind 180, ollie, nollie shove. I did slow front 50 and posed backside flip. Near the end I got a slow front 50 shove. That’s about the only trick I was remotely hyped on. Kevin and I had tried a bunch of halfcab crooks. Neither of us got it, he was of course way closer. Man I was in some serious pain.

Then I went to look at a Casey to see the spot Eric had shown me. It looked so good from the road I got out of the car. It’s a little kicker to a pad then a little two stair-ish gap after. The kicker was deceiving though as it drops away at the last bit making the timing weird. I got a switch 180 then front 180 the gap. I wanted to do kickflip then front shove, but I never got the kickflip. The weird kicker got to me and I went home.

(setup 8.25 null spanbauer deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 v-hollow, bones medium bushings, spitfire f4 50mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric foy 306 navy size 12, thin es insoles)
(pain level 6/10 super sore)

A little more tech, a bit fewer rails, a lot of lines and a lot of crust makes this one of my fav Westgate parts yet.

Woke up early with the late shift at work so I went to dog park. It was still pretty cold out before 8am when I got there and there was some iced over puddles. It was mostly dry though and would warm up quickly (unlike me). I was more sore than I had anticipated and doing anything involving an ollie seemed unrealistic at first. I haven’t been there in a few weeks and things were quite different. I had some fun with the ‘nollie’ tails, boardslides, ‘slappy’ noseslides then started to try 50s on the long narrow pad. Frontside were easy, backside took a bit. I battled front 50 on one of the wood ledge for a bit. It took me a bit to commit to ollieing that high, but once I did I had some real nice slow front 50s. I did have a line all picked out though. Front 50, back 50 the old tiny pad, 180 flip, halfcab noseslide the cinder block ledge then front 50 the new narrow bench. I got a first try frontside flip (well, it was one of those kickflip late spins on the ground), but never got another f/s flip and bailed b/s flips too. Then I started doing a different line. Crook the new lower bench, ollie over wallies world, ollie a parking block, kick back 50 on the weird pad, ollie the new metal ledge. Never go the kick back 50, but I was hyped I ollied the wallie so many times. I had done halfcab flip and fakie bigflip. Last thing I tried was a line of noseslide the new bench, front 50 the cinder block ledge, treflip on flat. My front 50s were bad as the approach was hard after the noseslide, but I would get the line. The treflip wasn’t great, but it was time to go to work.

(setup 8.25 null spanbauer deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 v-hollow, bones medium bushings, spitfire f4 50mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric foy 306 navy size 12, thin es insoles)
(pain level 6/10 super sore)

Not feeling much like skating on a cold wet night I went to the garage to get a fakie bigflip since I couldn’t land one the day before. I was feeling bloated from dinner and struggled to jump at first. Got to fakie flip, halfcab flip, 2-2 on fakie varial flips then got the fakie bigflip. I tried switch flips for a bit and was not close at all. Then on to treflip. I got one 4th try! I was desperately trying to get 3 within 10 tries, but that didn’t happen. In fact I went about 30 more tries before I put an end to my old chipped board. Ugh. I can take away some positive in that I landed on several and was super close to most of them.

(setup 8.25 303 deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 v-hollow, bones medium bushings, spitfire f4 50mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric foy 306 navy size 12, thin es insoles)
(pain level 3/10)

On an absolutely gorgeous day I worked for a bit in the morning then took a half day to enjoy the weather. I met Dave, Rob and Sean at a mostly empty and dry park. I hadn’t skated in two days and wore my old Foys as the 212s were dead. No real insole this time around and they felt good (although i would be super sore after skating). We skated for a solid three hours. Dave had been there for awhile, but the rest of us basically showed at the same time. Warming up felt decent for me and had some fun nollie back tails on the blue lurb. Seemed like everyone was on their own for a bit. Dave was up top doing bluntslide shoves on the mount. Sean was working through flip tricks. Rob lining things out. I was trying some lines too. At one point Sean said told me he was going to do a halfcab flip and missed it then I said “I think you were trying this” and missed one. Rob same, Dave same. Ha. It was funny though. We did get them after that. Rob was in demo mode with the long lines. Sean and I tried tricks on the blue pad followed by the ironman challenge. Sean was doing cool tricks like halfcab nose manual on the blue ledge while I was bailing kickflip back 50s or doing terrible back 50s. I struggled with heelflips, but once I got a few I got the treflip. I haven’t done the Ironman in awhile and it felt good. Sean got it too and went on to do like 5 treflips which is a lot for him. Dave did some back tails on the mount, boardlides on the little bar. Rob had lots of manuals on the slanted pad, back 50s, front 50 back 180, front tailslides, nollie front lip, switch boards, fakie bigs. I did okay on the black ledge as far as front 50s worked more times than not although I couldn’t do much else. Rob bounced. Sean did a line with kickflip nose manual, treflip then almost first try heelflip nose manual. Wow. He went on to get the heelflip nose manual and fakie bigspin manual. Dave was inspired by his halfcab nose manual and started trying them. He got close. I was trying nose manuals as it’s been too long and could not get one. Seriously tried for like an hour. I came really close to some nollie tres at least. I would finally get the nose manual and it did feel good. I shot my board off the steep bank in celebration only to see my tail get chipped beyond believe. Doh! Fun session even though I really didn’t land much. Definitely way better than work! And I should be somewhat happy about how easily I was getting up the little ledge.

(setup 8.25 303 deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 v-hollow, bones medium bushings, spitfire f4 50mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric foy 306 navy size 12, xero insoles)
(pain level 3/10)

After a long cold day of cleaning the garage in preparation of more boards coming (hopefully?!?!) I went to Square House right after dinner. The crew was Brian, Kevin, Dave, Bryan and me. Warming up was less awkward having been there a couple weeks ago. Kevin was all over the place quickly. He did the back 50 quick foot uphill grind, but never quite got the crook. Fuller warmed up in the miniramp. Brian chilled for awhile. The other Bryan had some cool manuals across the pyramid. Noseslides and crooks for me on the bump to box felt way easier than last time. Kevin and Dave were ollieing over the “channel” and ATVing it. Brian joined us and had a sick frontside grind over channel, treated us with the front rock slip, tough guy on the vert window. Bryan did a fakie bigspin tail on the little manny pad with the ledge. Kevin was really ripping everything it’s hard to remember but he unleashed a lot of tricks on the bump to ledge, even a fast back 50 to rock fakie the extension. Kevin, Brian and Dave skate the vert window qp. Kevin got some backside grinds. Dave did a nosegrab tail skid (I have no idea if this is the real name), Brian got close to front slash and did a few tough guys. When I wasn’t standing in someones way I was posing treflips to fakie on the bank and trying to switch noseslide the hubba. I would get it in a line with a crook, but didn’t slide the whole thing. I almost got b/s flip after that which would have been such a good line for me. Instead I spent the rest of the session just trying to b/s flip the hip and finally got a lame one. Dave as rolling in everywhre, had front 50s on the bump to ledge and even back 180’d out, front boards to fakie, front shove the hip. Kevin almost had nollie back shove the hip. Bryan had a nice front tail, almost got fakie bigspin tail the bump to ledge, came real close to a front 360 weird flip. Fun session. Could have gone for landing tricks quicker and not being so sore. Oh and the clip above is only my phone footage, there is more on Kevin’s waiting for him to post.

(setup 8.25 303 deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 v-hollow, bones medium bushings, spitfire f4 50mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 b/w size 11.5/12, nike sb zoom air insoles)
(pain level 4/10 knees)

After letting things warm up Jake and I rolled over to the og curb. Jake wanted to do back tail, I had not real plan and just kinda hucked a bunch of things. Jake pretty much went into back tails right away and would get a few of them. I couldn’t get a kick back 50 or tail, but some huck highlights were front nosepick to disaster, bennett stall (supposed to be back 180 fakie 50 but who cares), back pivot shove and another mediocre nollie back tail shove.

Then I went to Longmont to meet Dave at the somehow dry Longmont EMB. Although the melting snow did start to form puddles that messed with things a little. Dave was doing these cool pivot stalls on a bank median and trying to grind down in switch crook. It was unreal. There was a puddle making the approach hard so he didn’t want to film it. Next time for sure. He would also go on to nollie into it later. I warmed up with some nollie bigspins on the bank and switch noseslides on the ledge. I battled front 50s for awhile and would never get one. The wind had started making that direction very hard to skate. I got on really bad accidental 5-0. I got one or two kickflips on the bank and a crooks or too. Dave was doing some rad front 50 180s on the curb where he gapped over a puddle then followed it up with fakie varial flip. Then we ran up a brick median and rolled down backwards. Man that was way scarier than it should be, but a fun challenge to end the day on.

(setup 8.25 303 deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 v-hollow, bones medium bushings, spitfire f4 50mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 b/w size 11.5/12, nike sb zoom air insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

After a busy week of work I avoided the desire to take a nap and went across the street for the remaining daylight. The wind had died down and some snow had melted. The red curbs still had a little snow so I stuck to the og curb. My right knee was hurting a bit, but I skated alright. Pretty quickly I started hucking nollie back tail shoves along with a bunch of other tricks. I got a pretty funny one. I was trying a lot of switch crooks. I woiuld even kind of get a few. I went in on nollie back tail shoves and tried to film one. Jake drove by and almost threw me off before I realized it was him driving over the curb. Ha. My phone died pretty quickly in the cold, but I was pretty close to a lot of them. Flip tricks are hard on the rough uneven parking lot. I got kickflip, fakie flip, halfcab flip, b/s flip, the worst f/s flip in history, close to treflip and f/s halfcab flip and couldn’t get heelflip. I also never got a clean manual. Since the curb wasn’t waxed almost everything was just a stall. I came close to front crook and hucked a few kickflip front 50. I got kick back axle and tried to varial flip out. Ha. Got close to kick back tails. Then eventually ran out of energy and called it a day. I was hyped I hucked a lot, got another nollie back tail shove and didn’t get run over by Jake.

(setup 8.25 303 deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 v-hollow, bones medium bushings, spitfire f4 50mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric 212 b/w size 11.5/12, nike sb zoom air insoles)
(pain level 3/10 right knee and not much juice in the legs)

After dinner I was sitting around about to watch the Nuggets lose and decided I should probably try some flippers in the garage. I had reassembled my 8.25 setup with 5.6 v-hollow and 50mm wheels. It felt like a dream. Warming up was okay, kickflips weren’t consistent, but fakie flip, halfcab flip and b/s flip were all real quick. I tried cabs for awhile and kind of got them. If I had more space I think I would have done a proper one. Then I tried to combine all of the previous tricks into one glorious cab flip. I never got my feet on one, but a few did feel close. Then I went in on treflips. I was really hoping to get at least one in 10 tries, but I didn’t. I was about to get bummed, but then landed the 12th and 13th. Then another a few tries later. 3/17 is my best in a long time. Still want to get my 3 tres in under 10 tries though and obviously going to keep working on them. I tried nollie flips for awhile, not too close. Switch front heels, but I ran out of steam. I was happy I skated.

(setup 8.25 303 deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.6 v-hollow, bones medium bushings, spitfire f4 50mm classic shape 99a, new balance numeric 212. b/w size 11.5/12, nike sb zoom air insoles)
(pain level 3/10 not so much sore just didn’t have much juice)

On a warm and breezy afternoon I went to Saul’s right after work.  I had my new dedicated Saulside setup.  Basically my 8.5 that I never want to try and ride in the streets again.  It was a really fun session.  Everyone skated hard and we had some good laughs jabbing at each other and denying complements.  Ha ha.  Jake can do a ton of tricks there and link long lines.  Front 5-0s, front disaster revert, flies over the hip like it’s nothing, long back 50s on the big coping, I’m probably forgetting a lot.  He couldn’t quite get pivot to fakie.  I had one of the worst slams I’ve taken there missing on a back 50 and barely missing my tailbone on the coping.  I got my wrists really good though.  I had tried to get kickflip, but couldn’t quite get it.  Had some fun carve grinds, front slashes and a front smith that was supposed to be a disaster.  Jake and I encouraged Saul to do his patented fast carve grind lines that are always a treat to see.   Saul had some close long back 50s.  Gotta stay a little more inside on those!  After some chatting we went over to the school where Saul hit the curbs and Jake and I played SKATE.  Well, mostly.  I was at SKAT and Jake was at SKA.  I was happy to get first try halfcab flip, but struggled with fakie bigflip or heelflip.  I was on the 8” setup.  Jake started to go in on treflips, but started to feel dizzy from hunger and sat down.  I went on to get a treflip in about 10-15 tries that was a nice way to end the day.

(setups saulside 8.5, normal 8”, new balance numeric 212 b/w size 11.5/12, nike sb zoom air insoles)
(pain level 3/10)