Carleigh and I were both in kinda down moods. We both had our reasons and weren’t sure how skating would go. We went to the new bikepath ledge on 30th that is a downhill backside ledge for regular footers (me) and frontside for people that skate the wrong way (Carleigh). Before we skated the ledge I posed some ollies over a little gap that Carleigh did first try. Ok, so the gap wasn’t tiny, you had to go over a curb and it was probably the height of a 5 stair from the top. So yeah, after Carleigh dropped that first t we went and posed at the ledge until we got confidence to lock into tricks. We got 50s about the same time. Then Carleigh was going for 50 shove and I was going for a run of back 50, backnoseslide the tall ledge (which is under the gap that Carleigh already ollied) then I would walk up the ledge and go setup to try and ollie the gap. Carleigh got front 50 shove way before I got my line and it was bolts! I committed to the gap quite a few times and would slam pretty hard. Initially it was fun, but then it got old. I eventually gave up on the line, bailed the gap, got mad, then did it. It was way too small of a gap to take that much time on. Oh well. We played around at a gap above in the car dealership and Carleigh ollied the big part of it. 2 flat 1 with about 5 feet of flat. Sickness. Glad we skated.

Neil, Max and I headed up to Fort Collins to do business at MRKT and then skate at Northside. We met up with Chad, Jess and most of the normal Ft Collins heads were at the park. I warmed up real slow as usual. I dont even remember much of what happened for awhile except the dudes that skate that park everyday destroy it. Taylor front 5-0’ing up the jersey barrier is nuts. Xavier doing back lip followed by back tail over the shallow stairs was nuts too. Max ripped it all day and him and Jess did some back to back 360s over the hip and played big pop all afternoon. Neil skated, rested, skated, rested, skated. During the skating parts he ripped it. Boardslide the jersey barriers. Chad skates that park different than most locals. Not as much gnar, but some big pop and crazy tricks. So rad. I had a good time and landed most of my basics there. So like 3 tricks. I managed to manual the mj ledge with a tiny scrape that I think sits fine in the “over 35” category. Not enough of a scrape to be in the “over 40” category. I also spent a lot of time trying to b/s flip over the mj hip which I finally did with a nice wall hold to stabilize myself. Mike got a nice no comply shove over it and Neil got a really poppy no comply over it. Chad did nollie heel (almost to manny) and Max did treflip (not to nose manual like he wanted). We had a good time and the warm weather felt great. I tried a bunch of ollies over the little mound up top with the goal of some day hitting my chest with my knees. I probably didn’t get close but it was fun trying to suck them up so high. Lastly for me was wallieing the littlest part of the jersey barrier. I took a few slams before finally getting it. Neat. That park rules and so does the Ft Collins scene.

Had a long drive down from Buena Vista stopping at DIA on the way to drop off my brother. Got home in the afternoon, chilled for awhile, then Jason, Carleigh and Jake showed up and we picked up Lazer and headed to Broomfield. We chilled at Crisis for awhile then went across the street to the ledge where we ended up staying almost the whole time. Unfortunately Carleigh couldn’t skate due to a board hitting her ankle while shooting a photo earlier in the day. Lazer actually skated the ledge a long time. Neither of us go front smiths.

But at least Lazer’s looked like a smith grind as opposed to my mutant smith/5-0/wtf.

Jake was ripping and man it was good to see him again. He also got a front 180 nosegrind at the end and some nice ollies over some safeway debris.

Bernie met us at Crisis and managed to still rip even though he had rolled his ankle the day before. Bernie and I had a race to kick back tail. He won obviously. He also landed kick front tail and fakie varial flip back tail. Wow.

As tech as Bernie got it was nothing compared to this 2mph kick back 50 wall push out. First try of course. Ha, I was hyped to do that though. I also ended up getting a few front crooks to fakie. They were slow as well, but man, that is a fun one.

Fuzz showed up after work and busted the basics before we rolled to the church behind his shop. It was a blast. Some kids joined in and we had a good session. Jake did a front blunt transfer into the bank. Fuzz did front lip to fakie (gnar). Lazer did front lip transfer. I got a weak front blunt transfer and a front board front 180 transfer that felt really fun until my straight legged ride away came to a halt. I also got manual to back lip. Bernie did manual to boardslide and eventually nose manny to lipslide that shut down the session. Other stuff that went down before that were Fuzz struggling to ollie three curbs after Chase did it second try, me taking way way way too long to do a slappy lipslide, Lazer spilling his beer twice, a little kid doing a front 50 transfer into the bank, and lots of laughs. Awesome.

Had about one hour of free time so I bolted solo to the skatepark. It was warm and sunny, but super windy. My legs didn’t feel all that great. I cruised around feeling a few things out when all the teenagers in town showed up. I was thinking it would be cool to see some local dudes actually skate. Nope. Most just sat in cars. The bmx’ers actually biked around a bit, but mostly just annoyed me. I tried to ollie over the 3 stair rail again, but was over it when one dude sat on it two times in a row. I could not land a single flatground trick. The only cool thing I did was a backside flip on the 4 foot quarter pipe. Yes, well below coping.

Definitely having a tough day. Had a couple hours before Liz and the kids would arrive so I went to the park. I had to clear some tumbleweeds out from under the ledge to be able to skate it. My body felt sore, but mostly I could not get the sound of my mom crying out of my head. I started out doing laps from the qp and flyout. I’d start by ollie’ing the flat bar, axle stall the tall qp, try to do sucked up ollies out of the flyout, frontside smith on the small qp, then manual the ledge. Didn’t get them all. After awhile I tried just manual followed by nose manual on the ledge. It took me awhile just to get manual and I hung up on a few nose manny attempts. Ugh. I was feeling really old. Not just old physically, but old. I kept at it though. Finally got back 50 on the little ledge. I tried to ollie the 3 stair handrail for awhile. There is a big crack right before it so it’s kind of weird. I got some ollies over it, but kicked it away. I would like to do that sometime, but my head definitely wasn’t in it. Eventually the family showed up and Ollie rolled around with me for awhile. It cheered me up, but we had to go.

Steve with the wind up

And he’s still got it!

After a rough few days my brother Steve and I had a couple hours to get out of my parent’s house. We went for a little hike and then I told my brother I needed to go to the skatepark for at least a little bit. After a few days of not even thinking about skating it hit me and I really really wanted to skate. So we stopped by the Buena Vista skatepark. It’s about what you would expect for a tiny little mountain town. I actually love this park. Anyways, I took a few runs around the park before Steve jumped on my board and skated for the first time since the last time I saw him. He still has his basics. Boardslides, rock ‘n rolls, early grab flyouts. It was great to seem him skating.

Headless rock ‘n roll

Steve even almost got back feebs!

Here’s just an overview of part of the park. I skated really well. I worked up to a decent line of axle stall on the tall qp, flyout melon, front slash the little qp, front 50 the ledge, kickflip, crooks the ledge bail. The highlight might be ollie’ing up onto the funbox above and doing no pop back 180 off. Followed by a nose manual up and around the little bank. I also had 360 flip and fakie flip on flat to show off in front of my brother.

So yeah my brother and I attempted to shoot skate photos with my smart phone. It has a crappy delay sometimes so it missed my huge flyouts and captured the first little one (will any of you believe that?).

This ledge is aight.

It was a great session. It was great seeing my brother skate and then skating while he watched and got bored. It did feel different though since my dad has died. Like their is more pressure to be good at life. Better at being a son, father, husband, friend, work, null and skateboarding. It’s weird. I’ll probably be skating this park a lot now since I’ll be visiting my Mom up here a lot. It’s actually a pretty fun park at least.

My Dad died on Friday. It was sudden and completely unexpected. He was only 64 and was training for another Leadville 100 mountain bike race. I don’t feel that this is the place to talk about him, but he will be missed. I’ll be up in the mountains for awhile with my mom and family. Thanks to everyone who has sent along their regards. I love you all.

Once again, a lot has happened so this one so I’ll miss a lot of what happened. Carleigh, Fuzz, Dean and I went to No Love around 9 pm. It was a small crowd and we all skated. Well Dean took photos. Fuzz and Carleigh ripped out of the gates. Jeff was ripping too. Fuzz did about 100 tricks on the qp. Carleigh did huge wallrides. I had troubles on the wallride, but skated the qp ok. Got front lip, axle stall to fakie, fakie pivot fakie first try. Later on got a crooks on the ledge. Did a little nose manny on a little door to curb high manny pad. Finished off by played a game of SKATE with Mikey that he won. Had a lot of fun, but really felt old and stiff. Oh well. Got home late and was planning on starting a 4 day skate trip starting Friday but those plans would be changed.

I don’t like missing skate journal entries, but a lot has happened since this one. Dean came to my house then Carleigh and we met Fuzz at Broomfield park. I was rusty as all get out after a week of sickness followed by a few days of back spasms. After a few runs around the bowl Fuzz took advantage and challenged me to a game of ledge SKATE on the black ledge. We both missed lots of basic tricks, but he finished me off easily with a bluntslide. At one point I saw Fuzz noseblunt the bump to bar first try. Carleigh boardslid the little rail and came close to front 50 shove out. Dean looked like he was having fun. Derek met us there too and was ripping as usual. I don’t remember much of the session other than the above and the end when I tried to ollie the six stair. It took me awhile so Derek hyped me up by doing a switch front 3 and I had to get his back. Landing those stairs felt great. Carleigh ollied the double set easy. I was excited to skate again.

Must be nice growing up with a pro skater as a dad. Riley got moves on all terrains.