First full day in WI had a slow start to be followed by lots of heat and sweat at the Middleton, WI skatepark.  My brother tried to pass on skating since he only does it about once a year when I’m around, but Ollie made him skate with us.  So awesome.  My brother still has some moves.  Little ollies on flat, front 180s and some boardslides on flat bars.  He didn’t last too long, but Ollie and I skated for a couple hours and sweat like crazy.  When we first rolled up no one was there.  Within minutes the park was mobbed by kids getting out of their last day of school.  I skated ok.  Took a long time to warm up.  A really long time.As I said the park got mobbed with kids quickly so after a few warmup runs rolling in and some axle stalls I skated the flat bar for awhile.  I almost never skate them.  There was two of them there.  One about 4″ high and the other about 8″ high.  I tried stuff I don’t normally do like front 5-0, 50, back hurricane (didn’t land) and back blunt.  I even tried front smith which I’ve NEVER tried before on a flat bar.  I was so hyped to roll away from hone.  My brother even shot the photo above.  I guess you might not think it’s me since my head is missing, but come on, the foot placement is clearly bad enough to be me.Ollie joined in on the flatbar session and tried a bunch of front boards.  He landed quite a few of them.  Most of the ones he landed he came to a halt on, but this is also the first time he’s tried that trick on a flat bar.  And yes, I can’t do a front board on a rail to save my life.  My brother took this photo too.  Do I look like a proud papa or what?  Or just some sweaty old skate dad?After awhile people started sitting as the heat was pretty intense.  So Ollie and I skated the middle of the park again.  I failed at a bunch of no comply 360s over the hip.  Ollie was trying a run where he would roll into the front of the park, do a kickturn on the steep qpipe a nosegrab to fakie on the flat bank and then a fakie ollie on the qpipe.  He did these a few times.  Then he switched it up and pumped to fakie on the qpipe and did halfcabs on the flat bank.  Eventually he did rock fakies on the steep qpipe.  Wow.  I tried to get his back with a back 50, but it was so hard.  Several tries later and a board in the puddle I finally landed it.  I also ollied a ledge that was sticking out on flat a few times and gapped from a crack to noseslide and boardslide on a good ‘butter bench’ that was probably actually the best thing at the park.   Before leaving I did a bad kickflip and a bad frontside flip over the hip and we retreated to the nearby brewery with the family.  Yum.  It’s been a long time since I’ve sweat that much.A few hours later and a few beers later Ollie and I went to the Stoughton skatepark shortly before dusk.  I had had a few beers and was pretty tired.  I slammed pretty hard right away on a backside ollie over the hip.  Might be because I actually ollied for once.  Speaking of Ollie, he skated well.  Rock fakie before me on the qpipe, backside nosegrabs on the mellow flatbank and over the hip, and his usual smile.  I sucked, but didn’t expect much.  The only newish thing I did was a fakie bigspin over the hip and a bad run of front 180 over the hip, fakie ollie on the steeper flat bank then crooks the ledge.  I did that twice and both times every trick was bad.  Awesome.

5 hour drive from Omaha on our way to Wisconsin to visit my brother and I mapped out a fun looking skatepark only a bit out of the way.  When we arrived it wasn’t very crowded and it was cloudy, humid and hot.  Ollie chose to wear his helmet so I guess the park must have looked a bit intimidating to him.  Warming up was not easy after 5 hours of driving.  I cruised around for a long time not really doing much of anything.  Ollie on the other hand is a kid and doesn’t know anything about warming up.  He was doing longer back 50s up the slappy escalator than me and coming into the qpipe fine.  He also did some where he would come to a stop then grind backwards.  So awesome.  I think I would skate the street stuff a lot here if I lived nearby.  I found some lines I wanted to do, but everytime I’d start really trying them that area of the park would get overrun by scooters, bikers or mall grabbers.  I was able to get a few where I did tricks on a big flat bank, kickflip into a mellow bank then front 50 a ledge.  The flat bank tricks I got were backside flip, fakie shoves, fakie flip, frontside flip, no comply bigspin and eventually a super ugly and rare for me fakie treflip.  I didn’t always get the last part of the run and sometimes I wanted to back 180 out, but I always failed.  I also failed at manual, nose manual and kickback 50.  I got one kinda fast crooks.  The last part of the day Ollie was just doing flyout grabs off a 2′ qpipe into grass.  It pretty much ruled to watch.  He did a bunch of really good nosegrabs where he even rode out of it in the grass.  He tried some melons and indy’s but didn’t get them.  Pretty fun session.  That park is not all that, but the street course has some fun lines for sure.

On a family vacation in Omaha, I didn’t expect to skate everyday and today was too busy to keep the dream alive.  Oh well, my body needed a rest.

Got picked up at Liz’s house at 5pm by Mr Matt Rief and had a long air conditioned ride to Fremont.  First stop was some food by Runza then a warm up and the world famous ledge at Linden.  From Off The Couch to the Berrics this ledge has been blowing up.  Matt and Dan quickly reminded the ledge that they were the ones who made this spot famous.  Dan had manual to bluntslide, front 5-0 front board, manual front shove out, so much more.  Matt had nollie front 5-0 shove, long long front 5-0, back crooks, back 5-0 everything is easy for him.  I was sucking, but having fun.  Got into a few halfcab crooks that could have been the real one finally, but they weren’t.  After awhile Matt and Dan brought out the ‘Secret Spot’ aka Matt’s ledge and put it down the ledge.  They both did a few non stock tricks like they were stock tricks.  I had a couple runs with kickflip up the concrete ledge then boardslide or noseslide down the secret spot.  I was gonna try and get Matt’s back with a front 50 when he landed a back lip, but the deal wore off before he landed it.  Fremont treflip expert Chris showed up and did a few not basic at all tricks before we moved on to the next spot.We drove to a spot “downtown” that was called “Ghetto Spot”.  It’s funny to hear Fremont dudes talk like there is a downtown or ghetto in Fremont, NE.  But anyways, the spot was a torn down building foundation and it ended up being a super killer session.  There was a ledge you could ride along then ollie up a curb height and manual to either a bank ramp or a 4 stair.  We chose to try manuals or just flippers into the bank.  Chris did a bunch of tricks easy.  Treflip, hardflip, nollie inward heel, anything.  Dan did manual front shove quick like, manual casper flip quick like and managed to leave half of his shin on the ledge while trying to ollie south up it.  Almost made me puke looking at the pile of his hair and skin piled on the edge.  Ouch.  Matt did a bunch of nollie heels that went awol and he would almost come to a halt going down the bank. So awesome.  He also front 180’d onto the ledge which surprised me.  Also a quick up to nollie flip out of the bank.  I skated good for me at this spot and was super motivated.  Kickflip, pop shove, halfcab flip all came pretty quick into the bank.  I also nose manualled around into the bank and did a couple runs.  Front 180 up the curb, first try awkward fakie bigflip into the bank.  Kickflip up the curb then ride onto a different ledge and front 180 a little gap.  Also kickflip up and no comply shove into the bank.  It took several tries, but I also got a treflip into the bank which was probably the highlight for me.  It was slow, but I landed it good and it’s probably the hardest bank I’ve ever done that trick into.  I ended with little ollie over the corner to manual down the bank which seemed very basic to me but Dan and Matt seemed to like it.Dan dropped us off as his shin was done.  We were gonna skate a painted curb, but a janitor dumping trash led us to wander around and we found these weird banks that had lots of lines in the concrete and were about ledge height to get onto.  At first nobody had anything on them, but we kept skating them and things happened.  Chris did a kickflip up onto one.  Matt did ollie up then kickflip to fakie.  Yeah Daewon!  100 tries later and I did a lunch breaked ollie up to no comply shove to fakie.  Fun.  The next spot had some wallie curbs, a curb cut pyramid and a little gap.  Chris ollied the curb cut to curb cut jump pretty quick.  I kinda dorked around as I was pretty beat.  The only thing worth writing about would be the end with a front shove up the curb then a weak ollie down the gap.  The gap was basically a long two stair that you could cheat which I definitely did.  Matt slammed a bunch on back 180’s over the gap.  I think he got it in the end.  Chris closed down the day with an epic kickflip over the curb cut jump.  Such a good way to end an epic session.  Fremont, you dudes rule.