Another spring winter storm. We were supposed to get lots and lots of snow, but it didn’t stack up to high. It was still snowing though so a few of us resorted to an old parking garage with a flat bar. Although the flat bar ended up not being the main attraction. The parking blocks and manny pads were skated the most. Carleigh and Jack showed up later then the rest of us. Brett had a boombox going with some rap making me feel like I should have gotten way tech’er then I did. Wallie’ing the parking blocks to start the session is fun. It’s gonna be so hard to remember all that went down. So rather then go in order of the session I’ll just do some highlights from everyone. Jack was ripping. It would be easier to name the tricks that he didn’t do over the parking block then to list all 100 tricks he did over it. The fakie tre was hot. The run along and let the board fly over the curb was too. Front hurricane on the flat bar first try. Lines that allowed me to rest for 10 minutes while he would whiz around the place a few times. Ha. Neil was Neil. Flying over everything with good style. He had the funniest fall every trying to boardslide the flat bar, but gave up. The look he gave to see if anyone saw him was epic. He was the first to leave. Carleigh was having some back pains so took a long time to get going and seemed to skate pretty good to me. Back 180 over the parking block, boardslide the flatbar. The kickflip over the parking block took awhile, but she got a couple good ones. I skated decent for me. Tried a run of kickflip over the parking block then crooks on the flat bar, but never got the crooks. Landed a fakie bigspin over a parking block which I don’t think I’ve ever done before. I ollied over the newspaper stand thing a few times which was really hard for me. I couldn’t land a fakie bigflip to save my life, but I did get a couple slow treflips and a nollie tre that felt great. Got one kick back tail on the little curb. Brett was having fun, had some awkward slams and managed to break another board ollie’ing over the newspaper stand. He did some sick no comply 180 front d reverts over the parking block and solid no complys over it. At the end Carleigh, Jack and I played a game of SKATE that ended when Jack broke his nose on a fakie tre. Fun session. Can’t believe we skated so long.

Finally done with a week of the early shift and was gonna celebrate with a quick solo flatground session then head to fort collins to sell boards. Instead I got a call from Dave halfway to Longmont and we met up at the little, but fun park in Longmont. It was chilly out, but not raining or snowing yet as forecasted. It ended up being a blast, my arthritis was not as bad as two days ago (still pretty bad though). Dave was working on nollies over the hip when I got there. He got a few pretty good ones. Probably because he was on a nice new Null board. Ha. I warmed up with some tailslides over the hip and some kickflips on banks. We didn’t really work on anything for too long, but were having fun skating that dorky little park. I couldn’t get a good kickflip over the hip, but I managed a tiny one after ollieing up the tall ledge to get me hyped. Dave got a back 360 or two over the hip. Dave got some front noseslides on the far bump to ledge, front 5-0s on the little bump to ledge with the drop on the other side that makes it scary, a sick hippy jump over the corner rail, almost a 270 back tail over the hip. I couldn’t get ollie onto the tall ledge, couldn’t get front shove off the drop, got a f/s halfcab over a mini hip (in the corner), the f/s cab (more like a 180 but it’s fakie to fakie) and a f/s halfcab flip too. As we left I got a little f/s flip over it. Fun session.

It was supposed to be a warm day in the upper 50s/lower 60s. Apparently it made it that warm, but it sure didn’t feel like it to me or Carleigh. I went to the Lafayette park right after work and my first ollie felt so bad I almost left. My arthritis is the worst it’s been in awhile. It’s hard to describe what it feels like, but basically it takes away balance, makes my movements slower then normal and my knees feel numb. Perfect for skating right? Ugh. Dave met up shortly after I got there and we warmed up in the little kid section in the middle of the park. Dave killed it. Feeble to rock fakie on the little/weird black rock qp. Lots more. I was struggling big time. Carleigh showed up. I had a decent line of wallie the corner of the rock, axle stall the bank to circle thing then come around and front 50 the tight qp at the park entrance. Dave did some more crazy stuff like front board transfer the rock qp. Carleigh and I skated the flow bowl for a grind or two then we all went up to the manny pad. Carleigh got a clean manny in less then 5 tries and was hyped (as she should be). She tried a bunch more and failed, but some were really close. Dave got nose manny and back 50. I slammed hard on a bunch of front 50 to back 180 out attempts. The only thing I did I liked was a manny drop down to manny to the bank. We were kind of all in different spots for awhile. Carleigh left. I slammed a bunch over the little spine thing. Dave killed it. I hate arthritis.

This clip is amazing and fun all in one.

Had the early shift at work so I got out at 3:30. It looks nice and warm in this photo, but it was only in the upper 30s. Which isn’t too bad in the sun, but still, they were forecasting 50s which would have felt way better. This was the spot that Jason and I would meet up and skate all the time several years ago. We even met Nate there. Jason had the longest, raddest front noseslides there. He also had the this rad line with a front board and a chinese nollie. I miss skating here with him. Anyways I was pretty tired and my warming up was really bad. I just did chinese nollies and nose stalls. Eventually I was able to muster up the courage to try kickflips and other tricks. I’ve always had troubles skating right after work, but today was even worse then normal. I kept at it though. I should have brought wax, but the side in the shade is still somewhat slick. That’s the only side I skated. I started with noseslides backside and frontside I ollied on and front 180’d off. It’s narrower up top then it looks because of the openings for the trees. I started landing a few flat ground tricks. I struggled with front 50s for awhile, but got a couple fun ones that felt raw since the concrete is so chunky and not waxed. If I would have waxed it I probably would have had better luck. Came close to back 50. Posed a bunch of kickflip back noseslides. Was almost out of time and and tried a treflip that put me on my butt in a puddle. I couldn’t leave on that note so did another ollie up front 180 off followed by a fakie flip and walked back to my car with some of my pride still intact.

Another snowy night. They are getting really old. Luckily I have a ramp in my garage and some friends that enjoy skateboarding. We got things going around 7:30 without John yet. Carleigh did most of her tricks with the exception of front d within the first couple runs. Fuzz was all over the place doing lots of tricks and killing it as usual. For whatever reason I wasn’t too inspired. I didn’t land much all night and never tried any new tricks. Before John showed we talked about how he would just show up and his first run would be amazing. I guess we jinxed him because he slammed pretty hard on the first wall with a rock ‘n roll attempt. Oops. ha. He did kill it though with his flat bottom reverts and Fuzz and I tried some variations too. I can’t remember what all was done, but it sure looked and felt silly. Near the end of the session Carleigh got the elusive front disaster. Fuzz got fakie back pivots to fakie. I got a front tail stall.

After a pretty late night of partying for the Meta grand re-opening party I grabbed Ollie and we went to Southern Hills for a short session. I experimented with the panorama app on my camera and as you can see I must shake the camera a lot. Oh well. I had some new shoes, some Vox Class X. They seem good. As you can see there was a lot of snow and puddles around. Ollie didn’t really skate much. He just kind of pushed and didn’t really do any tricks. He was having fun though. I had more swagger in my step then I thought I would and was skating kinda fast. I had a line with an ollie off the ledge by the handicap ramp, turned around and kickflipped into the handicap ramp then ollied a pile of snow. I had another line with a noseslide the tall ledge on the far left, kickflip into the handicap ramp then ollie a bigger pile of snow (in the background behind the square of benches). I added a bad flatground treflip, front 50 and crooks on the main bench and we called it a day.

Got up early on a gorgeous saturday already in the mid 50s. Liz’s parents were here, but eating lunch with some friends so I had some free time and surprisingly my quads weren’t hurting so bad. Perhaps it’s the warmer weather helping out. I skated flat til Jake and Bernie came over. I felt really rusty. Jake showed first and we both just kinda messed around doing our own thing. Jake put together some decent lines. Bernie showed and we went to a middle school in east Boulder to skate the ledges out front, but instead ended up at the 3 stair in the back. Bernie’s friend Teagan joined us. Jake and I were having a blast. Jake had the first 180 down it and the first ollie up it. When Teagan joined though he almost kickflipped up it, had switch tre down it 2nd try and was having fun too. The photo is him doing a front 360 shove with Jake looking on. Bernie of course found some manual options with it. I managed a few tricks down it. Early grab, boneless, no comply boneless, front shove (first real try) and a kickflip. When we left my legs felt really good. Perhaps I should skate small stair sets more. This was the set I backside flipped before my arthritis hit the fan in 2011.

Jake had to leave. We went to the Google building because Teagan was trying to film a line with a switch tre down the six. While Bernie filmed him I just dorked around. I ended up above trying to ollie this little flower pot. Normally it would be somewhat easy for me, but the angle is so hard so after several fails I just went with a front 180 instead.

I came upon this across from the six stair in the next parking lot. It looked ripe for dorking out on and wow it ended up making my day even better. The slight slant of the sidewalk and the crack were appealing. First tricks were front 180 into it, sw ollie off the curb then a f/s halfcab flip on flat. I should mention that flip tricks were really hard at this point in the day because my shoes were toast. The real fun began when I started treated it like a bank to curb. My first “line” was ollie up, f/s pivot on the crack, kickflip off. I tried to ollie a tall cone after that too, but you all know I can’t do that. I don’t care, I was giggling anyway as that line was super fun. I also did ollie up. no comply to tail, back 180 off the curb. Almost got a kickflip b/s pivot too, but my nose would hit the rail. Eventually it was time to go and meet up with the in-laws. This was one of my favorite days skating in awhile. Dork spots are the best.

Rating: STYLE
Rating: COMFORT
Rating: BOARD FEEL
Rating: BREAK IN PERIOD (Good rating means it doesn’t take long to break in)
Rating: SOLE DURABILITY
Rating: UPPER DURABILITY
Rating: OVERALL

These shoes lasted 6 skate days

I’ve had a few pairs of these. The first pair seemed like the best shoe ever made. The second didn’t last so long. This pair pretty much set the low bar on sole durability. They only lasted six days! Most of which were short sessions on Rampy. This is really bad. The shoe is a comfy and stylish shoe, but a sole that wears out this quick is not acceptable. I hope Lakai puts the thicker tread on this shoe. It’s experiences like this that make me consider large corporate company shoes. Shame on you Lakai.

** NOTE ** I had another pair of these after being told Lakai had a new manufacture and they were much better.