Matt, Jake and I went to Longmont park to meet up with Riley who had just moved back into town. I had done about two kickflips, a front 50 and a front 5-0 before it started raining. Matt had b/s nose grinded the long ledge and did a switch tre as it started raining. Jake bailed a few back 50s in the flow bowl so I knew he wasn’t skating his best. I saw Riley slam on a back 360 over a hip.

We agreed to go to the covered pavillion and we ended up skating flatground there for three hours or so. It was awesome. Especially when we all would hit stop rocks or stop sticks and slam to the ground. No one escaped unscathed. Jake had the toughest time it seemed. He has been landing lots of treflips lately, but not this night. Riley and Scotty played 3 or 4 games of no repeat SKATE that were pretty incredible. Nollie late flips, inward heels, all kinds of tricks. It was so good seeing Riley skate again. Matt tied a ton of switch tres and beat me in a game of SKATE ending with fakie tre. I took a few tries to get tricks, but ended up getting most of my tricks. Kickflip, heelflip, fakie flip, halfcab flip, f/s halfcab flip, fakie bigflip, varial flip, fakie varial flip, nollie varial flip, treflip, nollie treflip, fakie treflip, double flip, b/s flip, some maybe. Man that list doesn’t even sound good considering we skated for 3 hours. Either way I still had a blast and it was great seeing Riley again.

I set up a lovely 8″ board. Jake showed up in the early evening and we went out to skate flatground. The joy of skating an 8″ board again was so incredible. I landed so many tricks first try and everything felt good. There was a kickflip that could have made my night all by itself, but it was joined with multiple treflips and many more flippers. Jake was skating well too. We started a game of SKATE as we waited for Matt. We both landed tricks that can often get us letters. I got Jake and S on a treflip and he got me an S on a fakie treflip (first one I’ve seen Jake do. Nice!) then Matt showed up and we left for Denver.

We went to this spot first. It was covered in debris from the tree so we didn’t skate around too much, mostly just hit this ledge. Matt tried to be a rebel and skate the whole spot at one point and slammed so hard pushing. It was brutal. He still skated good. Manualled the bottom block, back tail, manualled a bit of the top block after a quick up. I landed quite a few back 50s, chinese nollie to front tail, front 5-0s, crooks. Jake had back 50s, fakie front 50 halfcab out. Jake and Matt ollied onto the low block, then the upper block, and did tricks off. Jake did front 180 and tried nollie. I took about 30 minutes longer to get onto the top deck. Got front 180 and landed on back 180, but bailed.

Then we went to the Denver Art Museum. I saw Jake do some manuals across some ledges, ollie a narrow part of a ledge and front board a narrow part. I was having troubles seeing the poorly lit ledges. Jason always used to say I had horrible night vision. I probably don’t see any worse then others, I just am not very good at skateboarding and night vision sounds like a legit excuse. Anyways, geez. I skated kind of slow and slammed on a front board, couldn’t manual a whole ledge. But I did have a fun line of 360 flip, ollie up a ledge, over a little gap to manual the next part. Matt skated the best I’ve seen him skate. It was crazy. He was flying all over the place ollieing ledges, manualling them, nose manualling some. He was skating so hard he even broke his board. It was a Null board so you know he was skating hard because those things never break. Then we went to Black Dots/Cheap Girls which was a blast. I got home at 3:30am. Monday at work sucked extra bad.

Woke up early to give India a ride to ballet in Denver. Brought my board and randomly called Derek to see if he’d want to meet downtown. I ended up going to pick him up after dropping India off and we skated the Thornton park on 112th. There were a lot of puddles messing up the flow. Derek was kinda chilling, but ripped it. The air to fakie was perfect, first try. He did some funny wallrides to firecracker, pivot fakie a qp, couldn’t butt ride over the rainbow, dude just flows so good. I mostly just did whatever. Had a rewarding line of ollie the ledge into the downhill bank then did a hurricane on the bank to curb. Did some other stuff I was aight with.

Then we went to Northglenn HS. I tried a line of noseslide on the red ledge above, ollie the stupid little gap above, manual the bottom of the big 4 block. Sounds so simple right? But the ollie was so hard due to it being a death trap of cracks and rocks that I only got to the manual attempt a few times. Derek did noseslide 270 shove and back smith. So sick.

Later in the day I went to Southern Hills after setting up an old 8″ board that’s been in my trunk for awhile and was already cracked. It felt pretty good rolling around. I felt more willing to try and do tricks. Did a couple treflips where I actually landed on the bolts rather then the middle of a big board. Then I did a couple treflips where I didn’t land so good and the crack turned into a board in two pieces. Doh. Gonna setup a new 8″!!! Home sweet home!

After work I went to Crisis to do some bidness and meet up with this dude Jeremy from Seattle. JP from Seattle organized the skate date. After hanging at Crisis for quite a long time while it rained then dried out we wen to Broomfield park. There were a lot of puddles in the street, but not much in the bowls. We skated the flow bowl for awhile. Jeremy clearly ripped at tranny and flew around the bowl. I skated alright for me until we went to the ledge area then appeared to forget how to skateboard again. Struggling that bad is frustrating. Front 50s were weird, back 50s, everything. Darin and CJ showed up and that was fun. We skated the Quartapotty for awhile. Darin and CJ did halfcab blunt fakies. So crazy. I got a lot of my tricks and was most happy with a hurricane. Jeremy had some cool early grab variations. Then CJ, Jeremy and I skated the flow bowl for awhile. It was fun. I got some new lines around there and as long as I didn’t touch the coping it seemed like I knew what I was doing in there. I did get a few axle stalls on the pool coping though which was nice considering how long it took me to do them last time I was there. It’s also ironic how much better I skate tranny with Ventures then I do Indys. Makes no sense. I liked how Indys cruised the streets, but not the bowls. Weird huh? Then we skated kind of whatever. I could not land a treflip. Struggled with everything. Got the slowest and ugliest front 50 on the tall brown ledge. CJ was doing them sick. He almost got switch front 50 too. He good.

Went to FOCO after work to sell some boards. Met up with Matt and we went to Fossil Creek. It became apparent on my first failed curb high boardslide that I would have a tough night. Matt on the other hand was cruising around doing all kinds of good basics first try. Actually he ended up skating some of the best I’ve seen him skate. Manual the middle box on the manual pad drop down to manual. Back tail’d it too. Ollied the Carrol gap easy, kickflipped it. Halfcab back 50 on the low, halfcab noseslide to fakie on the regular ledge, nollie back noseslide. Lots of good stuff. Including a pretty bad slam on a kick back tail attempt. I had new shoes which I can maybe blame about 5% for my skating. It was all my legs sucking. More New Balance Numeric Quincys. This time in a size that wont kill my feet. When it was finally dark I was kind of skating remotely ok. Had some fun crooks, back 50s on the curb, a 3 flip on flat and slow line of ollie onto the ledge, front 50 the ledge up top and then a crawling kickflip off the ledge. I tried to back 50 the regular ledge and got back 5-0 and back feeble instead. Sounds good unless you actually saw them. Even though I totally sucked it was still fun. Matt ripped hard and laughed at most of funnier bails, it was nice out, the park was pretty empty, etc.

We got up early after a decent night of sleep and were the first ones to the Gunnison park. It ruled. We both felt better right away and were doing tricks we had to work up to last time as warm ups. I had a line of kickflip over the b/s hip a kickturn and then a b/s flip that felt great. That alone made my day. Skated the big bowl for a tiny bit. Failed at back smiths in the little bowl. Watched Ollie back 50 in the older bowl (photo above). Front 50’d the old ledge and crook’d it. Did a ton of ollies over the hips, some of which might have left the ground. Front smith the 3 foot section. Ollie did a first try fakie shove into the mellow bank in the old section as well as f/s halfcab. We skated for quite awhile. Doesn’t seem like it from this entry, but we skated for almost 5 hours and it was hot. We ended with Ollie front 180’ing the flattened cone and then trying back 180 and giving up mad. First time I’ve seen him actually frustrated. Then we did the 4 hour drive back to Boulder and it was done. What an amazingly fun trip.

Had a long drive to Montrose and an almost longer driver around Montrose to find their stupid park. Worst directions/signs ever. It was super hot when we got there and neither of us slept that well camping the night before. Ollie was over it immediately and almost didn’t skate at all. I did Donut Duty a couple times, did a couple back 50s, lost speed and was over it. That park has gone to crap. There are chunks below the coping, there were firework debris everywhere, huge piles of cotton/weeds, and water running through the park. I had high hopes for it since this park was such a formidable park when we did our Indecisive trips in the mid/late 90s. Oh well, it doesn’t always work out. We went camping again and had a blast.

We drove from Buena Vista to Gunnison. First stop was the park. And there we stayed for quite a awhile. My legs were still not feeling so good. Ollie did the bunny hop right away. So rad. He loved that park. Rolled in on the 3 foot section, did front and back 180s all over the place. The front 180 from the deck into the bank was my favorite. Lots of little half cabs over the hips too. Some other dudes were at the park. Some of the nicest locals I’ve encountered. It was cool talking to them. Ollie and I skated the spin thing and rockride for awhile. I got quite a few spine transfers. Roll over, front 50 to back 50, front feeble to back smith, front feeble to back smith to fakie. Got a tiny f/s flip over the hip and a bad b/s flip where Ollie said “Over 40 it’s a make” that really cheered me up. We skated for a long time. Ollie out lasted me. Oh yeah I got a grind over the little 3 foot love seat thing. Off to camp ..

Ollie and I embarked on our first father/son skate and camping trip. We left Boulder pretty early and traffic really wasn’t too bad. We went to Silverthorne and Ollie started ripping right away. The little fly out above, 180s up and down the little banks, dude was having fun. My legs were not well. Something about the altitude and arthritis doesn’t mix well. I fell pushing at one point and got upset. That’s how my trip was starting. I think I was way too excited about it ahead of time. I failed at rolling in, but did a few things I was ok with. Front slashes in lines, back 50s in taller spots easy, b/s flip on the new bank, front rock and had fun pumping.

Then we went to Leadville to meet Rob and Fuzz. We were there way before them. Neither of us were skating great. In fact after awhile we decided to stop skating until Rob and Fuzz arrived. They finally did and things felt better pretty quick. Rob had skated there before and had some really long lines. Long manuals, fast back 50s, poppy ollies on b/s hips, standard rob steez. Fuzz killed it with lots of lofty f/s ollies, a gnarly kickflip to fakie, more lofty ollies, high speed front 50s. Ollie got into gear and had a bunch of front 180s into a little kicker, mongo pushes, rolled into the little qp, manual up the a frame, and a rock fakie in the bowl. Leadville is at 10,000 feet. Rob says it’s a good excuse to use for feeling exhausted the whole time. Good, because I needed it. I had a funish line of front d on the little qp, kickflip up the curb, back 180 off. A b/s flip on the round hip, not much else. The bowl was my favorite part and Ollie and I only briefly skated it at the end of the session. I had a fun little roll in and some little grinds. Then we went to my mom’s to watch fireworks in Buena Vista.

Watched the premiere of Static 4 and 5 at Meta. Had a couple ciders. Then went skating with John and Matt to the Wells Fargo qps. There were a few other people skating them. It was fun. It was really brief. John did pivot fakie. Matt ollied out over the brick wall. I did a front board transfer to fakie. Oh and board sitting in the photo is late after missing Matt credit card himself trying the ollie again. Ha.