Flatground Friday! I can never tell when I’m going to skate flatground good. I was mentally hyped on it today, but it became apparent pretty quickly that I wouldn’t land much. It was cold, but not that cold. My board was flat and slippery from the water dunk it took last week. That’s not really much of an excuse, but oh well. So yeah, I went to the hockey rink instead of the gym and skated flatground for about 45 minutes. The rink has a slight slope to it. Going downhill I would try tricks I should be able to land. Going slightly uphill I would try new ones. For a long time I failed at fakie double flips up and treflips down. I gave up on fakie double flips and tried switch varial flip rewinds. Both were close at times, but never that close. I landed on about 50 treflips, but never rode away. Then I randomly started trying varial flip sex changes and they felt close. A few tries later I sketchily rode away from one. Cool! So now I’m only one month behind again. So then I started trying treflips until I landed one. Took like 10 minutes. I was upset. But landing one made everything feel alright.

I met Dave at Boulder ditch after work. Warming up was not fun. I bailed curb high ollies on the regs. I would eventually have fun trying to ollie over the pipe then boardslide transferring back into it. I did a couple other dork around things. I filmed Dave do a couple rad lines. Here’s a screen shot of one. It looks easy to 5-0 that right? It’s not. Not at all.

Then we ate and went to the newish ledge spot at Pearl & 30th. We started slow as we were sore by slappying up the angled part. We looked pretty darn old I reckon. But we stuck with it and had fun. Dave had some really long slappy back 50s, some to tail, slappy crooks, boardslides. I had a few decent frontside slappy 50s, regular front 50s, front 5-0, front 50 180 out, a couple weak crooks and one lousy back 50.

Instead of taking my typical mid morning gym break I went to the nearby skatepark again. I was really upset with how poorly I skated last night and wanted to redeem myself. I did. I skated faster, harder, did some new stuff and had fun. Pretty early on I had a great feeling treflip on flat. The best one I’ve done in awhile. I had some front 50s on the little ledge, crooks on it, crooks on the taller part of it, halfcab noseslide. I was determined to ollie onto the middle ledge near the flatbars. I got close, close, then somehow a miracle happened and I was riding on top of it so I front 180’d off and smiled. I also got crooks up one of the escalator ledges which felt great, front 50 too. Last two things I was trying were front shove off the main ledge (without ollie’ing up sorry) and ollie over the small side of an escalator ledge. Got the ollie pretty easy and instead of trying the front shove again I left. Hyped.

Go see more from Frank Zirbel, the creator of Psycho Unity.

After work I was determined to not take a nap in hopes of sleeping better. I played football with Ollie for awhile and it was a total blast. It was a lot of running. Had a smoothie for dinner and left for Crisis where I would hang out for quite awhile. I had watched some good tech east coast skating during the day.

So I really felt like skating a granite ledge. But this is Colorado where there basically are no granite ledges. I lit up Safeway ledge with my car lights. Did some 50s both ways, but punched the wall in the cold once and was over it. Mainly because the rest of the area was too dark to do flatground and stuff. I went to the park. There were quite a few people there as usual. There was an older scooter kid with a helmet doing laps on the quartapotty/blue ledge so I lost my motivation to skate that. The black ledge had a crowd too. I tried a front 50 and shot out as it was so insanely waxed and fast. I would go on to do a few more, a few crooks. I was really uninspired and tired though. I tried to boardslide the tiny rail a few times and failed. I told myself if I didn’t get it the next try I would leave. I ended up leaving very frustrated. I should have taken a nap. I didn’t even sleep good. Ugh.

Yeah so I’ve skated a lot lately. I’ve had it in my head to go to this little park instead of the gym a few days a week. I don’t really expect to skate at my full level (ha as if), but just dork around and try stuff I might not ordinarily try since no one else is at the park. I was pretty darn tired after all the weekend fun. I continued the tradition of learning to ollie over stuff. Went over the flat bar a few times then the small side of an angled ledge. Got one bad treflip on flat. Tried ollieing into a bank, slammed and kind of hurt my achilles. So I headed back to work.

@matthouse #nineclub #slappyslalom

A photo posted by Rob Helmstetter (@43shifty) on Oct 10, 2014 at 1:59pm PDT

Slappy Slalom 3 was off the chain today!!! Nolan took the win for best trick on the car. If anyone knows this dudes insta handle, tag em. Thanks for the good times @mottrock @bad_egg @nameinbloodsk8boards and all the other homies that showed up. After party at the badegg house this eve.

A photo posted by Skater, Photog, Filmer, SPB (@coburnhuff) on Oct 10, 2014 at 3:02pm PDT

Slappy Slalom

A photo posted by Matt House (@matthouse) on Oct 10, 2014 at 12:31pm PDT

Repost from @coburnhuff the slappy slalom yesterday was insanely fun, I was so excited to skate that I didn't take any photos, but really happy to see everyone else's photos and video, and excited to be in a shot!

A photo posted by carleigh samson (@gnarlycarleigh) on Oct 10, 2014 at 10:17am PDT

More Slappy Slalom

A photo posted by Matt House (@matthouse) on Oct 10, 2014 at 6:30pm PDT

Woke up late and had to hustle to slappy slalom. People were already going off. The hill seemed steeper then I remembered. I dorked around on the bottom for awhile just doing slappy crooks on one curb. I did a lot of standing when I would go to the top because there were so many people. I would eventually get a few runs that made my day. They were super tech. Boardslide a curb, slappy tail the wood box, boardslide the long pvc slider and then early grab off the launch ramp. Man that was fun. Did the same starting with slappy crook. May have also added a manual to it. Documenting what all other people were doing would be crazy. Dave had good slappy crooks and feebles. Matt did a bunch of tricks on the red curb on top of the box. Fuzz was cruising fast. After awhile Matt and I played a game of SKATE. Well, two games. The first one was pretty awesome and the second one took forever. Matt won both and I missed treflips every try except before the first game. Then we skated the slalom some more. Carleigh boardslide the long pvc. Rob was doing sick slappies on the first curb. Watching the huck fest over the car was really fun. This event ruled. I didn’t skate a ton, but the little I did felt great. Even just doing powerslides down the hill.

Missed out on most of Slappy Slalom but had a good time over at York street with the FTC posse and this awesome group of peeps! @adamdude @43shifty @crisis_skateboards @_f_u_z_z @cookiegrinder13 @null_skateboards @corpoglenny @hellagnarbrosevelt @matthouse @gnarlycarleigh @jackspanbauer @lindysu1 plus the man of the hour, @rabethica!

A photo posted by Chris Sessions (@chrissessions) on Oct 10, 2014 at 4:45pm PDT

ran out of time

A video posted by Matt House (@matthouse) on Oct 10, 2014 at 4:33pm PDT

Then we went to the nearby DIY slab again for even more fun. John called out the trick up trick on trick off challenge on the little manual pad and we all bought in. It was so much harder then I thought it would be. It was like working out at the gym. Jump, jump, jump! Everyone would get a few. Adam got the kickflip up, on, down challenge. Matt rolled his ankle trying it. I couldn’t quite get it. Fuzz put down quite a few. Front 180 up, f/s halfcab on, front shove off. Ridiculous. Halfcab up, back 180 on, fakie flip off. First try. I got front 180 up, halfcab flip on, back 180 off. Rob had a couple with back 360 of cabs in them. So crazy. John took the cake with the best line with switch ollie up, on, down. None of which the tail hit at all or the wheels really left the ground. It was amazing. Fuzz and I skated the weird spine for a bit. He had a nice bluntslide transfer. I got a little boardslide transfer. Mike stopped by and boardslid it. I got a little front feeble transfer thing.

Then we dorked around on the manny pad some more. Fuzz did a bunch of around the world to manuals. John had the amazingness above. Carleigh worked on manuals. I early grabbed up it. Rob did no comply front shove manual. Crazy. What an awesome day.

I waited at my house for Lazer and Rob to arrive. I waited and waited so i went over to the school and dorked around on the curbs and stairs. The parking lot is so rough it makes actually trying grinds not fun. I did front tail stall shove out, front nose with a weird front 270 out, a few other regular stalls. Tried to ollie down the stairs a few times, but failed.

#rckcrk

A photo posted by Rob Helmstetter (@43shifty) on Oct 10, 2014 at 3:25pm PDT

Rob showed and we picked up Lazer and headed to Rock Creek. I felt disoriented. I was almost getting warmed up on the ramp when Rob started a ledge session that birthday boy Lazer killed. Front nosegrind! He’s 30 now. He also had some really long crooks on the lower ledge. Rob had boardslide, crooks and almost halfcab boardslide. I did noseslide on the top part, crooks on the lower and could not get up to front 50 on tall which was oh so frustrating. We played a game of SKATE that Rob won. I was hyped to have gotten a halfcab one foot in it at least.

Then we went to a nearby ditch where on the very first run Rob lost his board into water. Doh. Lazer was soon to follow. I was starting to think I might escape, but nope. Into the drink. Lazer had some crazy roll ins. Chief showed up around the time my board was finally drying out. I got a line with back feeble, front pivot, kickflip on a bank. Chief killed some slides to fakie. I wish he could have met up sooner, but it got dark so we went to Crisis.

Went to Louisville to meet Rob and his buddy Chris. I got there first and cruised around the park. Took awhile to get back pivot on the bank to curb then joined Rob and Chris in the rink. Flatground started slow for me and landing anything other then kickflip wasn’t going well. That would change though. I didn’t get any long lines, but I did get a lot of my harder ones. Nollie varial flip, nollie treflip, f/s halfcab heel (landed not moving though so maybe it doesn’t really count), treflip. Felt good to skate just flatground. Rob was going for kickflip, b/s flip, halfcab flip. Got close. Had a bunch of back 360s. Chris has pop. Nollie shove was popped high. Saw some boosty halfcabs. We had a good time. Oh yeah, I was wearing the NB+s again. They felt infinitely better then the Etnies vulcs.

Chief in town! So hyped. We headed out later in the evening on a warm evening. We lit up Stonehenge with my car lights. Chief has been recovering from knee surgery so he wanted a mellow spot. When we first got there he said he would be stoked to front 50 it. A whooping 5 minutes later he did front and back 50s easy. I rattled through quite a few of my staples. Got kick back 50, and kick back pivot. Tried for the flip trifecta with kick back tail too, but never got it. Chief threw some backside no complies then started trying it to back tail. He ended up getting quite a few. So sick. He would also get front 50 front 270 out all steezy.

Then we went to Red Curbs. That place rules. It didn’t take long for Chief to line out some long ones. He was having so much fun. He’s been skating for so long and he did his first front 50 front 180 out in a long time. He was doing shove its, long front 50s, back 180s off the curbs. All with patented Chief steeze. He was oozing stoke. Just having so much fun. It ruled. I don’t remember getting a whole lot myself. Then we skated the metal ledge part in the photo. We did a bunch of ride on grinds that were super fun. Chief was doing front 50, front 50 front 180 out, no comply front 5-0 and no comply front tail. I did back 50, back 50 up onto the top, back 50 up then back 180 off. Also some front 50s down it. I was trying those then treflips and didn’t any clean ones. Last trick was back 50 back 180 out. Skating with Chief ruled. Can’t wait to do it again.