The vacations and weddings are over so the #theglenandjosholdfartlongdistanceinstagramtricksuperchallenge #andnate game is back on! Up first is my first 'real' back lip ever as challenged by @the_neviathan. Next trick is a no comply big spin on a bank. Or @boredzinejp if you want to do it on vert that's cool. The fall was pretty funny because I fell and then my board nailed @fullertrron. The old guy struggle was real today.

A video posted by glen gillinghammer (@corpoglenny) on Aug 9, 2015 at 4:30pm PDT

A few more from today's junk jam struggle fest. @fullertrron

A video posted by glen gillinghammer (@corpoglenny) on Aug 9, 2015 at 7:02pm PDT

I got to the spot first. My arthritis was still kicking something fierce, so I started with just pumping the bank. Then manualling the bank. Then doing the little wallie to manual which was way too fun. I did it a bunch of times and that’s what I was doing when Dave showed up. Dave brought a new manny pad/PVC coping manny pad! I had some fun lines doing ollie over the wallie thing on the bank then nose manny on the manny pad. Back 50s and 5-0s were fun on it too. Dave was trying to front smith it for awhile. He did a really good front 5-0 once, had an awkward fall during the roll away and somehow kicked the ground hard enough to likely break his toe. No! Somehow he skated through it though. Unbelievable! We arranged things in different ways for awhile. We had a wallride going for awhile. I actually beat Dave to landing it, but I think it was because it had slid down a little and wasn’t as vertical. I was still hyped though. I tried kickflips to fakie for awhile. I wanted to get 3 in a row, but it didn’t happen. Argh. Dave got a really good one and a switch front shove. I did a front shove while turning backside. I’m not sure what you would call it. Then I started trying hardflips which were kind of a kickflip to fakie body varial, but they felt really cool. I never got both feet on it. Then we put the manny pad on top of the bank. I took a long time to just wallride and come off of it (both f/s and b/s). Dave did those easy, felt out front 5-0 and back 50 then settled for the back scratcher above. That was the end of the session. Both of us had frustrating sessions, but we skated and tried stuff so it was still fun.

(setup 8.1 null venture lows thunder bushings 52mm stf v3 nb# pj stratford 533 cream)

Picked up Jack and met Riley, Garret and Scotty at Crisis. Did some business, hung out for a bit then went to Broomfield park. My arthritis was still kicking fierce. I didn’t do anything I was hyped on and I flailed at a lot of tricks I normally do first try (like front feeble on the quartapotty). Everyone else ripped it though. Jack had some cool unique tricks, Riley slays everything in there, Scotty mixes nollie noseslides in with eggplant attempts (does it get any radder then that combo?) and Garret gets better every time he skates. Then we went to the Broomfield hubba. While Riley was warming up I tried some slappies and didn’t do so well. Riley got his trick. So sick! Then we went to a school out in Arvada. It has a rainbow ledge that you can ride on to. You can go either way, but regular foot backside doesn’t have much runway and it’s pretty much impossible to grind the whole thing. Garret had some rad slappy crooks to fakie. Jack went as far backside as you can. I tried to go over it frontside, but just couldn’t commit to going fast enough. Riley couldn’t ride backside into it. So funny. Then I filmed Riley for awhile on the other stuff there. He killed it super hard. After that Garret and Scotty skated the ledge while I skated some flatground. I was hyped my legs were kind of working. The session ended after Scotty did an absolutely perfect hardflip late flip. So rad!

(setup 8.1 null venture lows thunder bushings 52mm stf v3 nb# pj stratford 533 cream)

Feeling really arthritic. Not sure why. Probably the crappy food I was eating in NYC catching up to me, but who knows. I didn’t want to ollie at all and it was too nice out for Rampy. So I went across the street again and skated the little curb. I started with all 4 tip stalls that didn’t involve an ollie. The f/s halfcab nose stall first try kind of surprised me. Then I did all 4 rock ‘n rolls. Then a no ollie front tail to body varial. A halfcab nosestall body varial. This is all dumb stuff right? Gotta have sessions like this to make 300 days. Last was a slappy crook stall then a switch slappy crook.

(setup 8.1 null venture lows thunder bushings 52mm stf v3 nb# pj stratford 533 cream)

For more about the artist Frank Zirbel click here.

Today’s song of the day. This is off of “I’m Wide Awake It’s morning”, one of the few non-Dinosaur Jr albums in my top 10 all time.

Headed to campus trying to find a median with sharp edges to try and learn back lips on for the Instagram game of OLDFART. This wasn’t the one I thought of originally, but worked out just fine. I really like how low it is! Ha ha. I put a few up into it. Then waxed it. Then spent awhile trying to slide a little and got out of it. I landed one! It wasn’t great though so I sent it off to Judge Fullerton for review.

I was happy to have made progress regardless and decided to skate some other stuff for awhile. This was the first time I really street skated again with low trucks on. I loved it! I started with a line of switch front 180 off the sidewalk on the right, ollied up onto the pink ledge and front 180d off then added a fakie flip in for fun. I was already hyped. Going the other way I wallied up. I had two more lines from the far side that really hyped me up. 360 flip on flat, ollie up the ledge, kickflip off (first try kickflip!). I had one 360 flip that bummed me out. I hit the board with my hand somehow mid flip and pulled away as a reaction and punched myself in the forehead. Wow. It bummed me out at the time, but man I wish I had that on video. The 360 flip I got in the line had a hand down, but another one felt incredible. Another line was fakie bigflip, ollie up, front shove off. Going the other way I did front 180 up then switch front 180 off. At this point I was totally stoked on my setup. I’ve proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that a bigger (or smaller) setup doesn’t make me skate better. It’s just up to me. So I might as well skate something that hypes me up when I look at it. Hooray for Venture Lows! Then I went back to work on back lips and got one that felt way better. Nice. Turns out Dave wouldn’t count the first one anyway. I was super hyped. Then I went to skate the long ledge. I tried to film a front 50 kickflip out for awhile and got really close. Then Collin and Craig showed up and I picked up my camera and just skated with them. Collin killed some switch crooks, mad flippers, switch back tail, etc, etc etc. Craig had some rad wallies, ollies, cab over a manhole, etc. I didn’t get much more. An accidental front 5-0, maybe a crooks and couldn’t do back 50. Oh well, fun day.

(setup 8.1 null venture lows thunder bushings 52mm stf v3 nb# pj stratford 533 cream)

I should start doing Song Of The Day again.

Didn’t feel much like skating and didn’t have a whole lot of time as Liz and Ollie wanted to watch a movie. So I went across the street and went back to the little curb that I have fun messing around on. I wish the asphalt wasn’t so bad in the front area so I could wax up a section of yellow curb. Oh well. I had an alright time. Did a few basic stall tricks including kickflip axle stall. Couldn’t get kick back tail or kick pivot. Ended up having more fun doing tricks off the curb. Kickflip, front shove, back shove, slappy b/s flip.

Then I went to the 5 stair which I have said “I should ollie that once a day to get used to stairs again”. I had trouble committing though and once I finally did I splatted pretty hard. It’s hard to get enough speed. Rather then clean it up I went home and we watched War Games. Pretty fun.

(setup 8.1 null venture lows thunder bushings stf v3 52mm nb# pj stratford 533 cream)

Warm day, nice night. Jake came over around 6:30 and we went to meet Jack and Ladd at “Jack’s spot”. But when we got there they had left. Oh well Jake and I skated it anyway. It took us awhile before we could even hit the qp. We tried ollieing up the curb like Jack does, but it didn’t work for us. We eventually dragged the heavy sign that Jack used to kickturn on and were able to find a way to throw down with enough speed for the qp. This spot is 1000x worse and harder then it looks in these photos. The cracky lump right before the qp really throws you off and the lack of setup time is so hard. With that said it took Jake and I a long time before any trick was landed. We both got rock ‘n rolls to start. Then front rocks followed shortly after that. I added a feeble and an axle stall after a bit longer and then somehow managed a front axle stall. I was hyped. I could have kept skating it, but Jake was understandably over it. We went back to my house and played a game of SKATE in front of my house. It ended up being a long one with some surprises from both of us. I got 360 flip first try. Jake got heelflip and I couldn’t seem to land a heelflip. I landed a lot of the tricks Jake normally gets a letter on me like fakie f/s bigspin (aka the Creepy Spin), fakie 360 shove, nollie f/s bigspin and f/s flip. I hucked a few tricks like f/s halfcab heel, fakie tre, varial heel. Only the fakie tre was close. I would eventually win after getting tricks like fakie bigflip and b/s flip.

(setup 8.1 null venture lows thunder bushings 52mm stf v3 nb# pj stratford 533 cream)

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Feeling tired from traveling and skating/walking so much the previous two days. My obsession over low trucks again led me to switch Venture hangers to some lows. Thanks JP for triggering the thought that my favorite setup in recent times was with lows. So now I’m on lows again. Yippee. I went out in the street thinking I would just push a little and adjust my trucks. I ended up at the little curb behind the school across from my house (far right in the photo). I did a few basic stalls and it felt fun. Tried some back disasters that weren’t so fun because I can’t get close. Got a kick back tail stall. Did some front crook stalls that were fun and eventually got a front crook shove out. That’s a new one! Tried kick back axle stall to varial flip out. Landed on it. Tried more kick back tails with the goal of doing a shove out, but didn’t get another one. Was trying front smith or front pivot to kickflip out and ended the night with a great feeling front pivot kickflip out. Failed at a couple treflips on the 5 push ride home.

(setup 8.1 null venture light lows thunder bushings 52mm stf v3 nb+ pj stratford cream)