Somehow the snow/rain let up and skating was possible after I got off work. I met Jake and Saul at Saul’s. I missed my first scratch grind, but the second one got me hyped. Then I even landed some actual stand up back 50s quickly and things were good. Saul was flowing. His quick grind lines are quite incredible. Jake was attacking the straight wall coping like a man. Also airing the hip, frontside grinds the deep, front disaster. I tried a bunch of front feebles on the brick section, but never got one. Fun session, I need to skate there more.

setup 8.5 null plant life deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.8 red cast baseplate titanium hanger, venom 88a big bushing 91a small bushing flat washer top, 52mm spitfire f4 99a classic shape with all washers outside the wheels, es accel slim plus gray size 12, xero thin insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

Pretty much right after work I met up with Dave at the new meetup spot on campus. There was gravel everywhere from the recent snow so we moved on right away after Dave shoed me up with a nollie back tail on the curb. Ha. Actually he had been doing it for awhile waiting for me and it was the first thing I tried. We moved on to the little yellow “ledge”. It must be a “ledge” if it has angle iron right? I had new shoes, some Es Accel Slim Plus shoes. I was trying anything to reduce knee pain. They were a big odd, but felt good and my knee pain was less severe so maybe they did the trick. Anyway, we did some tricks. We mostly started with nose jib 270s and stuff. I managed a nollie back tail first try, take that Dave! Ha. We would go on to get a lot. I had crooks, crooks fakie, front 50, nollie front tail 270 shove (maybe a gleNBD?), kind of a nosegrind 180 with the back wheels dragging around, front 5-0 to front board (not much grind if any), remotely close to kick back 50 and front 5-0 kickflip. I couldn’t do a back 50 to save my life though. Dave had nollie back tail, front 50 back 180, switch crooks fakie, switch front crooks fakie, crooks, crooks fakie, back 50, back 50 back 180 (one with a super bad slam to elbow that I can’t believe he kept skating), and super close to halfcab crook to fakie. Way too close. Dave was getting frustrated. We moved on. To the new business building area. The lights were alright, not great, but it was fun. We started with some kickturns on the bank and checked out the spot. We put the table after the bench. It was so much harder and scarier than we thought it would be. I did a million rocks before I finally ollied onto it. Dave had beat me with his amazing cab kickturns then ollie on. I played around with some side rocks and axle stalls with lines too. Almost ollied onto a lower ledge then off a tall drop over a rail, but chickened out. Dave’s front tail was unreal. We played around at the bottom of the new area too. Dave did a cool ride on to ollie on to drop down. I tried to ollie the six stair gap thing (height of 6, distance of 3), but chickened out and just caused pain for myself. That spot is like a skatepark. Fun times with Dave, we skated for a really long time.

(setup 8.5 null plant life deck, jessup ultragrip, venture 5.8 red cast baseplate titanium hanger, venom 88a big bushing 91a small bushing flat washer top, 52mm spitfire f4 99a classic shape with all washers outside the wheels, es accel slim plus gray size 12, xero thin insoles)
(pain level 4/10)