Up pretty early and needing to go to my moms in Buena Vista I setup a skate date at Golden. Jake, Kevin, Cass. Jake brought a new Dave. Ted was randomly there. Jaixon from Bluecar met up, but didn’t skate. Out of the gates I felt very off on my board, mostly because I had hit the wall with the Splay shoes as skate shoes. Jake on the other hand was shredding right away as was Kevin. In different ways, but still shredding. Jake got a run of front rock a steep little qp, ollie up the kicker, f/s flip the bank. Kevin did something then ollie up then nollie f/s flip. Dave had impossibles to fakie on the banks every time. Cass did a perfect hardflip on flat after saying he had lost them. I had some crooks on the tall ledge, but couldn’t get the noseslide after. I had to go pretty quickly to get up to the mountains in time.

After spending way too long at AT&T helping my mom buy a new phone I went to the Salida park in the remaining sunlight. There was a couple people that could ride skateboards, but mostly kids playing with scooters with no idea that skaters were trying tricks. Argh. I posed some tricks, slid out fierce on the slippery concrete after a boardslide, landed my silly switch front nose first try. It took me way too many tries to get a kickflip over the perfect hip and the one I got felt like a miracle. Totally over the Splays. I got a noseslide on the tall bump to ledge. Ended with a fun line of boneless over the a-frame rail then kickflip to fakie the mellow bank. Man that park is slippery. Not the best park, not the worst. Didn’t hit the bowls at all.

(setup 8.25 nullosaur, jessup ultragrip, 5.2 venture lows venom 91a bushings, 1/16 riser, 51mm f4 101a spitfire classic shape 2 washers inside, splay freestyle grey size 12 nb# custom insoles)
(pain level 6/10 these barefoot shoes are not meant for skating)

After work I went behind the school since it was already dark and there is a section that’s lit okay. I had put together an 8.25 with venture 5.2 lows again because, well, I hate how heavy even the hollow Indy mids are. I attempted a couple slappies, but they didn’t really work so I just went back to the school. I did some warm ups then went into sucking. I definitely hit a wall with skating in the Splay shoes. The flick is just so inconsistent. I did some kickflips and stuff, took forever to get a fakie flip. Could not for the life of me do a heelflip. It was miserable. At one point I had a fakie flip followed by a halfcab flip as my only bright spot. Which is such a bummer considering how those tricks didn’t used to feel like highlights, just warm ups. I landed on a few heelflips, but never rolled away. I hucked some fakie and switch varial flips. Got a b/s flip and fakie bigflip. Close to a few others, but yeah, that’s it. 1 hour and only 4 flip tricks. Somehow I left not wanting so shoot myself, but rather was motivated to try skate flatground more.

(setup 8.25 nullosaur, jessup ultragrip, 5.2 venture lows venom 91a bushings, 1/16 riser, 52mm f4 99a spitfire classic shape 2 washers inside, splay freestyle grey size 12 nb# custom insoles)
(pain level 4/10 these barefoot shoes are not meant for skating)