After a nice morning with the wife I went out with very little motivation to find something different. And I did, I found this “little” gap that I thought would be fun to ollie. I skated an 8.3 with Indys. It had great pop, that is it. I had a warm up line of kickflip, ollie up a curb, ollie a very tiny gap. Then I tried this gap and didn’t have the guts to commit.

Went to this nearby ‘sorry excuse for a bank to curb’. Not shown are the ruts and worse asphalt you get to ride through. Anyway, I took a little bit to get a front tail. Talked to a snow bro that works at the cannibas place about snowboarding a nearby rail. Then went hucked a couple kickflip axle stalls I thought would work. A million tries later I focused my board like a baby. I was in disbelief I couldn’t land it. Guess it shows why I won Stubborn Of The Year a few years back.

(setup 2/10 8.3 null smoke valley, jessup ultragrip, indy 149 forged hollows with bones medium bushings, 53mm bones stf v1 103a pj, new balance numeric 574 vulc 11.5 half insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

On a really nice day I rolled to Denver and met up with Cass, Kyle and Ryan at a newish DIY spot. It’s got some qps and a curb that are pretty fantastic. Well, the qps are a little gnar for me, but I’m a wuss. Kyle had just done his trick and hurt his back so he was out. Cass was on the slappies right away. Says he just learned them because of this spot. Took me a bit to get the confidence to skate it like a qp like Cass was, but they were really fun. Had an early line of slappy front crook then rock ‘n roll the qp. The glorified f/s kickturn then regular slappy was really fun. I had a b/s flip after too. Ryan had really good slappy feebles and almost got bluntslide to fakie 50. Then we went to York St. It was a pretty fun session although I took too long to do a front slash on the tiny bank to pool coping section followed by front 50 the little slappy curb. I ended up mostly trying to skate the ledge on the outside. Never quite got a front 50, my pop was lacking. A first try crooks made up for it. Ryan had a nice nollie noseblunt on the parking block. I think Cass did halfcab blunt. Fun session.

(setup 3/10 null 8.5/14.25 20 year deck, null jessup ultragrip, thunder hollow lite 149 bones medium bushings, 52mm bones stf v1 103a, new balance numeric 574 vulc blue size 11.5 with half insoles)
(pain level 3/10)

On an absolutely gorgeous Friday I took a little lunch break and met up with Paul and Will at dog park. I started in Xero’s, disliked them and put on some really old and worn down 272s. It was a pretty mellow and weird session. There were a couple of rippers there training. Paul had back 5-0 front 180, 50s, etc. I had a couple crooks I liked, maybe a back 50 on the curb. Will was later. We all hucked switch backside flip for a bit. Alton showed and he did one in like 3 tries. Mine weren’t even remotely close. Paul left and Will and I played a game of SKATE that I think I somehow won on backside flip even though I did the full under rotated tic tac thing. It wasn’t the best session, but it sure was nice to get outside on such a nice day.

(setup 3/10 8.25 null flaherty, jessup ultragrip, thunder 148 hollow lites with bones medium bushings, 53mm bones v1 stf 103a pj, new balance numeric 272 size 12 teal with half insoles)
(pain level 4/10)

After work I met Dave at Frederick after the sun had set and temps had dropped. We somehow ended up on the weird lump of a qp that neither of us liked and skated it for a while. I think Dave had started with the alley up 50 and then did it 5-0 as I tried to learn 50. It was fun though we did a bunch of different variations. The alley oop fakie back 50 was my fav feeling of them. But Dave had done it switch too which I got as well, but he added 5-0 to every variation, also had crooks. I liked the frontside versions too. Then we moved 20 feet away to the bank to curb area. Dave did some 5-0 transfers down into the bank that were gnar. Also some Tiago lines with nollies and switch ollies on the banks and hips and back tails on the bank to curb. I spent a really long time doing a line of fakie flip on the bank, noseslide a hubba, alley oop fakie back 50. Slammed hard on a crooks after that, but the line hyped me up. I spent an hour trying axle stall then treflip flyout and finally got one about 50 tries in. After that I was basically too sore to do anything other than putz around and do some basics. Dave was doing nose stall on the bank to curb then switch 180 slide around to nose manual over the pyramid and getting really close. I tried to skate the ledge to end the session. It didn’t go very well, I could barely ollie as my soreness had taken over.

(setup 5/10 8.25 null flaherty, jessup ultragrip, thunder 148 hollow lites with bones medium bushings, 53mm bones v1 stf 103a pj, new balance numeric 440v2 wide navy size 12 half insoles)
(pain level 7/10)

On a nice Friday got out with a big old guy crew and Sean at Broomfield earlyish in the day. I’m writing this several days later so I don’t remember a whole lot unfortunately. I know I was first one out in a game of SKATE against Paul and Cass. Cass had a good line of halfcab over the parking block to back 180 nosegrind the blue ledge. I think everyone seemed like they were skating decent. Gordon crooks was sick and all the pop on his tricks. Eric front tails and front lips were cool. Bratcher with the nollie tricks on the blue curb. Cass did like a million kickflips. Paul back 50 front 180 out on the bank to ledge was cool. Sean nollie back nosegrind first try. I don’t recall anything from me really, the front 50 into the bank was once again more difficult than it should be.

(setup 5/10 null 8.5/14.25 20 year deck, null jessup ultragrip, thunder hollow lite 149 bones medium bushings, 52mm bones stf v1 103a, new balance numeric 440v2 navy size 12 with half insoles and currex runpro insoles)
(pain level 4/10)