A photo posted by carleigh samson (@gnarlycarleigh) on Jan 26, 2015 at 8:15pm PST

On an unseasonably warm evening in the 50s I went to the dimly lit St Julien spot. I was to meet Jack and Carleigh. I started doing laps. Front 50, back 50. I had finally retired my previous pair of Stratfords and was rocking a new pair. Since I’ve skated only this shoe for a long time they felt fine. I added front 50 180 out and a manual on the ledge. Jack and Carleigh had shown. Jack was super sore from the day before. He isn’t 20 anymore. He’s 22. Ha ha! He still did some manuals all easy tailblock slides and front 5-0s. Carleigh mostly skated flatground. Did some nollie shoves, tailblock slides and noseslides. We pushed and walked for awhile. Jack and I ollied a little gap. Ok, Jack ollied it easy. I took a bunch of tries to do a weak stretched out no pop ollie where I landed sideways. Lastly we ended up at the new ledge spot. It’s sick. Jack and Carleigh got cute and did doubles. Jack did front board to manual. Carleigh did boardslide. Then some steezy noseslides. Then tried noseslide shove and front 180 nosegrind. Jack had front 50’d it super easy when we got there. I wanted that. But the shortness of the ledge weirded me out. I had to settle for going in slow and sideways and just doing a little stall. A front noseslide made me feel better at least. Then I had to split to pick up India.

(setup 8″ venture lows bones med bushing ricta crap 51mm wheels)

When I went to work a few hours ago it was cool out, but sunny and no breeze and it felt nice out. So when I skipped out of work to Blue Skies and was met with a very gusty cold wind I got bummed. I still went to the park, but man it was tough to find any motivation. I slammed on a couple ollies over the flat bar, did some super slow front 50s then mostly just skating the banks. I started with a few basics on the main bank. Did a switch ollie to fakie which felt kind of neat. I did some frontside ollies and ollies to fakie on the little qp. I was hyped on the ollies to fakie because I’ve never really done that trick. They weren’t popped at all, but then again nothing I do is. I would do the ollie to fakie then push switch to the main bank and do halfcab or try halfcab flip. That was it. Oh yeah, I started a new pair of Stratfords. Only 4 more pairs left.

After work I went to the Research Center. It was cold and windy still, but not quite as cold somehow. I went through a few warm up basics. Noseslide, switch noseslide (the slappy non ollie kind aka john brandow), etc. Then on to crooks which is really fun there. I only landed a couple though. For how often I skate that spot and try crooks there I should land way more then I do. At least I feel like I’m posting up better then I used to. Got a couple bad back 50s. Tried kick back 50, got kind of close. That ledge would be one of the taller ledge I’ve done that on. Tried to front 50 the tall part of the ledge and struggled so hard. Would fly off my board. In the end I got one and I will blame brand new shoes for the problem (it sounds legit right?). Flatground went ok. Tried a lot of nollie flips, fakie tres. Did a couple b/s flips. Kind of a whatever session, but at least I got out and did some grinding.

Flatground Friday #scenesfromwhereifalldown

A photo posted by glen gillinghammer (@corpoglenny) on Dec 12, 2014 at 10:08am PST

Flatground Friday! This time with some new shoes. Another pair of Stratfords from the stockpile. I feel like I’ve been blowing through shoes, but I’m still getting 3 weeks out of these which is about as good as it gets for me. I started a little slow, but ended up feeling pretty good. Got through a lot of the basics in first or second try (first try nollie varial flip!). Struggled a bit with 360 flips as always. Did the worst nollie tre ever. Slammed hard enough on a fakie treflip that someon walking their dog nearby asked if I was ok. Tried some new trick. Not close on switch flip or nollie f/s flip. Landed on fakie double flip and shot out. Super close to fakie hardflip. Almost some really good f/s halfcab heels. Some really good for me heelflips.

Okay so now that I was down to skate lows again I stopped by Meta to get a new set after work. The hanger’s I had were really worn down and apparently so old that the mold was different (pre-DLX) and they didn’t fit right in my newer baseplate. I traded in a set of trucks that Reed had given me. Then I went to old faithful – the research center. I had about 30 minutes to skate and just hit the ledge. Didn’t skate it too well, but I attribute that mostly to having already skated earlier in the day and being incredibly hungry. I got one good crooks, a sloppy back 50 or two, struggled for front 50s. I forgot how good the low trucks carve. They carve better then the highs. Flip tricks were whatever.

Skated the Sol ramp with @nolancormier this evening. Totally embarrassing. #ripper

A video posted by glen gillinghammer (@corpoglenny) on Nov 11, 2014 at 7:48pm PST

Went to the Sol ramp after work to talk bidness with Nolan. I played foosball with Allan for quite awhile first. Then we hit the ramp for a really mellow session. I didn’t do much of anything other then axle stalls. Nolan being mellow is still really good (see above). Oh yeah, I had new shoes, since my experiment with some 11.5 Stratfords proved they were too big. Doh, guess I can’t stockpile all of the 11.5s too. Gotta make 3 pairs of 11s last until April now (yeah right).

Tis #rampy season

A photo posted by Null Skateboards (@null_skateboards) on Nov 11, 2014 at 6:04pm PST

Had a few minutes before leaving for Murder City Devils to skate. Cleaned up the garage a little and skated for about 20 minutes. I had more fun and landed more tricks then I expected. Front tail, feeble, smith, disaster. Back 5-0 fakie (my poor impression of the trick), fakie pivot fakie, fakie Joe Hamilton, fakie 5-0s, front d to fakie. I did quite a few tricks that felt in more control then normal. I did several flatground kickflips to help break in the shoe. These shoes are a half size too big. They are a test to see if I like them enough to add all the 11.5s at Sol, Meta, 303 to my stash of 11s.

It was so nice out. I normally go to the gym around 10am at work for about 45 minutes, but it was just too nice out. I went to the nearby “rollerblade park” and skated for about 45 minutes. It was hot out. I had a new board after my idiocy last night. 8.1 this time. Felt good. I kept it pretty mellow. Mostly just skated slow trying flip tricks and the occasional ledge trick. At one point I had a halfcab flip, 360 flip (over 40 make) and then a nollie 360 flip (over 80 make). Ha. Was hyped. Was really missing vulc shoes though. They are just so much better for skating. Gotta do this instead of the gym more often, it was quite fun.

After work, a nap, laundry, I went to Crisis to meet up with our old guy crew for Denver Tuesdays. I was first so Fuzz and I sat and watched a video while disagreeing over everything except how rad Ty Bealls part is in the A-Street video. Ha. Dave and Rob showed and we drove to Cherry Creek to a parking garage called “Cherry Curbs”. Money. And it exceeded all expectations. We mostly skated this crazy manny pad with all kinds of weird angles that you can go into/out of grinds. I was the last on the manual to front 50 train. Actually, I’m not sure if I even did it without tilting. Rob did it with no comply and one foot as well. Fuzz got tech with heelflips up, switch back 180s, noseslides pop ups. Dave did front 5-0 to nose manual and manual body varial. Rob had such a steezy nose manual front 180 out. I was trying a quick foot combo of manual then nose manual to grind. Unfortunately we got the boot. At least we got awhile on it.

@corpoglenny

A photo posted by Rob Helmstetter (@43shifty) on Oct 10, 2014 at 9:41pm PDT

After some spot lurking we ended up here for a fun brief session under Fuzz’s headlights. Well, Fuzz’s truck’s headlights. Fuzz and Dave did some soft rocks/pivots. I did the standard kickflip to fakie and fakie flip. Then we all did early grabs off it and Fuzz and I did bonelesses.

Epic skate night. Old dudes skating past last call. Work is gonna suck in a few hours. @crisis_skateboards @43shifty @fullertrron

A photo posted by glen gillinghammer (@corpoglenny) on Oct 10, 2014 at 1:42am PDT

Then we ended up at this gem of a spot. It had this little slappy ledge, then a short long ledge after, then down the street a little another ledge with a gnar option. Dave did some ultra smooth switch slappies. Rob had slappy then nollie lipslide. I had slappy, bad crooks, then almost boardslide on the further ledge. Fuzz almost got to the gnar option with a front 50, but we got kicked out. Doh.

We ended up at the newish college spot downtown with the long marble manny pads. Everyone got manuals except me (nothing new there). It seemed like really fun place to skate. As I was just getting warmed up again it started raining.

A photo posted by Rob Helmstetter (@43shifty) on Oct 10, 2014 at 12:09am PDT

So we went to the RTD garage. Fuzz and I didn’t think we would skate at all, but I guess Rob and Dave were shredding hard enough to get us off our tired butts. Rob was seriously ripping. Manuals at high speed, nose mannies, lots of energy hopping up/off the ledges. Back 50 around the corner to shove out. Whoa! Fuzz was on the high speed tip too with a long manual that opened a little emergency phone case. Pretty funny. He also had good fakie 50s with and without halfcabs out. I just did crooks. But I did a lot of them. Some long ones on the main ledge and a few through the corner which felt really neat. As usual Dave was the last man standing. He did all kinds of moves. Front 5-0 through the corner, boardslide to fakie then switch front noseslide. Front board to fakie. Crooks and ended it with a really good switch crooks.

Got home around 2:30 am stoked and feeling very alive. Thanks for the good time dudes.

Went to Lafayette for a short session after work. It was super nice out. When I got there Blake was there. Super hyped to see him. Matt met up too. I had new shoes. Another pair of the NB+ Startfords. They skated pretty good out of the gate. I haven’t seen Blake skate in awhile and he was ripping. Long slappy willy grind on the bank curb. You can tell he skates there a lot. Matt treflipped up the euro pretty quick. My legs were feeling beyond horrible. Basically the only thing I did the whole time that felt worth a crap was a flatground treflip slightly before Matt did a switch treflip. Matt had some good lines with like front lips on the marble flat bar, back tail the back of the toilet bowl ledge. Blake has moves. Good seeing him again.

Stuck working on a Friday night. Ugh. Managed to see most of Ollie’s football games. Then went for a brief skate to the research center. I started near the Max rail and it ruled. I had new shoes (Etnies RCT) and a new 8.25 deck with my old Venture wides. Yeah, so in Portland there were several times where I felt like my board was too small. So I figured it’s time to try the bigger setup again. This time only 8.25 and Ventures instead of Indy. It felt decent. I started with a line of noseslide coming up the handicap ramp, boardslide a curb, then front 180 up the two stair. It’s a dorky spot, but really fun because you have to curve around all crazy. Then I had a super fun line. Firecracker the two stair, ride down the mess of long stairs, kickflip on flat, no comply 180, start doing down the hill, switch front 180, back 180 (felt really good with the bigger setup), turn around, ollie up the curb, crooks the ledge, then manual the long pad. But I ended up falling on the landing of the manual. I laughed then looked up and saw this awesome view.

I skated the ledge for awhile. Locked into some crooks, didn’t land many of them. Did one back 50. Went to try some flippers, but my achilles is still hurting so bad that I stopped.

Feeling pretty arthritic and only wanting to skate tranny I hit up Darin to see if he was skating his ramp. Darin’s friends Ivan and Ben joined. Darin didn’t skate much as he was hungover. He did grace the ramp with a bunch of his patented rock to willy tricks. I started out pretty slow bailing a lot of basics. But there were a few highlights like a first try f/s beanplant, a few front tails and front smiths. I bailed a lot of front 50s though and couldn’t quite put down the fakie pivot fakie. Ivan and Ben learned acid drops. Ivan kind of destroys it and Darin filmed this.

So yeah that pretty much summarizes Ivan’s skating minus the really long and fast grinds. Fun session although I was still pretty sore. I went to Crisis after and hung with Fuzz and John for quite awhile. It was cool. Then John and I went to Broomfield park for a mellow session. I had some new shoes. Emerica Leo Laced. I had them because my Es Accents are broken in perfect for Portland and I didn’t want to ruin them. These are cupsoles, and not as flexible as the original Laced. Oh well. We did a lot of slappy noseslide back 270 out attempts. Neither getting close, but they seemed possible if we kept working on them. We played a game of SKATE with Will and John killed it. He landed more tricks then he normally does. I was first out and blame the new shoes (ha). I then spent a long time trying treflips and eventually landed one. That was pretty much it. Fun times.

Felt like crap yet again. Had the day off work and had gone for a hike with Liz and taken two naps. Still didn’t feel well though. Dave called after work and was in Boulder and wanted to skate. I stubbornly agreed and went to meet Dave at the Mikes Camera manny pad. Wow the asphalt sucks there now. I was feeling super out of it. Took me like 10 tries to get a manual. I did a nose manual first try though. Remotely close to a switch front 180 mannny. Dave showed up and after a manual agreed we should go check out the rainbow ledge. It was pretty dark, but we went for it anyway. Dave had a really long boardslide pop out. I had a short boardslide pop out. I also had some noseslides and a line with a front board pop out and an ollie down the 4 stair. Oh yeah, I was wearing my glasses which partly explains why I was out of it because I have pink eye. Ugh. I also had a new pair of Es Accents. This pair a half size larger that I’m trying to get broken in for Portland. Gonna get this pair dialed in and if they start to blow out too much wear the smaller pair before the trip. How boring is this to read about?

Then we went to look at the jersey barrier, but it was too dark to skate so we hit these parking blocks for awhile. We did all kinds of stall tricks. Dave did back 180 nosegrind, back 180 nosegrind to forward, back feebles, back feebles almost with back 180 or body varial out, front disaster, maybe front hurricane, probably a bunch more. I tried a bunch of front pivot kickflips out, but never got it. Managed a front 180 front truck pivot, hurricane stall to forward the long way, several feeble stalls which hyped me up since I have never really done feebles. We had a blast and I didn’t seem to make myself feel worse.