New Drill Set: 2.1

After going to bed at 1am (post skate session), I was up at 6am yesterday, skating less than a half mile down the street to work on a tv show that rhymes with “Sleigh’s Slanatomy.” ABC Prospect studio. Favorite show to work on.

Long days, late tired sessions
Title says it all. Each night I cut into my sleep by a couple hours to go skating. I never really regret it, but I sure miss the sleep when I’m up before dawn to work. Since I can’t go back to irresponsible childhood, I’m pushing forward toward financial -and schedule- freedom.

On the grounds of ABC’s Prospect Studios, in Los Feliz (A few blocks east of Hollywood, up by the mountains). Perfect manual pad. Not happening right beside the security station. On the clock. Today.

New drill set
Felt I needed to make an adjustment to my skateboard drills. It was wonderful, I see progress, but it was again getting too long. Want more time for playing against curbs and trying even more new stuff. I just reduced each make amount down to only 2. Used to be 25 when I only knew 3 tricks back in March. Then it was 10. Then 3. Now 2. I think I have 21 tricks on this list.

Usually I hyperlink it, but for this first posting about Set 2.1, here’s the full deal. Everything in bold is new to the regiment, including the number of makes.

Drill set 2.1
Regular Ollies
2
Frontside 180 Ollies
2
Backside 180 Ollies
2
Nollies
2
Fakie Ollies
2
Backside Half-cabs
2
Frontside Half-cabs
2
Backside Popshovits
2
Frontside Popshovits
2
Kickflips
2
Heelflips
2
Backside Varial Flips
2
Fakie Kickflips
2
Fakie Heelflips
2
Fakie Varial Flips
2
Half-cab Kickflips
2
Backside 180 Kickflips
2
Frontside 180 No Complies
2
No Comply Impossibles
2
Frontside 360 Ollies
2
Fakie Frontside 180 No Complies
2
Frontside 360 No Complies
2
Fakie Frontside 360 Ollies
2

Another photo from the studio lot. I’ve written over and over how these lots are each like skate parks. This beautiful red curb going down a hill looks like it has never been skated!

The verdict
While I enjoyed the new stuff and the no comply practice of the new drill set 2.1, it felt weird only doing 2 of each thing, like it wouldn’t be enough. Also, because I was so tired from so many long days and late nights, my skating was off. Took me 40 minutes to do this set. During Tre flip practice I learned but didn’t land. That’s fine.

Note on the 360s: I don’t usually go a full 360 unless I’m going off of something, like a curb or sidewalk hip. In these drills however, I am working toward getting that ability, everywhere. So I count it when I land it close to 300 degrees, and when I add that nice feeling front axle pivot that I learned from Aaron Kyro. Just saying.

Ugh, night off
I was super dead exhausted all day today, to the point of not being productive and fearing a cold due to a low immune system. So after work and running around and dinner, I stayed in. Super hard to do. Makes the wife happy though. Happy wife, happy life. Otherwise it would’ve been another 11pm or later session. I want it, but I had to play it responsible. This challenge of juggling priorities is just another aspect of being an adult relearning to skateboard. Almost as hard of the tre flips. For now.

I’ll be pissed if I don’t get to skate tomorrow. That’ll be another challenge of priorities. I was invited by some of the stand-up comedy brass of Hollywood to backstage at their show. These are my peers actually, and I have fallen away temporarily (due to my addiction to skateboarding for sure), but I need to keep my self in the game, so I might have to go suffer through another stand-up comics set. Good news is, the comedy club is right down the street from a bright street light and different manual pad I’ve scoped out in the past!

Another long day, another quick session. Last 2.0 Drill Set.

While commuting to work I transferred busses here at Fairfax and Wilshire. Suiteboarding on this high marble ledge. Where the white car waits for the light in the background is exactly where Notorious B.I.G. was shot and killed.

More tempting suitboarding
I’ve worked on TV gigs over the past few weeks that took place in some of the famous Santa Monica/Venice area school grounds. And yet I was wearing a suit, working. Brought my skateboard too, but it was my bomber board (also an 8″, but with risers and big old soft wheels, for commuting). I was aware that I was a couple of blocks from another school, very similar looking, where Natas Kaupas skated in Streets of Fire and Wheels of Fire. On the way to work I spot hundreds of skate spots. Especially rails along Wilshire. Hence, imagine my craving to skate, but I was on set, working, in a suit. I’ll be back!

While taking a photo of my garment bag for set, and skateboard (above), I missed my bus. So I killed a few minutes by crossing the street to this always empty parking lot and ridable angled wall. I’ll be back!

Squeeeezing in a session. Progress through repetition
I got home at 10pm last night from working on that show Parenthood, had been gone for 16 hours. Hadn’t managed to skate for two consequetive nights, and I was exhausted yet determined to skate. My inspiration always goes back to Mullen and the book, “The Talent Code” by Daniel Coyle. With that in mind I went out and skated from 10:30 until 11:30pm, and only thereafter bought thai food on the corner and ate. I love LA. Got home excited from my session and got 5 hours of sleep.

Location: Rite Aid parking lot. Los Feliz, LA. Western Ave and Franklin.
Duration: One hour exactly. Clocked it.

Drills: Complete Drill Set 2.0.
This was my last 2.0. I changed it after last night.
It was a very smooth hour, with focus on higher pop and a steeper angle of the tail.

Practice Sets
Tre Flips:
Attempts: 25. Makes: 1. Make rate: 4%!
First make in a few sessions. I see the future!
Frontside 180 kickflips
Attempts: 20. Makes: 2. Make rate: 10%
No Comply Impossibles:
3 makes
Fakie Varial Flips
3 makes

I’m writing about the above set on the next day, late in the evening. I just got back from skating again, after another 13 hour workday on set of a TV show. I’ll write about it later! I overhauled my drill set to include new things.

First ever kickflip into a curb trick! (Backside flip into 5-0 axle stall).

Flipping backside into a back truck axle stall!

Saturday October 26
Ridiculous that I’ve been too busy to write notes about my session 4 days ago. Way too much work, way too much adult stuff. That’s pretty much always the challenge for many adults relearning to skateboard.

Duration: Two hours
Location: Fairfax Middle School. Flat ground and manual pad.

Since my good phone was stolen months ago I haven’t been able to record myself skating. No stills grabbed. Decided to bust out the old camcorder, set up the tripod and record a couple clips. On the phone it’s just two steps, a few minutes, but on the camcorder there’s like 10 steps and adds about an hour. Hence the rarity.

Above: Fakie varial flip

Drills
I did a Complete Drill Set 2.0. About to switch this up, add tricks and maybe reduce the makes to 2 per trick. Want to keep it fresh and develop but also have more time for new trick and practice sets at the end. Have been working on doing everything higher and cleaner.

Above: Halfcab kickflip

Practice sets
For some works in progress I track attempts and makes, for other stuff I stubbornly commit to landing 3 each, regardless the make rate based on percentages.

Tre flip practice
Attempts: 25. Makes: 0.
Fronside flip practice
Attempts: 10. Makes: 0
Fakie varial flips
3
No Comply impossibles
3
Fakie 180 frontside no complies
3

Above: No comply impossibe

Breakthrough to first kickflip into a curb trick
So this was huge for me. I’ve repeatedly mentioned how much I craved to flip into something on a curb. Anything. All previous attempts were horrible. However, while practicing 180 backside kickflips I kept noticing that my board consistently would go about 110 degrees of the 180 after flipping properly. I’ve since made adjustments to get them around 180, but in the meanwhile I took advantage of my reliable 110 degree backside flip. I decided to try to do it into a backside tailslide or tailstall. I came very close numerous times. However, as a bi-product I learned that it is way easier to do the flip into a rear axle stall. Looks and feels great. Did about 6 of them. Am still determined to nail the backside flip into a backside tailslide.
If it wasn’t for yoga there is no way in the world I’d still be healthy enough to skate!

Downtown skate dreams and midnight sessions

Perfect wall-riding to be had in the Hollywood/Western station. After the zombie apocalypse this is my destination.

Downtown LA suitboarding
Suitboarding is the term I use when I’m traveling around wearing a suit, wishing I was skating, photographing spots. The only time I’ve ever worn a suit in my life though is: 1) The day I was married. 2) A few occasions when stand-up comedy clubs required me to wear a suit. Lucky I had my suit from my marriage day. 3) The most common: I’m background “acting” as someone on TV who has to wear a suit.

Ledge or manual pad? Depends on the size of the ollie. Either way, it is marble and it is awesome.

Skateboarding with a suit underneath my skate clothes
I just worked a 3 day commercial gig in downtown LA. On the first and third day I actually put on my suit and then put on my baggie cargo pants, hoodie, etc, over the suit. This allowed me to skate commute, and also allowed for a couple of sessions around midnight. After two of my all-day workdays,  I put the suit into a backpack and enjoyed about an hour skate session. Getting home at 1:30am and getting up again at 7am or 8am was tough, but that’s just one of the challenges facing many adults relearning to skateboard.

Suitboarding and skateboarding! On the way to work, about to peel off the skate clothes and play the role (in a commercial) of businessman.

Drills
In one of the sessions I managed to get in a Complete Drill Set 2.0.
In the other session I did everything in another Complete Drill Set 2.0 except the 360 ollies and backside flips and halfcab kickflips.

Each session lasted about an hour. Loved each one.

This building is crying out to be skated upon.

Practice Sets
On one night I didn’t really do practice sets. I focused all my time on the drill sets, and it took longer because I was actively working on playing with the angles to make everything pop higher. The second night, when I didn’t complete the drill set, this left me time for the following:

Tre Flip Practice
50 attempts. Zero makes. I made 4 a couple sessions ago. None since.
Frontside flip practice
25 attempts. Zero makes. I made a bunch a couple session ago, not since.
No Comply Impossibles
5 makes. Didn’t count attempts. These come very easy now. I initially made a few, then none for awhile, and now I feel like I have them down. I just want to adjust the way I bounce my back foot up in the air as I go into the trick.
Fakie Varial Flips
3 makes. Just going for the makes, not counting attempts of these. I’m probably about 20-25%. These will be added to the next complete drill set line-up.

I actually did ride on this side of the building. Suit and everything.

Studio world
I love working on TV and Movie lots. Universal, Warner Brothers, CBS. There’s a ton. One thing they all have in common is that they look like skateparks to me. Only twice have I been allowed to skate inside the studios. Once while running an errand to a wardrobe trailer, and once while being paid to skate on Fox.

An all-marble television studio fills a complete block in downtown LA. It is filled with rails, stairs, curbs and ledges, all for the purpose of being in the background of many different TV shows and movies.

Another spot I’ll never skate. Not just because it is in a TV studio lot, but because I’m 40 and this is out of my league. Can’t help but look and drool though.

Would love to do a lip-slide on this long perfect TV studio piece of granite. This isn’t out of my league.

Studio breakfast after suitboarding
This post is mostly about my commute to and from work, and otherwise relatively standard nights of working on relearning how to skateboard. So to round out the details of my journey, I’m adding the photo below. After skating and taking the train my total commute time is 30 minutes, plus 30 minutes of goofing around with my camera and skateboard. Arriving at the TV studio on most days there is a caterer willing to make any kind of omelet I want, and often a table spread with about 30 other breakfast options. For free! Breakfast, lunch and dinner.

On the day of this post I chose an omelet with an extremely high ratio of basil to fried onion. Skate or die, and Basil or die!

While suited up, my skate clothes and pads (in backpack), wait 12 hours for me to get done and have some fun. Often surrounded by effeminate, snobbish actors, my display of skate stuff is foreign and glared at.

First ever rail slide attempts
After work, I went straight to these rails. I’ll admit these first attempts at boardsliding down rails were pretty weak. I only tried a few times and I didn’t have the balls to stick my board to the rail during the ollies. Instead my board just kind of shot out in front of me. I tried this rail and another one up the side of the building more, at a place where there were a couple more steps. I chickened out because 1) I was thrown off by the way the rail kinks out flat at the end. Probably not a good first rail 2) I wasn’t warmed up at all! I’d been working for 12 hours straight 3) It was dark, but that’s a lame excuse. It wasn’t totally dark. 4) I doubted my ollie, even though I know I can do it.

This rail is closer to my league. I bet that I’ll be able to do it within a year, after I practice straight rails.

The future
I already skated again after this post was drafted. I’ll write about it later if I have time. It was a breakthrough session. As I write this blog, I’m squeezing it in between other work, and I’m quite bummed that it is raining outside. Very rare for LA. I already had to miss skating last night for work and some much needed marriage time. I’m going out of my mind mostly because I feel like I need to really work on my tre flips! I don’t want to lose any of the ground I’ve gained, and it’s already been a couple days. When I was 17 getting more into guitar, writing, partying and girls, I never thought I’d be 40, worrying about my tre flips.

First time landing fakie heelflips

Today
Am grateful for consistent practice. Even if I have to miss every other day, or am 2 on, 1 off, or 1 on, 2 off. Tonight it felt like the board was a lever, very easy to lift and flip. It isn’t always like that. As I’ve written recently, sometimes I’m rusty as hell for the first 20 minutes of each session.

Location: Rite Aid Parking Lot, Los Feliz
Duration: 80 minutes

Drill Sets:
Managed a Complete Drill Set 2.0. Maybe one of my last, as I’ll be upgrading to a 2.1 soon. To include new things I’ve pretty much got down.
Everything was pretty smooth tonight. No hangups. Nollies are easily my weakest trick. Eventually they will be feautured as one of my practice sets.

Beautiful marble. Surprised the skate stoppers are still on it.

Practice Sets
Tre Flips
50 attempts, 3 makes! Make rate: 6%
Slow and steady, tons of failure, it will pay off. Tonight felt amazing. Total focus on micro steps and timing within them. Total awareness of every muscle, motion and direction. Right now it’s about the synchronicity of the front and back foot. Have gotten to the point where the 360 scoop is coming more natural, so it’s time to focus on the next step.

Frontside flips
Recently learned it’s not cool to call the 180 frontside kickflips. Attempts: 25. Makes: 5! Make rate: 20%
Focused on a higher cleaner ollie to start with. Super fun.

Marble ledge, long protected by these stoppers.

The following tricks are incubating for  a drill set:

Fakie Varial Flips
3 makes

No Comply Impossible
3 makes

First fakie heelflips
3 makes
The heelflips felt so good, so many days in a row, I decided to seize the moment and try them fakie. Within a few minutes I landed 3 beautiful fakie heelflips first ever for me!

Saw another skater pass by here the other night. He was regular footed, like me, approached this curb, did a slappie (backside) on the top lit flat part, and rode it all the way down around the curved part. It was beautiful!

Tomorrow
16+ hour day days, the next two in a row. 5 hours sleep! 2 jobs. If I can skate I will! Bummer if I don’t, but to be Zen and defeatest at the same time: It is what it is.

 

 

Text

Awesome Super Geek YouTube Skate Support Guy

The YouTube profile I’m psyched about is “Slowmomike.” I’m linking it here!
The way he describes things is completely up my alley. He answers the questions I’m thinking about, points out things I’ve never heard, and they directly help me. We think alike, and he’s way better than I am, so I am extremely excited to watch all of his many videos. I already benefitted a ton from the below tre flip troubleshooting link, that was the night before last night. I landed one. I haven’t even skated since I just watched the other video, and I am already in serious anticipation of my session tonight.
Tre Flip How-To Video.
Tre Flip Common Problems Troubleshooting
Am also a big fan and quite reliant upon all the troubleshooting vids from Aaron Kyro of Brailleskateboarding.com. I’ve gained more from his vids than from anywhere else. Check it out on YouTube!

Last night
After watching some of those videos I squeezed in a session starting at almost 11pm. Irrational.
One hour.
Complete drill set 2.0
Tried 50 tres didn’t land any. Still, the videos helped. There’s promise in these attempts.
Tried 10 frontside flips, didn’t land any.
Played with manuals.
Was a squeeze play set, as is this post.

Killer session. Huge inspiration from past blog posts.

I was irrationally excited to return to the Rite Aid in Los Feliz. I skated over 100 hours there over the summer – I estimate, and didn’t know I’d return.

The blog has paid off!
The other day I reread the first couple months of this blog (January and February, 2013. Nine months ago). Holy shit it blew my mind to see the struggle, patience and growth.

Some things haven’t changed. I’m still totally stoked to learn. Still suck at transition, still not ready, or too chicken, for rails, or anything too big or too fast. Already been injured enough. Still prefer to skate alone at night. While I love it and blog it, skating is a very private thing otherwise. Maybe it’s that I just don’t skate well with other folks around, and I’m a hard critic. Or I’m not used to the pads yet, make me feel like a leper.

Those posts reminded me not to take anything for granted.

When I first started relearning to skateboard, I could ollie, 180 frontside ollie, shovit (not popshovit), nollie-popshovit (don’t ask me why). That’s it. That was about last September. However, I count my real “start again” date as the end of October because until then I was borrowing a mix-matched old set up: 7.5 board, no tail, with 7.75 trucks, no bushings, and 20 year old bomber wheels. On October 20 last year I got an 8″ deck, and it took until the beginning of November for me to afford the right size trucks and wheels.

Little ledge across the street from my business on Melrose Avenue. These cool street obstacles are everywhere!

The thrilling struggle, and more to come!
My drills and practice sets, now very long and variable, used to consist of only  “100 popshovit attempts. Zero makes. 100 kickflip attempts, 1 make.” Over and over. Then it grew. I learned Kickflips by the middle of Febrary, but they were old 80s style, not conducive to grow upon. (Side and downkicking the front foot). I had them up to about a 75% make rate before I realized I had to start over with a brand new foot action. At the end of February I was down again to a 0% make rate. Hundreds and hundreds of attempts. Varial flips, weeks of zero makes, hundreds of attempts. Then there would be one landing of one of the tricks. And then not again for a couple of weeks. Just hundreds of non-makes while seriously trying.

I wish to put the same amount of patience and persistence into my struggle with tre flips, and to learn how to incorporate all these tricks into curb tricks, grinds and slides, and eventually get them up onto ledges. After I round out my catalogue of all these flips tricks, I have a life ahead of me to get them smooth, with cool combinations. But first, get that tre!

The Practice
Last night was my first night staying back up in Los Feliz. It was an unexpected return to an old ‘hood where I skated nightly over the summer. I knew exactly where to go: Rite Aid. Smooth lot. Well lit, nobody cares. I’ve been putting in very full days working on our business, so it was a no brainer reward for me to go skating.

Duration: 80 minutes.

Pros: Great skate spot. Plus I’d watched an awesome tre support video, and it gave me some encouragement to examine tres with a different perspective.Cons: No cons. Well, I’d have loved a manual pad, but I could skate for a decade on flat ground and not get bored.

Drills
I managed to practice a Complete Drill Set 2.0. Everything was super smooth, and it went down in record time: 30 minutes. Took 10 tries to get my first heelflip, but then I got 3 makes consecutively, each one high and tight. Got the 180 backside flips and half cab kickflips with only a few extra attempts each. The nollies and frontside 360 ollies took the longest, but they are progressing. Also goofed around with nose manuals.

In an earlier post I actually made a chart of my varial flip progress! How geeky and encouraging for tres!

Practice Sets
These are developing and changing. Eventually they’ll get incorporated into a different Drill set. It would be so long I’d have to only do 2 makes of everything. I can’t believe how much I just kept banging out sets of 3 of so much super fun skating. The only thing I didn’t do was 360 non complies. I tried for about 5 minutes at the end, but I ran out of time. I was honing back in on it after not really doing those since the late spring.

Below, in some cases I just did 3 makes instead of tracking it based on percent. Just like with drills. The sets of 25 are for my weakest links.

Tre Flips
25 attempts, 1 make. Make rate: 4%

180 Frontside kickflips
25 attempts, 1 make. Make rate: 4%

No Comply Impossible
3 makes

180 Frontside No comply
3 makes

Fakie 180 Frontside No comply
3 makes

Fakie 360 Frontside Ollies
3 (Some were 270+ rotation, with a revert. Still learning).

Fakie Varial Flips
3 makes

Fakie Tre Flips
10 attempts. Zero makes. After I felt like I had a breakthrough with the technical side of tre flips, I thought I would just see what it felt like fake. To my great surprise, it was super feasible! 3 out of 10 made the complete rotation and spin and ended up exactly where it needed to be. I just wasn’t high enough in the air to catch them, I didn’t expect them to even be there! A few other attempts where in the right neighborhood. I don’t know if I’ll commit to learning these until after I get tres down rolling forward. However, it will be fun to play with them from time to time.

Notes
1. Was super stoked to land that one tre flip. It’s the first one I’ve landed since the end of August. Now that I’m getting heelflips down, and now that my living and working situation is getting into a better routine, I can focus again on tres. I want to give super credit to the skate support video I saw on YouTube, by slowmomike. The part of this video that helped me the most was where he says to scoop and kind of kick the board with the back foot, to go almost straight up! Yeah he showed it going around in the backside direction, but he made it seem as though he was trying to kick it under toward where the nose was at the beginning of the trick. Meanwhile the nose rises almost to a vertical position while the front foot gives it a full slide. Good video. I had quite a few attempts that came close because of it. Super helpful tre flip video.

Looking back, looking forward

Back again, BOA at Fairfax and Melrose

Today
Got in a tight 80 minutes while my wife taught class. Third practice in a row wherein I couldn’t believe I was skating on such tired legs and busy mind. Started slow and then BOOM, I was into it, 100% focused and energized.

Drills
Managed to get in a complete drill set 2.0. The nollies and backside 180 kickflips remain the weakest. Today noticed an improvement in my backside 180s as well as nollies. Everything really.

Practice sets
Tre flips
0-25. Some attempts got around correctly and I caught them with one foot. Promissing.
Frontside 180 Kickflips
2-23: Make rate 8%.
No Comply Impossible
2-23. Make rate 8%
Fakie Varial Flips
5-20. 20% Make rate.

3rd or fourth tube of shoe goo. Same shoes.Got black this time.

I reread my first 15 blog entries today. Inspires me for the future. Big time. I’ll write more specifics about it next time!

First time landing a Frontside 180 kickflip and a Fakie varial flip!

Plan A (Manual pad) had cars around it. Plan B, Bank Parking lot nearby.

Last night
I was so exhausted from the early morning and long day, I almost didn’t skate. I had to remind myself that I always get a second wind on my skate, no matter how heavy my legs are and how sluggish my brain.
Duration: One hour, from 11pm to midnight.
Location: A high school parking lot, manual pad and flat ground.
The session: Didn’t even think I’d practice any drills, I was feeling so rusty and mellow, but after 15 minutes of playing with manuals, my legs woke up and my mind sharpened up. I embraced the challenge.
For the first time I repeatedly ollied onto a manual pad with fakie backside 180s (half cabs). Timing fakie ollies and flip tricks, on or off of curbs and pads is a weakness. A few times last winter I made it up onto a few sidewalks doing kickflips. Then I was injured trying Casper flips. Not since. I’ve never flipped into a stall or grind. So this small step – even though it was just a fakie 180 backside – shows growth!
Drills: Managed a Complete Drill Set 2.0 minus the 180 backside kickflips, halfcab kickflips and the 360 frontside ollies. No time!
Practice sets: I attempted 10 Tre flips, did some things right but didn’t land any. I attempted about 15 frontside 180 kickflips, didn’t land any. And some no comply impossibles. Zero percents.

Tonight
Similar to last night, I was feeling sluggish and exhausted. I’d already taken a long difficult yoga class at the crack of dawn and worked all day. However, it proved to be an early night of work for me and I started skating at 7pm. Unheard of lately. There was a function at the high school, nixing the manual pad as an option. I hit a long standing backup plan: Bank of America on Melrose and Fairfax. Not the same BOA as the one I frequent in the blog, up on Vermont near Santa Monica.

Store on Melrose. Side of building. Perfect layout for no comply wall rides.

Duration: 95 minutes!
The session: Started super slow and clumsy, by the end it was graceful and with really good board control. Even though tons of attempts weren’t makes, they were all quite light and lofty. Kind of slow motion.
Drills: Managed a Complete Drill Set 2.0! Not easy in general, the flip stuff at the end takes awhile sometimes. Heelflips came much easier tonight. Took about 5 minutes instead of the usual fifteen to land the 3. Landed 4 actually.
Practice Sets:
25 tre flip attempts, zero makes. A few close ones. Not super close, but they showed I was doing something correct. I used to land these, back in February (stationary) anf August (rolling). When I has to stop (injury and busy-ness), both times I immediately lost it. At least in theory I know where to put my feet and to my thing.
25 frontside 180 kickflip attempts. Many close ones, 1 make. Make rate: 4%. This was my first make of this trick, third session trying. It is much like the backside 180 kf, but it is easier to get the board higher and so it is easier to get it further out of control as well. Had to learn to pop it and spin it a bit before flipping it. The hardest part still is remembering to give it a light flick of the front foot to get the flip going off the nose with an upward and outward motion. Otherwise, I have a habit left over from the late 80s version of kickflips, wherein the foot goes down more, and off the side by the truck bolts more. In frontside 180 kickflips this makes it hard to keep the front foot up in the air long enough to catch the lofty landing. Hence, many of my “almosts” resembled frontside 180 no comply kickflips. Which gives me the idea to learn how to do those too.
10 no comply impossible attempts. Zero makes, a couple close.
Fakie varial flips: It occured to me how similar this is to a half-cab kickflip so I thought I’d try. Didn’t count the attempts. Took about 10 minutes, with many almosts on the way. Feels amazing. First make ever! My analysis of it is that it is exactly like varial flips. Yeah I’m going backwards but it is completely mental to not do anything different otherwise. Can’t wait to learn these going off of something.
Fakie 180 frontside no comply practice. 10 attempts, 2 makes.
Fakie frontside 360 ollies: 10 attempts, lots of good almosts, and that I rolled away from after going about 300 degrees and then pivoting the rest.
Fakie frontside 180 kickflips practice: Once I landed that first regular forward rolling frontside 180 kickflip, I thought it would probably be pretty easy to land it fakie. I tried it maybe 20 times. Didn’t land one, but I came very close a number of times. Hard part for me is not jumping the gun on the front foot timing, and keeping the front foot going up and out. And keeping the back foot up in the air long enough and high enough to catch the board.

Super fun practice. Very playful but focused.

Gotta go!

Same store as above, on Melrose. Front view. 2 waxed ledges.

First time trying Frontside 180 kickflips. Life. Whatnot.

Sunrise from the balcony of my new business on Melrose. It’s a Yoga Studio. Info coming soon!

New skate schedule. A deal with my wife
My wife and I, and our new yoga studio on Melrose Ave, have been open for business for a week now. Super tenuous. Starting from scratch, no wifi or separate business phone number even.  Extreme manual labor is done, and now it is all on-line networking and promotions. At one time I went out into the neighborhood to introduce myself to a few other local businesses, but only got as far as the 3 nearby skateboard stores.

My skating time has been limited. From like 3 hours per day to about 1.5 hours every two or three nights. That will change for sure. Absolutely. For now there’s just too much initial set-up time needed.The new schedule after my initial busy-nes will be 1 hour per night. There’s the perfect manual pad with bright night lights 3 blocks from the studio. My wife says if I leave to skate before 10:30pm, and am home before midnight on any given night, she won’t give me shit if I skate for an hour and a half each night.

A day(trip) in the life
The photo above shows what it looks like from the balcony outside our yoga studio. Let’s pretend it’s me leaving for the day at 7am after signing in a class, and I have to run an errand.

My street skate is an 8″ Toy Machine, Provost. Favorite deck ever. I skate with Indy’s and 53 bones stf, probably worn down to 50s by now. Bones Reds. However, I’ve been doing all my skate commuting on a setup I got from a yardsale for only $10. The thing rolls super fast like I’m on ice. It’s a Creature, Heshlaw deck, 8″, with Indys, Bones Reds and these huge green Powell Bombers. I’ve never skated on bombers, not since Vision Blurs from like 1984. Super fast big and grippy. Well, slow compared to hard wheels, but fast on these sidewalks and because they are so big. I feel like I’m skating on a big dune buggy.

Street setup. Mostly night skating. I love the feel of it.

Cruising set-up. Day skate commuting. Huge manuals. I love it differently.

Errand past skate spot
Today I had to go about 1 mile away to obtain some kind of tax certificate from an LA City building in Hollywood. Took my 8″ Creature deck with the bomber wheels. Enjoyed some huge manuals on those cruiser decks. I bailed on one the other day, but it was a nose manual. Cut up my elbow.

An artified verson of me doing a backside no comply wallride, from last winter, on a spot I passed today during my commute across Hollywood. Same spot as below.

While skate commuting passed by this great wallride spot on Highland near Santa Monica.

Next I passed by a gas station with a great long slick black ledge curb. Where I’ve skated in the past. Hollywood, along Santa Monica west of Highland.

Picture of the long black curb mentioned above. I passed by it today on my manual-only skate commute to an LA City office. This photo is from last summer.

Hollywood Media District
I’m a huge fan of really getting to know an area of town. Certainly I’ve explored and skated the hell out of the square mile around the Studio (Media) district of Hollywood. Hundreds of hours. A fun thing about today’s commute was I skated past a bunch of TV studios with lines of background extras waiting to get in, and some of them working on “spec.” That means if they need extra people they might get some paid work out of it, they are “speculating” they’ll make $. I’ve earned plenty of money over the last year in those lines, so I recognized a bunch of the people. Some great people too. Total hustlers trying to earn some easy money watching a game show or talk show, and then it will be on to their next audition afterward. I was great to go right past them today, heading on my way for other business.

My big targeted first rail!

First rail spot
Turns out the LA City building is the same exact spot I’ve been casing for when I finally have the balls to try to boardslide my first rail. I had the balls one day, but there was a car parked right in front, and that’s a dealbreaker for me. I can risk banging myself up, but I know I would have been shooting my board straight toward that car. According to street sweeping No Parking signs, I’m going to have to try on a Tuesday between 10am and 1pm. The approach is not that long. So that’ll be a challenge too.

On the way back to work, I passed by. The school on Romaine where I love to skate at night. It’s where I just saw a video of Eric Koston doing some awesome manuals, over the seven mini manual pads in a row.

This is me doing a backside 180 kickflip at the school I passed today. This photo is from summer.

I frequently see this pole and want to do a pole jam up it, a steep grind mixed with a wall ride motion. I haven’t tried it yet.

Pole jam spot. Santa Monica Blvd.

Skated passed the spot where I landed my first 360 frontside ollie. Right off this curb last winter.

My recent skating
Other than all this commute skating an manuals, like I wrote my skate time is limited. 3 nights ago I skated, and I plan on skating again tonight. Last night I fell asleep early after 48+ hours of only 4.5 hours of sleep, super early mornings, super late evenings. But that few nights ago I went to the old manual pad under the bright lights at a nearby high school.
Duration: 90 minutes.
Location: High school nearby.
The session: Managed to do a Complete Drill Set 2.0, minus the 180 backside kickflips, the 360 frontside ollies, and two of the half-cab kickflips. With the time I had, I could’ve gotten those other things in, but I was also playing around quite a bit with trying to do nose manuals across the pad and shove-it out. And heelflips. Work in progress. Also played with trying frontside 180 kickflips for the first time. Probably 10 minutes of the latter. A few came really close. I can see myself making it. The hard part for me now is keeping the front foot off the ground before it makes the spin and rotation. Lofted a few nice almosts.

The fence over which I jump to get in and out of the manual pad skate spot.

Notes:
1. I landed a few no comply impossibles the other night, and noted it here. Haven’t landed one since! Granted I only try a few times each night, so I’m not sweating it. That’s often my style though. I’ve got tricks I work on and make part of my nightly efforts, and then I things I accomplish because I know I can. Eventually I’d love to get really solid with everything.
2. Since forever a couple of the things I super focus on are kickflips and backside 180s. I wish to retain this, though they’ve been at only a bare minimum since the time crunch. 3 to 10 makes of each, each session. Instead of 25.
3. I finally started a new tre flip practice routine. From now on I’ll aim to attempt 10 tre flips each session. Just lightly, no strain. If I want to attempt more, sure. I’ve been managing to spin and flip them around roughly the way I intend, so I’m not as far off as I thought. I did land a few in the summer and also late last winter. I keep stopping the progress (injury, injury, and then busy). Yet if I just try 10 per night, it will work toward something.
4. Each time I land the 3 heelflips, while rolling, of my new Complete Drill Set 2.0, it is not without tons of effort. Takes like 4 or 5 minutes for each one. I’m kind of laughing right now. It used to be like that for popshovits and kickflips, less than a year ago. When I do land these heelflips, it is totally blissful, and often they are high and well executed!