270 no comply to back board; Fakie backside flip to front board

Backside flip to board slide.

Skate update
Alright so it’s been a couple weeks since I last posted. Good news is I’ve been skating for a couple hours, 2 or 3 times per week, plus daily commute skating and the occasional manual and grind along the way.

Before my last post I managed to learn a couple new tricks (no comply to lip slide; fakie halfcap heelflip). A couple days later I landed other firsts: 270 no comply lipslide and fakie backside flip to board slide.

They weren’t easy, and I haven’t landed the halfcab heelflip since. Not worried about it though, as I’ve been mostly just playing around in my sessions with my new skate bro. We goof around trying stuff, and trying to film stuff too. So those sessions are key to keeping it fun, but aren’t technical or practice oriented.

That said, in most sessions over the last couple weeks, before I began skating with my bro, I managed to complete a Practice Set 3.0 (including the tre flip!).

Above: A little video of the two new tricks which make up the title of this post.

Skate Lines
A new skill I am working on with my skate bro is putting together a “skate line” (sequence of 3 or 4 consecutive tricks in a row). This is very much harder than I would have thought. These are tricks I’ve done over and over, and even while playing my FAM Game, I often make on the first attempt. But there’s something about the camera rolling, buddy joining in, and the quickness needed to reset for the next trick. I have managed to string together a few lines, but they ended up being the easier tricks I know. Very anti-climactic once I looked at them. But is was super fun.

Waxed low ledge outside Hollywood High. It actually goes for the entire block. It’s the longest waxed ledge I’ve ever seen.

Other skate news
My sister was here from the east coast last week. She’s like 38 years old, and she still is an awesome skater, mother of three, showboarder. Mostly cruising, power slides, ollies. We went to Venice Skate Park, carved around. Also we got to skate the entire length of Hollywood Boulevard’s Walk of Fame. It is all marble and smooth and fast. Both of us busting out manuals, seeing how many stars we could traverse. Huge fun.

Had to do another round of shoe goo on my old vans. And then my goofy footed skate bro ended up giving me a slightly used pair of Bones Brigade Vans. Just a couple little holes on the right shoe. Doesn’t affect me, as I’m regular footed. I’ll goo that up anyway and get lots of life out of them. Wonderful while budget skating.

Also, not skate news, but my friggin’ transmission went out in my car, setting me back a few thousand dollars, which I don’t have. The car will have to remain parked for at least a month while my wife and I hustle together some extra jobs. Bla bla. It relates to skating in that whenever money is tight I feel more pressure as a husband and adult to become less of a skater and more of a provider. Good times.

Adding another few layers of shoe goo to my black vans! That’s Melrose Ave in the background.

Tonight
I have plans to skate tonight with my skate buddy. Definitely going to keep practicing the faster moving tre flip and the skate lines, trying to get a sequence. Mostly working on the 360 no comply, the fakie kickflip, fakie varial, regular varial and then kickflipping a board. That’s my line. We also were filming a line on the manual pad – it was a nose slide into a 360 shovit, into a 50-50. Was more fun than cool looking.

Next time I get to skate alone for a few  hours I’m going to go back to those long parking blocks on work on a 90 degree varial into board slide. Awkward so far, but I’m feeling it.

 

New trick: fakie backside 180 heelflip

A new skate spot, surrounded by small manny pads, painted curbs and ledges. A buddy of mine was arrested here for skating though.

Skate update
Now that I have a new skate buddy, I’ve been extra stoked to get out and skate more. Yeah I’ve skated every day even in my long absence of blogging about it. But now I’m more excited to get out and really skate, actually push to learn more new stuff, keep the old stuff dusted off and most importantly to just play around with it a ton more and HAVE FUN.

Fun has always been the nuclei, but as I mentioned before, for awhile there I got so obsessed with tre flips and my militant counting drills and games, I spent every second of my precious skate time analyzing, counting and perfecting. And then I burnt out on it (fueled also by the previously broken foot, the wife problem and the long work days, I just didn’t need skating to turn into a job), and over the summer I mostly just did grinds, ollies and manuals (and visited for a week skate parks while back east with my family and that was different because I learned more transition than ever, and was the exception to my otherwise simpler summer).

My new formula: 1 night a week of having fun alone, practicing every trick I’ve learned before and methodically working on new tricks while occasionally grinding and doing manuals. The other night I managed another Complete Practice Set 3.0 (which includes a Tre Flip. I can usually land a tre flip within 10 attempts now. The entire history of this blog has worked up to that, and was inspired by that goal).

Formula continued: And then one session per week with my new skate buddy, just playing around, trying stuff.

Sure, it’s anti-climatic compared to just over a year ago when I was skating an hour daily. That phase was unsustainable though, as I wasn’t really working then.

I know, I KNOW, you’ve seen it a hundred times on this blog. To me though, it is even more beautiful than the first time, especially with all the new wax.

 

New trick
It has been a long time since I’ve update my timeline of milestones on this site. I’ll do that soooooon!

I’ll mention here though: Two weeks ago I learned no-comply to 5-0s on a parking block.

Last week I tried learning no-comply to backside lipslide. No luck yet, but I came close.

This week I decided to try to learn fakie 180 backside heelflips. A look through this blog will reveal that I super over-the-top struggled with heelflips for a good 10 months, and then fakie heelflips. Now I have them. I was pleasantly surprised that I was able to start landing these half-cab backside heelflips within 30 minutes of trying. Here’s a little vid.

New skate buddy; New Trick; New Stoke

New Trick: No Comply to 5-0 grind. After I learned it, I caught a short one on vid. This is a still from that. Can’t wait to film a nice long one.

New Skate Buddy
Any one keeping tabs on this site knows I am almost exclusively a solo skater. The few times I’ve met other skaters has always been an absolute joy, but we never exchanged contact info, or if we did, never followed up. I always skate alone. This is because, a) I almost never can plan my sessions. My spare time arises usually late at night with no warning. To call someone doesn’t work. By the time they’d show up, it would be time to go; b) Especially as an adult relearning to skate, I need every second I can get to work on the “muscle memory” (though it is really neural pathways). I love to patiently, persistently analyze my motions and hone in on the correct dynamic, until I get it. Then, each time I skate, lest I lose what precious skills I’ve gained, I always want to take about 45 minutes to do at least one of every trick I’ve learned. Since my sessions are usually only 75 to 90 minutes, skating with a buddy doesn’t work with this kind of Rodney Mullen-style intense skate-lab like approach; c) I suppose I get self-critical and maybe even a bit shy or sensitive about my art in motion, and since this is supposed to be a fun endeavor, I just don’t want to deal with attitude.

However, my new skate bro totally fits this ancient skater’s needs. In fact, despite my militant discipline – or maybe because of it- I burnt out a bit on always pushing myself and some of the fun had left. I still loved it, but then it was becoming exactly what I didn’t want it to become. I had eased back on all the constant stand-up comedy and got back into skating specifically to give myself a healthy outlet to create and grow. Comedy – a huge love – had become too destination oriented. Skating literally saved my life at that point. But then, about a year into relearning to skate, I got on this mad fixation to land more and more tre flips. Later, coming back from a broken foot I got bummed out on the subtle dynamics of the tre (see my post Fucking Tre Flips), and got too destination oriented.

My new skate buddy is super chill and is the perfect antidote to my pushing it. He’s just out to have fun, and doesn’t give a shit about an of the militant perfectionism. So that’s a perfect fit. Plus, he’s about 6 years younger than me (so, about his mid-30s), and exibits none of the douchey age-ism that comes with lots of skaters. Perfect fit. Also, he’s involved in the comedic arts too, so there’s that comaraderie to speak of while we skate. I’ll say again, he’s chill, but gets super stoked when things are landed. Very enthusiastic.

Having a skate bro has helped to renew my skate stoke. We’ve got loose plans to get together once per week. Coming out of a summer/early fall with tons of outside busy-ness, though I’ve been on a board almost every day, I didn’t really work at any tricks, or just stop at cool spots and play around. My new skate bro is inspirational to both of these. Also, it has inspired me to go out on my own at least once between sessions with my friend, and this is when I get all technical and practice my craft a la Mullen style.

Coolest thing about my friend, is he’s actually a friend of my family. My aunt has been telling me for literally 25 years that we need to meet. When I realized he lives like 3 blocks from me, I gave him a call.

The boards change, but the spot remains the same!

Drill Set 3.0
Last night while out alone, I feel like I finally got used to my Cliche Deck. The tail is a little steeper, which makes for higher ollies, but makes me need to adjust my timing. I now love it.

Both of the last two times I’ve skated I landed Tre Flips again. There is something awesome about this.

Last night, alone at the Fairfax Manual Pad (before going to the Bank of America lot and learning a new trick), I worked my way through a Complete Practice Set 3.0. I was banging these out before my tech/militant style burn out. Yet I loved doing this last night. I want it more! Last night was easily the best flat ground frontside 360 ollie I’ve ever landed. In addition to the 3.0, I also landed the new tricks from just before my more relaxed cruise and manual-based summer. (Note, I also got better at transition and half-pipes over the summer). These new tricks are the fakie frontside pop shove and the fakie backside pop shov.

Although I linked it above, I just want to paste here what all is included in that Practice Set 3.0.

Regular Ollies
1
Frontside 180 Ollies
1
Backside 180 Ollies
1
Nollies
1
Fakie Ollies
1
Backside Half-cabs
1
Frontside Half-cabs
1
Backside Popshovits
1
Frontside Popshovits
1
Kickflips
1
Heelflips
1
Backside Varial Flips
1
Fakie Kickflips
1
Fakie Heelflips
1
Fakie Varial Flips
1
Half-cab Kickflips
1
Backside 180 Kickflips
1
Frontside 180 No Complies
1
No Comply Impossibles
1
Frontside 360 Ollies
1
Fakie Frontside 180 No Complies
1
Frontside 360 No Complies
1
Fakie Frontside 360 Ollies
1
360 Backside shovit
1
Backside Nollie Popshovit
1
Tre Flip
1

Found and old photo of myself from a newspaper. That’s an Old School Caballero, and it must have been about 1986. Skate contest, hence the pads.

New Trick; No-Comply to 5-0 grind
Going to the Bank of America, I was just practicing front and backside boardslides and hope-I-don’t-snap-my-deck lipslides on the parking blocks. That’s when I was just goofing around and discovered I could do no-comply to 5-0 on those parking blocks. I landed a few relatively long ones (like a couple of feet, long for me, for a new trick). Just before I had to go, I decided to put my camera down and I got one of film. It was a shorter make of it, but I was stoked. I’ll get a longer one on film later. For now, I’m embedding it below, so for a visual. Yeah this isn’t too spectacular, but whatever, it was fun and I had just learned it like 10 minutes earlier.

Coming up
I update the timeline and milestones as well as my wishlist of tricks. Long overdue.