Go Skateboarding Weekend - Part 4

So, we headed out from Grove City Sunday night, tired, smelly, hungry. We decided to head down towards Dry Ridge/Florence, KY and see what the weather would do. There was a chance of rain again so if Mother N. Decided to dump then it would be an indoor sesh at Ollies. This place is amazing, Calabro and I hit it up last year. They have a 13' vert ramp, a cool wood peanut like bowl, a 60' long mini with a bowled corner, micro and huge street course.

Luckily, we did not need to skate indoors. We arrived in Dry Ridge around 10pm and decided to check out the park. It was dark, quiet and relaxing to walk around the dimly lit gem of a skatepark and explore the superb finish on the concrete. Calabro and I were down last year and were trying to skate the Florence park, but the finish was terrible in the bowl. I have heard that the streetcourse is amazing but the bowl area is not...

So, this kid told us about a brand new park in the town he was from, Dry Ridge, KY. We were soooooo surprised when we hit it up. The park has an amazing old school snake run that starts at the crest of a hill and runs down into the main level of the park. There is just about anything one could need here, banks, transitioned banks, hips, walrides, euro gap, marble hubbas, hipped q'pipe, mini snake run w/ corners, pump bumps and the coolest little pool you'll ever ride. It is about 5 1/2' deep with very mellow transitions (almost too mellow), a lil' love seat and deathbox, topped with very nice hand poured concrete coping.

We skated here for about 3hrs and then the clouds rolled in, pissed and it was time to move on. Our next stop was Kokomo but by the time we got up there, the sun was assuming the position to blind all transitions that face west. So, we decided to go to Taco Bell first, bad idea - we were soooo bloated and full of gass that it was time to continue on I-65 North...

We had to put in Master of Puppets to keep the juice for the ride back. Cappetto free formed over the crunchy riffs and Calabro was annoyed by the air guitar contests within the fit...

It was an excellent trip and we are already planning the next one!!!

Go Skateboarding Weekend - Part 3

So it was Sunday the 22nd and our Skateboarding day was killer!! We went to three parks and had a blast. The LL crew stayed near Powell, we woke up ate coffee, donuts and Advil and were ready for more!

It was unfortunate that the other group did not come down for some shred. They got rained out in Athens and were not trusting of the weather and headed back to Chicago. I was bummed and we tried to get them to come down but it didn't happen. Sorry guys, I really wished you could have made it.

We went to Powell for a repeat and got some redemption time in. We got to ride the pool with local Pro, Chris Higgins. This guy kills that pool. He rides that tight transition effortlessly. Then a couple of other guys showed up and we were having a great pool session. After a few pointers from Higgins, I learned the Goofy foot line and began getting tile in the shallow end. I was so stoked because I never had the opportunity to ride something like that before. I had always dreamed of riding a pool and the only time I was near a backyarder was last year when I was broken and couldn't skate!!

I tried several times to do the stairs but kinda got distracted. You see, out of no where, the Quicksilver cruiser showed up, and all these Pros jumped out and kids were everywhere, Red Bull cans were flying in air. Kids were getting ollied over and kickflipped in the head.... My concentration was blown and we were outta there... Stairs next time, I hope.

The deep end is really easy to grind, slash, air, whatever, despite the fact that there is 2 feet of vert on a 4' transition and about 7' total deal...

The next stop was a re-run of Grove City where we spent the rest of the 9 hour skate day... I really love both of these parks and getting to hit them up two days in a row was a real treat. I was able to build a ton of lines a Grove today. I even got some slashers, airs and sweepers in. I was happy. Calabro did "the trick" and Cappetto was ripping the street course, the bath tub and the big bowl. All around. We have video which i will post as soon as Cappetto edits it...

We basically skated the place with a bunch of 12 year olds. Some of these kids were pretty darned good too! Allegedly, Morgan Burgess was living in the area and was a loc for about a year. I wish I could have seen that kid ride Grove!! Maybe next time, we will get to ride with Higgins or, Owen or someone who destroys, just to get that perspective also...

SO, after a long day of skating, all I heard about was how we were going out and destroy the bar next to the hotel. All this talk of doing this and that and as soon as the car was unloaded, this is what i see>>> Dry Ridge tomorrow.

Go Skateboarding Weekend - Part 2

So we all woke up the next morning in Jay's Dad's house. This place was great! He built it himself and used the river rocks from the property in the building process. He has an 1840's like saloon in the basement and wood heated boiler system. Too cool! The guy even made us pancakes in the morning. It was a bit of a free-for-all and Calabro stole my damn pancake but it was cool anyway. Thanks sooooo much to Jay and his dad for all the hospitality!!

Cappetto finally surfaced too!! We all headed out to the Akron skatepark for the Vans BBQ. We hung out, gave out stickers, watched a kickflip contest and some of us skated the cool DIY Q-pipe. Jay put on a great event for his home town park and kids. We broke off from the group after 1pm because the weather was not looking good and I was really needing to get to Powell, OH. I regretfully did not even get my camera out for this part of the trip.

So, the LL group headed south.

I was crabby as hell because I was lacking coffee and toilet paper, Calabro needed his meds and Cappetto hates donuts. We got what we needed and were ready to embark on the next chapter. But then the asphalt crew was blocking the only entrance out of the area... I was soooo pissed, that I drove up a hill, found an open area and did the banzai in the FIt down some old path... Ha Ha!! Got through!

We got to skate both Powell and Grove City. Two excellent parks. Soooooo good!! The Great thing about Powell is that it has a real swimming pool. Complete with a love seat, deathbox and stairs. Oh, and the shallow end is something like 4' deep with 3' of vert! Seriously, so it was not easy to skate. It took quite a while to get used to the transitions. We had a great time. It was funny because we ran into this crew that was all from Cincinnatti. I actually knew one of the guys and the rest of the group were cool. So we all seshed this pool together!! Good stuff!

We went to Grove City after a few hours of goodness but it rained. SO, we waited it out and luckily the storm went on and we dried the park out. Grove City is RAD and anyone that goes there will not be disapointed. I highly recommend both Powell and Grove City to any concrete addict.

Road Trip - Go Skateboarding weekend - Part 1

We all decided to head out to Ohio for some good seshtime in the new northwest. The plan was to head out and hit some parks. Calabro, Cappetto and I jumped in the Fit and headed East. The plan was to meet up with two car loads of other dudes at Fort Wayne and play it by ear after that. So, we met up with Surgen Tom, Topless Mark, Scotty Karate, Jose, Gordon, Tom P. and Anna and Olivia.

We skated Fort Wayne for like 6 hours and had a blast!! I had never gone to another park with so many people from Wilson before. It was a really cool feeling to be out with so many dudes you see everyday in Chicago.

It was super hot and sunny but we all held strong for the whole day. They were quite pleased with the park as most of the dudes had never been. I really like the smaller snake-run. It is tons of fun, tight and fast. The larger snake run bowl area is cool but I am not a fan of the coping. It is small, and fast. The transitions seem to be too mellow and you really have to search to find the coping. The 50/50 enthusiast will love this park. You can lock in and sit on top all day long here... I am more of an in the ramp, carve grind type of guy so small, slick metal coping is not my thing.

We went to get some food afterword and then took the long way to Akron from Fort Wayne. It was a good trip though, the scenic route. There was a lot of road shinanigans happening too!!. Calabro could not help himself and began mooning everyone right from the beginning. Later he pressed his hinder areas up against glass, exposing more than needed to Karate. I believe he has pics. Not that we want to see them...

After a long drive we ended the trip with some inter-auto digital entertainment. Laptop against the glass always works well at night. Luckily we made it to Akron all safe and not dead. We stayed with Vans guy Jay Croft's Dad's house. He was nice enough to put all 9 of us up for the night. Calabro talked a good game about how he was gonna stay outside and blah blah blah, but he was the first one indoors asleep.

Scotty got a bit tipsy and the rest of us sacked out. It was kinda funny because we lost Cappetto at some point. He was last seen with a couple Budweisers and a pack of cigarettes. He was mumbling something about catching varmants for breakfast. We found him the next morning up a hill in a tree covered forest area passed out. He did have a sleeping bag though so it was all good!

Wilson Sesh - Danforth

We went to the Mexican Grocery store in Whiting to get some lunch. They have a grill in the back of the store where this dude cooks up the most killer Burritos you could imagine. Soooooooo good!!. And cheap. Wednesdays are $3.49 Burrito day!!

So after we chilled for a bit, it was time to head to Wilson for the second annual post skatecamp sesh... I must say that I was a bit bummed with the sesh, I was hoping we would have had more dudes show. This has been a weird year. Some dude was letting his kids go into the bowl after he would take a run. These kids would jump in and run around...

Bill didn't mind though, he immediately rolled in and was ripping. We had a great time and I was so glad to skate with him at my home park. The only regret is that I had an off day and kinda sucked ass in the bowl. Bill didn't care too much though, he was happy to just rip the bowl with a couple guys that love skateboarding.

I was also, glad that I did not do a repeat of last year. I was trying to do a laidback rollout and left my foot at the coping while the rest was down at the bottom of the bowl. I was out for 4 weeks. I did however get wheelbite while coming back in from a front side air and went down on my wrists. They were already tweaked from the Sunday before and then the day before... Oh well.

Whiting sesh

We had a quick sesh at Whiting before we left for cheap Burritos at the secret Whiting Burrito Heaven. Bill blasted a few as you can see here. It is sooooo cool to have a guy who lived the dream still ripping. Everything Danforth does is fluid, aggressive and proper. I was quickly reminded that none of my tricks are done the correct way... I guess I have some more work to do. He was telling me a story about one of his buddies doing laid back roll outs in front of Duane Peters.

Duane showed up to the park all crazed and stiff. He immediately rolls in without even figuring out a line and looked as if he was about to die at any minute. After a few runs Peters begins to completely rip the bowl. Duane Peters proceded to
destroy all coping and every wall in the place. One of the locals did a laid back roll out the slow way. (where you are on top and slowly drop back in)

Duane was sooo discusted that he nearly hit the guy. He said, "Is this really one of your bros??" "I never would have invented that trick if I knew guys would do it like that".. I guess now since I do nothing the "right way", I will just have to not do any tricks around any skate legend again... haha.

It is all about fun anyway. I am gonna work on my shit all summer! And that is the point, it is a challenge, every day and if you work hard, it pays off. Even if you don't work hard and have fun carving or kick turning - you win!! Skateboarding Fuckin' rules!!

SO anyway, Pics of Bill Danforth at Whiting:

Skate Camp '08

Skate Camp!! So, Bill Danforth Skate Camp made its stop at Whiting Skatepark the past three days. I was there to help out with the kick turn lessons. We had a pretty good crowd the first day and then they started to drop like flys... Hopefully the turnout will be better next year. I am probably gonna do a few more this summer in Michigan.

It is pretty fun when the kids listen. Our little pro here was very creative with following directions. He was indestructible though so it was rad to see the little guy slam and get right back up for more!! Not a single tear from him this whole camp!! So here are a few pics from skate camp...

WTF?? Wilson Fashion Barge

WTF?? Gordon and Jose were not pleased with the barge:

So, we were on our third sesh of the day when suddenly this huge Top Kick pulls up and all these beautiful people pop out. It was like a UFO landed at Wilson. After about an hour of set up, these invaders suddenly barge our bowl session! They just dumped all the equipment in the shallow and we were like, Fuck you guys. This is a public park you can’t just cut us off… SO, everybody began sessioning the deep end and the side pocket.

One of the Bacon dudes did a frontside carve around the Photographer and man was he pissed. Little David was doing his Kiwi Slides and Topless Mark was double carving the deep. The funny thing was they had these pretty boy models that were pretending to drop in and trying looking all tough… Kinda not..

WTF?? Topless Mark getting ready to roll in on the Photographer and flip the bird at the rent-a-(off duty)cop.

Bacon at Wilson

So we were all skatin’ at Willis the other day and an old Suburban rolled up in full primer. All kinds of smoke emptied out of the thing the road trip sensors were going off. A bunch of dudes got out and I’m like, Ok, who is it now??? Sure enough, they immediately begin destroying everything in the park! All the kids and dinosaur dudes took a step back and just looked on. It turned out that they were all Ams that ride for Bacon Skateboards.



Pics:














I guess the 5 of them were on the road after the Damn Am contest in Minnesota last week. They were on their way to Skatopia for the insane weekend of thrashing, burning and mudslinging. Pretty cool stuff. I was happy to skate with them and learned several possibilities in the bowl. Not that I could do any of it, I just know now that someone out there can...

T-Shirts

So, I finally took some pics of my T-Shirts. I have been messing around with stencils lately and decided to put a few up. Let me know what you think. I have been using fabric spray paint, one color, simple linear stuff. I am learning on the go here.












I really want to do silkscreen stuff one day. But stencils are low-tech and not such a pain to do… But every time I spend hours cutting out a stencil, I tell myself…