So today it was something like 70 degrees (F) with blue skies and the sun shining down. I was actually out skating in a T-shirt, and I was hot! The whole time felt very surreal for January, but I had a great skate anyway. Some great people from the past came out, Tom & Sarah, and John Franke.

I gave out lots of USFSA stickers, and practiced cones while Tom & Sarah’s daughter Emma ran around the Art Museum area.

Denni and I went to NYC this weekend for a quasi-organized saturday night skate with the Union Square Crew. I’d say it was the best group skate I’ve been on so far. First, Dominique and Marie from France showed up, which was a pleasant surprise. This gave us a good balance of slalom and non-slalom skaters. So, Denni and I took turns learning slalom tricks from our french guests, and non-slalom tricks from our new york friends.

The skate consisted of just the right ratio of skating through new york traffic, and then hanging out at good locations to do tricks or relax. And we did lots of relaxing, because it was still hot even at night.

I think a bunch of us are going to visit Dominique and Marie in france some time next summer.

We learned our first 50cm trick too! I guess its called the windshield wiper, or the “X” not sure which.

Just did the landskaters sunday skate, but i brought 7 cones, a tape measure and a piece of chalk (7 was all i could fit in the little camera case I was using).

It made the skate so much more fun to do cones at each stop, and plenty of people were joining in.

Thanks to Doug for making the stops just a bit longer to accommodate the cones. I got really fast at setting up a line of cones too =)

ps: found an even better rain location at 8th and Poplar

This was a very cool session. There are a few different topics that came up this time: cups, weather, location, tricks, wheels, skates, future skate sessions, and other sites.

Cups
Jeremy brought me a set of the cups he bought. They rock. They’re pretty colors of “baby” blue and “I’m wicked gay” pink. I love them.

Weather
It rained. Blah.

Location
The location was a situation because there were a few locations that were possible rain places but none of them were definite. Then Jeremy said on his way up that there was a parking lot on the way to my house down the street. When he described where it was, I knew immediately where it was and thought it was a great idea. It is basically the same sort of place Jeremy has in Philly where the entire space is covered by a highway. The only difference is that in my area, it is a parking lot. So we skated during the day and met a couple skateboarders and a little biker named Steve, or Jim… hmmm. wait. Nick… that’s it. I think it’s a pretty good location.

Sunday, we skated from morning until late afternoon in two different locations. The first location was the bball court across from my place. That is my favorite place to skate ever. It is so perfect for setting up cones and just goin nuts with tricks. There are lines to set up the cones and it’s a super smoothe surface. We skated there until lunch and then in the afternoon, we went back to the highway because it started raining again.

Tricks
This was a good trick session. Oh man, I learned or honed 3 different tricks: the crazy, the grapevine, and a modified grapevine we invented as we went. We may not be the first skaters to have invented this but it’s pretty neat. It has to have a name of some sort.

The crazy has gotten easier for me especially at the bball court. As I practiced it more, I got a little better at it. I also learned from Jeremy that transitioning between front cross and back cross is a spread eagle or inverse spread eagle, which is supposed to be the sideways movement.

The grapevine is something Jeremy taught me on Saturday. I learned it pretty quick as it is similar to the crazy. It’s not really a trick that people do much on the cones. The only video I’ve heard about is one where one tiny part of the trick moves around a cone. Otherwise it is done beside the cones. I had trouble maintaining my momentum through this trick. I thought that if I can do it around the cones, I would be more likely to keep my momentum. So, I started to practice it on the cones. This gave birth to this 3rd trick that modifies the grapevine.

We initially called it the “insanity”. I think it is probably called something different already though. So this is where you do the grapevine in a compact way and less exaggerated backwards ‘S’, moving your crosses through the cones and doing the inverse spread eagle and spread eagle around the cones. I want to start practicing every day at the bball court.

Wheels
I ordered new wheels! Woo hoo! I will have rockered wheels very soon! Woo hoo!

Skates
I want new skates. Jeremy has recommended the Roces SKT 100 Slalom. These are the ones I will probably get when I purchase new ones.

Future Skate Sessions
Jeremy and I discussed going to the Big Apple Roll, which is a giant pile of city skates over 3 days. We’re going to go and have a blast. We’ll be there to get our skate on and blow people away with our beginner style slalom tricks. Awww yea!

Other Sites
I may be stealing Jeremy’s thunder but he found another slalom site. Looks pretty neat! American even! Woo hoo! I also registered at nycskaters.com. There are some great discussions/whining arguments on there. So great.

Conclusion
I think that we both learn way way way more when we’re skating together on one of our main skate sessions. I also think that solo sessions are really great for practicing what I’ve learned in a main session. I will be practicing these new tricks with my new wheels and new skates at the bball court every day after work (weather permitting). One last… Woo hoo!

The last freedom skate was pretty good, and my feet are killing me. Met Evan, Alister, Pete, Shawn and Juan from NYC. They’ve got an online forum dedicated to freestyle skating. Seems like a great place to organize times to get together. I’ll definitely be heading up there on some wednesday nights to skate with them.

On a side note, John Franke is back in the Philadelphia area. Even though he wasn’t at the freedom skate, it was great to hear from him over the phone. Congrats to him and Sue on their new baby. Oh and Tom Detwiler showed his face at one of the skates too. Lots of cool people, old and new.

Just finished a sunday city skate, and surprisingly there wasn’t a huge difference like i suspected (due to the rockered wheels).

If any of you out there are interested in getting together in Philly, PA or Springfield, MA area, just email “list at theslalom dot com”

Also found a new site with a great tutorial on the Crazy which is what i wanna learn next. http://www.skatefreestyle.com/