This past weekend I travelled to Bremen, Germany to attend the first Freestyle Slalom Festival. It was a great event with a huge turnout. I’m sure it will become an annual freestyle spot now. The weekend was a great balance of competitions and just doing slalom with everyone when no official competitions were underway. Practicing with all the big names like Seba, Igor, JB, Phil and Nathan was worth the trip alone, never mind that I actually won the amateur battle! Here’s my write up of the weekend.

We did tons of skating over Friday, Saturday and Sunday. A small group of skaters showed up Friday night including Seba and Igor, so our small group got to take advantage of some personal training time with the two of them. This totally rocked! Seba worked on heeling and toe-heel spinning with me, both of which I was able to put into my battle runs thanks to his help.

On saturday we skated for at least a few hours before any official events started which was great, because i got to meet tons of skaters, and so many great skaters showed me things i didn’t know yet. Overall this event had tons of unstructured time for skaters to do whatever they wanted, which really made it worth the trip. The “Rollersport Staddion” where it all took place is basically a perfectly smooth cement floor the size of three basketball courts at least. It was perfectly level too.

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This past weekend my friend Christophe generously offered to host a freestyle skate weekend inside an empty building he has access to. Evan, Denni, Christope, Rosicel, and I had a great time, skating for around 12 hours over saturday and sunday. Christophe’s wife and daughters joined us sunday as well.

Having Christophe, who is just getting into slalom and Evan who is starting to apply his own unique skating style to slalom really made the weekend much more fun than just Denni and myself. I think both Evan and Christophe are hooked on the cones (Christophe already bought two pairs of Sebas!) I ‘ve got tons of video to comb through and make a movie for the weekend (about 5 hours!) so i hope you enjoy the video when its done.

Denni and I are definitely getting better; our skating is more smooth and relaxed, and we each learned a few new things. The real star of the weekend, though, was Evan. Skating freestyle has been his past time for years, but until recently, he only made fun of Naomi for being into those silly cones. Now he’s applying the skills he’s built up over the years to the cones, and the result is unlike anything i’ve seen from either the asian or european slalom scenes. I suspect when people see his slalom skating they’ll start talking about it.

Another great freestyle weekend. Check out the videos:

Winter Warehouse Land
Shoot the Duck!

When I started slalom skating with Jeremy, both of us bought new skates. I chose the Roces SKT 100 and he chose the Sebas. I think both are great skates. I have been skating in the SKT 100s for about 6 months now. Recently I went to Philadelphia to visit Jeremy and have a skate practice weekend. At the very end of the session on Sunday just before I headed home, Jeremy was comparing skates with someone and both of their skates had a hinge up on the boot for your ankle to be able to move forward and back. I was very surprised to see their skates bend like they did.I wondered why mine did not as they were the SKT 100 skates designed specifically for slalom as are the Seba skates. Even skates that are not designed for slalom but have the hinges bend the same way. I looked on my skates and found two bolts on the back of each skate that bolted the upper boot to the lower boot preventing the hinge from working like a hinge. I am not sure why Roces decided to do this. I removed the bolts pictured to the right, and now the hinges work like they are supposed to. I can not believe I have been skating on them for 6 months without the hinge. I think skating will be different now. (If only it would stop SNOWING.)

Update (7:10pm):
It did stop snowing finally. I went out front and just did some simple moves around the parking lot and oh man is it so much better. I have a feeling that the shoot the duck is going to be much easier. Possibly toes and heels easier too.

Update (Dec 9, 2006, 9:52pm):
From Bayside Blades online store rep, Jenny:

“The bolts are in place to make the cuff stiff and supportive so that it
remains very responsive. The FSK skate range is the same. It has hinged
cuffs but bolted in place at the back.

The FSKs were the best selling freestyle skates for last year so they must
be fixed for a goor reason!”

I really want to know what that goor reason is still!

Slalom - Slow
This is a playlist for the start (warm up part) or end (cool down) of a practice session.  My legs are super relaxed and move through the cones very easy and gentle at the beginning of a session so I thought it would be good to have a relaxed type playlist.  This playlist also calms me down at the start of a session if I’ve just come from a stressful situation (like work).

How to Save a Life               The Fray                               How To Save A Life
Waiting On the World to Change   John Mayer                             Single
Chasing Cars                     Snow Patrol                            Eyes Open
The Riddle (You & I)             Five For Fighting
Over My Head (Cable Car)         The Fray                               How to Save a Life
My Immortal                      Evanescence                            Fallen
Island in the Sun                Weezer                                 Weezer (Green Album)

Slalom - Speed
This list is for when I’m practicing moves that I know well.  I use this list to practice these moves in a super speed manner.  This is also where I practice putting in transitions randomly to different moves.  It tests how fast I can transition and also how spontaneous I can be with my runs.

London Bridge                    Fergie                                 Single
Black Horse and the Cherry Tree  KT Tunstall                            Eye to the Telescope
White & Nerdy                    "Weird Al" Yankovic                    Straight Outta Lynwood
Peanut Butter Jelly Time         Chip-Man & The Buckwheat Boyz          EP
Sugar, We're Goin Down           Fall Out Boy                           From Under the Cork Tree

Slalom - Moves
The “Moves” playlist is designed to make me want to look good while doing moves.  It motivates me to do a “bad ass” version of all the moves I know, emphasizing style.  This list is very good to use when wanting to work on how each move looks and where my arms are and what kind of beat the music has and how I can present the move so that it flows with the beat.

Promiscuous Girl                 Nelly Furtado                          Loose
Dirty Little Secret              The All-American Rejects               Move Along
Move Along                       The All-American Rejects               Move Along
London Bridge                    Fergie                                 Single
White & Nerdy                    "Weird Al" Yankovic                    Straight Outta Lynwood
Remember the Name                Fort Minor featuring Styles of Beyond  The Rising Tied
3 Rs                             Jack Johnson                           Curious George Soundtrack
Shake                            Ying Yang Twins                        U.S.A (United States of Atlanta)
Sugar, We're Goin Down           Fall Out Boy                           From Under the Cork Tree

Slalom - Control
These are songs that I use to help me learn control when doing moves.  The idea is to be motivated to do the moves slow and very controlled.  This is best when at the end of a practice session while I’m super tired.  Very good for working on technique.

Yea                              Usher featuring Ludacris
Snap Yo Fingers                  Lil Jon featuring E-40 & Sean Paul     Single
Run It                           Chris Brown Big Mike And Big Stress
Shake                            Ying Yang Twins                        U.S.A (United States of Atlanta)

  

I just spent 3 1/2 hours practicing for BattleUk. I’ve been nervous up till tonight, but i realized the best thing about going is that there will be tons of good skaters there who I can learn stuff from. Whatever happens in the battle is fine with me if i get to skate with all them!

So in order to do my best i’ve been practicing. Brian Lipko came out tonight for about 1 1/2 hours which made it easier for me to keep going. I finally got the front volte down pretty well today, and I’m starting to do runs without completely planning them out first, which is definitely good for the battle style competitions. I’ve been focusing on the 80cm cones almost exclusively now… hope that doesn’t hurt me this weekend.

Anyway, wish me luck! I’ve only got tomorrow night left to practice!

Just posted a new video. Its pretty good, since its not just the crazy over and over and over…

Practicing new moves

Dennis, Phila-Jeff & I did Naomi’s workshop this weekend, and it was great! I’m very happy that we were able to organize it on such short notice. Over the two days, I got the basics down for tons of tricks. Before I could just do Crazy and Mabrouk, but now I have learned Volte, Italian, Nelson, Crazy Sun, X, Wiper and the cool Sweep move from Naomi’s video as well as the front stroll, back stroll, barrel roll and a handful of freestyle (non-slalom) moves that I don’t know the names of (one was the grapevine, but Evan had already taught me that). Better still, Naomi taught us some good tricks for mixing moves together, using either Crazy or Mabrouk as a “soup base” to throw other moves into. That way you always know what you’ll do before and after a move, which takes a lot of the mental block out of doing a real freestyle run.

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I’ve spent a few minutes each day since last weekend, combing through all the footage of our session. Its actually a pretty boring job, but i think i’ve put together the best video I could have. Its much more interesting than the last ones i posted with the same trick over and over. This time I made one video for me and denni, and mixed it up according to the music. I didn’t bother putting multiple runs of the same thing in, so it should be more interesting for everyone to watch.

We’ve got three new tricks, as you can tell from Denni’s previous posts: the grapevine, the new thing we’re doing on the cones thats like a cross between grapevine and crazy, and toe-heel snakes. I think we should just focus on these until we can do them fast before learning more.

go on over to the videos section to watch, or go straight to the movie

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!

I’ve been into skating for a long time, in some form or another. Roller skating kept my interest till the mid 90s, then inline skating. Yeah, we used to go to the rink like every weekend, sometimes twice a weekend. Now in 2006, it seems like another age has passed, and I’m ready for something new. I think we’re both ready for something new. I had taken a little time off from skating (got married among other things. I got married first though…) and I was wondering if I really wanted to get back into it for any other reason than to “not get fat.” I’ve always said I would get back into skating. But, there has never been any reason for me to so I just let it go.

Then I discovered what they call “freestyle slalom” skating. The basic idea is to skate along a line of evenly spaced cones, doing footwork, without hitting any. Sure I’d seen this before skating in Philly, or at Central Park, but this new variety I found focused significantly more on style, as opposed to just going down the line as fast as you can. This new focus on style is not so new to me. From when I was a kid skating in high school, I always watched my feet and legs making sure my movements were as fluid as I could get them. This new stylish slalom was appealing to me.

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