So, we went up to Boston on the 4th, as planned. Brodie and everyone we met were very friendly, and open minded enough to try out our “Euro” style slalom. Then when it rained everyone came over to the bridge we had set up under, and skated with us for a few hours, while the 6ft spaced large american cones got rained on.

All in all it was very fun, and we’ll be going back next year, i’m sure. Head over to the videos page to check out videos of all the people we met.

I’m heading to Chicopee, MA^[1] today to meet Denni, and we’re going to Boston tomorrow for the annual slalom setup they apparently do there. We’ll report back here after the weekend and let you know if it was worth the trip.

[1] Why do i always go to MA, and Denni never comes to PA…

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

So the grapevine that Jeremy taught me looks a little different than the one in Brodie’s vids. There’s more turns involved and snaking and stuff… Brodie’s grapevine looks more like a modified crazy. Jeremy and I made a connection between the crazy and the grapevine while we were practicing. He said that the grapevine is like the crazy only crossing over the cones going forward instead of facing sideways. I’ll have to look at some video of us doing the grapevine or our “insanity” and compare it to the grapevine vids from Brodie. He does it kinda fast so I’ll slow it down to watch his feet movements easier….

… after looking at it in slo-mo, it still seems as if Brodie’s grapevine is actually the crazy done on cones spaced further apart than 80cm. It also seems as if it is nothing like the thing we have been calling the “insanity”. Maybe Jeremy will have some insight on this. Brodie moves very fast through this thing and with loads of expertise so I’m probably just not seein’ it.

Upon researching the new site Jeremy found, I found some cool videos of the grapevine and some other tricks and races in Boston from a couple years ago. Checkem out!

The path I took from this reasearch was: started here, then here, then here, then here, then here, ended here.

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.

I just got back from the basketball court across the street. When I go out for these solo sessions, I aim to learn something I didn’t know before about slalom. Here is what I learned tonite in about 30 minutes of learning the new trick Jeremy learned:

1. 80cm is a good width apart for this trick. It might be easier at 40cm.

2. Six cups stacked, of the cups we bought at Walmart, is a good enough stack of cups to withstand a pretty heavy gust of wind.

3. Thirteen cups in a line, or an odd amount, is good for going back and forth over the cones without stopping. I started out with a forward cross on the first cone, down the line forward crossing. At the last cone, I did the last of the forward crosses, then did the cool stop and go thing of the crazy to reverse direction. Then did backwards cross down the line to the last cone which was a cross, then did the cool stop and go thing of the crazy to reverse direction. Then did more forward crosses, and so on and so forth and so hence forth on and forth, fifth and sixth.

4. Doing the Crazy, I haven’t figured out the best angle to start with. I don’t know if it’s easier to do back and forth straight then diagonal, or do all diagonals. But I learned that the angle at which one starts with matters.

5. Doing the Crazy, I haven’t figured out how far out to go. But I learned the distance one goes out from each cone matters.

6. The laces around my ankles need to be tightened for more support from my skates.

7. Doing the Crazy, going from backwards to forwards is harder than the opposite.

8. I want to rocker my wheels as soon as possible.

So, I suppose you could say I learned enough for about eight sessions. It was a good 30 minutes.

Last time Jeremy was here, I bent one of the metal lace loops. I fixed it with some pliers. Good stuff.

I just modified the lower buckles on my Twisters. They used to hook around and into the shell of the boot, which caused them to protrude into my ankles and give me hot spots.

I used some speaker wire to attach them to a lower part of the boot. I’ll find out tomorrow if this does any good.

UPDATE: the new buckles I made are perfect. I skated all day today with the hotspot from yesterday and it didn’t bother me once!

Lots of new stuff going on. First I got a new digital camcorder, so the movies aren’t crappy still camera avi’s. Second, I found a new location (thanks to Josh) that’s perfect! Its under i95 at front & washington ave (philadelphia) so it’s covered by the highway. The pavement is really smooth because cars can’t get to it (not sure why its even paved, but hey, no complaints). There’s even a slight slope at one part, which was fun to play on for a while, till i got sick of speeding up and knocking over all the cones.

Oh and third, I learned a new trick. I’ve been watching Naomi Grigg’s tutorial on ‘The Crazy’ like once a day until i memorized how it worked. Today I did it for the first time.

I’ve got a major hot spot on my foot. The Twister’s have this plastic power strap built in, but the place where it connects to the skate is right over a bone in my foot, and it kinda sticks into the skate more than it should. I think i’m going to get some wire at home depot tomorrow and attach it in a different way to avoid it rubbing my ankle.

Check out the videos, i trimmed and edited them in iMovie, so all the dead air of me skating around before and after each run is gone.