Ticking Over
Posted by on Tuesday, May 19, 2009
The last month or so been pretty busy for me, although most likely a bunch of stuff that isn't of much interest to readers of this blog.
The biggest time-eater has been replacing our bathroom. First of all we had to take everything out, then sort the walls, ceiling and electrics, just getting things ready for the plasterer, plumber and tiler. Lots of new stuff to buy, lots of mess to get out the house and lots of organisation. Dealing with mistakes that workmen make. Not doing the work ourselves has still been a lot of work. Still, we're one step closer, and the end result is pretty nice.
We're getting close to a release at work (software), which has had an impact, but to be honest, I haven't felt it as much as others have. I've also been nursing a sore heel. I would have said foot, but it's been a strange kind of pain, right in the base of the heel. Add in a family event, a friend's wedding, some work in the garden... you get the picture.
Not sure if the heel is a viable excuse, but the other stuff has all contributed to the lack of posting around here. That, and a lack of material.
But despite all of this stuff, I have managed at least one skate session a week. Of this, I'm really pleased. Slow but steady progress. I said lack of material, but at least there's some material, there's a routine now. Sure I haven't posted some of the video that I wanted to, I haven't actually been taking the camera with me that often, and I haven't even been thinking about the footage from Morzine...
But I'm ticking over. It feels good. And I'm looking forward to skating tomorrow night.
Double Figures
Posted by on Sunday, April 26, 2009
After a short, sunny session on Saturday morning, I've hit double figures for ramp/bowl skate sessions. I'm officially hooked.
10 so far is pretty good compared with the poor performance of 2007 and 2008. I think the summer of 2006 is the only time I'd say that I skated consistently, until now. I'm skating once or twice per week at the moment. I'm expecting some of my commitments to fall away later this year, so I should be able to step it some more.
Labels: skateboarding
Beautiful Session
Posted by on Thursday, April 23, 2009
Last night's skate sesh at Redcar was pretty awesome. The three of us - Dave, Dan and myself - all skated well. For myself, I think it was the best I've ever skated.
On the mini-ramp I had the spine transfer working easy, stalls around the coping were feeling good, some nice long 50-50s, I had the frontside 50-50 fast and smooth, and the biggest frontside ollies I've done yet. I even had one or two nice backside ollies. Some sick runs.
Having the park to ourselves was nice too. It was all finished off with a Subway, a McDonalds milkshake and a hot bath (hard slam right at the end). Roll on next Wednesday...
Labels: skateboarding
Skateboarding Tricks
Posted by on Sunday, April 19, 2009
I think the only way to get better is to push yourself by trying new things. Sometimes when I skate, I don't really know what tricks to try next. I'll think of something, or see someone doing a trick, but when I try it it turns out to be way harder than I was expecting. Or I'm just doing it wrong... The result is that I don't always have the next bunch of tricks to work on to keep me progressing.
With that in mind, I'm going to list the tricks that I can do now, on a mini ramp. Some of these tricks are consistent for me, others are less so, and some, I'll probably get the names wrong:
- Drop in
- Drop in, switch
- Rock to fakie
- Rock to fakie, switch (is that a fakie rock, or something?)
- Tail stall
- Rock and roll (Backside? I can do it the easy way)
- Axel stall
- Backside 50-50
- Frontside 50-50 (but not very consistently, yet)
- 5-0 (but not very good)
- Frontside ollie (do they call that frontside 180?)
- Spine transfer from tail stall (not sure if that is a trick...)
- Fakie axel stall (probably not called that: going fakie, turn off front foot into a stall, facing into the ramp)
- Fakie axel stall, the other way (but I don't often get it)
- 180 kick turn to rock and roll, from fakie (probably not called that)
- Frontside early grab, indy
- Early grab out of tail stall (is that lame?)
And this is what I'm working on next:
- Nose stall. It follows from dropping in switch.
- Backside ollie. Because it looks better than frontside.
- Feeble stall and/or crooked stall. They seem like close variations on the axel stall.
- Frontside 5-0. Nice movement around a ramp/bowl, and doesn't seem like it will be much harder than frontside 50-50.
- Blunt rocks. Not sure why...
Labels: skateboarding
Blog: From Behind The World Snowboard Guide
Posted by on Thursday, April 16, 2009
I've been a reader of the wsg for a good few years now, and more recently, I've written a few reviews of my own, covering some UK slopes. In doing so, I've been dealing with Steve Dowle, the wsg's head guy. Apart from coordinating effort for each review, it's been good keeping in touch with someone who's created something like the World Snowboard Guide. Organising, writing and maintaining such a comprehensive guide must be a lot of work. It's impressive.
I'm interested in how things work in the snowboard industry. What's it like to set up a snowboard shop? What's it like to run a chalet? How about producing a guide book? Hopefully, I'll get a chance to chat about some of these things with Steve in the future. But in the meantime, he's just started a blog: From Behind The WorldSnowboardGuide.
To quote Steve, this is what the blog's about:
I really want to talk about what it is like to develop and run a website like the worldsnowboardguide, to independently produce and publish books, and still have to do normal work for a living.
I'll enjoy reading it...
Labels: wsg
New Skateboard Setup: Pictures
Posted by on Thursday, April 16, 2009
This is the new setup:
- Chocolate deck, 8"
- Venture trucks, wide
- Spitfire wheels, 57mm
- Bones Reds bearings
Last night was the weekly Redcar session, which was my first opportunity to try it out. It was all good. Definitely a little faster on the ramp, but apart from that, I didn't notice much difference, except that it's all new. It felt good to skate, and it had that solid 'pop' feel.
I seem to be doing pretty well with the number of times I'm getting out, and the improvement is following. No major advances, but I'm feeling much better around the coping. I had quite a few slams last night so the body's been a little tender today. Just gotta keep it up now and hopefully bag some new tricks...
Labels: skateboarding
New Skateboard
Posted by on Sunday, April 12, 2009
I went for a skate early on Friday morning, a couple of hours at Silksworth. It was dry here, but it must have been raining fairly recently over there because when I arrived all of the bowls and surfaces had water on them. It was sunny though, so I decided to wait it out. I wanted to take a few photos, and, suspecting that I'd be buying a new deck sometime soon I thought a photo of my current skateboard was in order...
Me in an empty park.
The dendex dryslope at Silksworth.
To start off with I was picking my way around the wet bits, but once it dried out, my main aim was to work the spine transfer to check that I could do it at a different park. There are three spines at Silksworth: a small one that leads out from the small bowl, one that joins the small bowl and large bowl together - so it's kinda got two sizes, and finally, a medium/large spine that joins the large bowl area with another area.
The small spine from the small bowl.
The large bowl, and spine leading to the small bowl.
The medium/large spine (in the background).
It didn't take long to conquer the small spine. It's concrete rather than wood, but no problems. Next up, I was dropping in from the large bowl to get speed to transfer back into the small bowl. So I was going up a large transition to the spine and then dropping down a smaller transition. That was more difficult, and a little scarier. I did get it though. Getting enough speed wasn't a problem; it was getting the right amount of speed. It was quite easy to overshoot, which meant jumping off at the last minute...
I haven't tried going the other way and I haven't tried the medium/large spine.
On Saturday I bought a new setup. My wheels are pretty tired, the bearings are kinda shot and the deck's worn and starting to delaminate. Plus I just fancied something fresh.
I decided to go for something a little wider. The current Almost is a 7.75", so I stepped up to an 8". I'm told that wider decks are more suited to bowls and ramps, which makes sense, and there are times when I feel a slightly bigger surface would be useful. I also went for bigger wheels. I'm not sure what my old ones are; probably 54mm to start with, but they're smaller than that now. The new ones are 57mm.
I've gone for this slightly bigger setup because I most like to skate bowls and ramps. A bit more stability and more speed. The whole thing looks quite a bit bigger. It's a little heavier too, but nothing that I think will cause me a problem. I'm keen to try it out. No doubt it will feel strange at first, but hopefully it'll turn out good. I'll post some pictures soon.
Out with the old...
Labels: skateboarding
Spine Transfer - Stoked!
Posted by on Thursday, April 09, 2009
Last night was another Redcar session, the second of this year. I've been feeling a bit ill all week but I decided to go anyway, I didn't want to miss out.
I'm wanting to try new things each time I skate at the moment, but a couple of the things I had in mind for last night turned out to be harder than they were in my head. So, I decided to return to a goal that I've had for a long time: getting over the spine.
The method I want to use is to go forwards into a tail stall on the coping, ready to drop in on the other side. To be honest, I've never really tried it before, save for 10 minutes or so at Silksworth a couple of weeks back. After 10 or so tries I realised that getting into the stall was pretty easy. All that was left was to get my balance more forward...
More attempts... then I got it. Sick. It feels so good.
I pretty much had it on lock down by the end of the session. If there are any skaters reading you may be thinking "that's a pretty easy move" - and you're probably right. It is an easy move. But for me, it's definitely one of those things that seems hard until you get it, and then it's very easy, like it totally clicks. There are other tricks that I can kind of do, but a lot of the time they still catch me out. This transfer feels more like learning to drop in; once you learn to do it, you don't forget it.
Then again, I should probably hold off that assessment until I try it on a bigger spine!
Labels: skateboarding
The Season's Over For Me...
Posted by on Monday, April 06, 2009
Well to be honest, it's been over for a while. I won't be shredding anymore this season. Next real snow is likely to be next year, that's a long time off! Poo.
For the season just gone and the one before that, I've been limited to two weeks on snow. I don't want to say that sucks, because I've had a great time snowboarding, but in the past I've been used to more. Before that, I had three years of riding somewhere between 3 and 5 weeks over the course of 12 months, so the last couple of seasons have seemed something like a wind-down.
I'd like to put an end to that, yet, my plan for next season will be the same: two weeks away. I obviously want to make them a good two weeks! Good powder and good parks. Good powder mostly.
This reduction in snowboarding has changed my outlook a little. I'm sure it's slowed my progression, but more generally, I kinda fell less involved. In the past I've been looking for any opportunity to get away - I've been active throughout the season, and in the summer too. These days, it's much more like a holiday.
This blog is mostly about me and snowboarding; but when you're not snowboarding that often, it's hard to write about the stuff you like writing about. For the time being, I guess I'm just more removed than I have been. I look forward to next season - I hope to shred in Canada again - but it's going to be another holiday year...
So what now? What for the rest of 2009?
I'd like to skate more. I'm into double figures for outings already, albeit some of them are short, around the one hour mark, but still, I feel active on a board, standing sideways. I'd like to aim for at least once per week. That shouldn't be hard should it? Maybe more. I'll be keeping track of the sessions in the sidebar, so we'll see how I get on.
I'm going to set out with the aim to post a video each month. It might be short, and I/we won't film every time I skate, but it would be cool to show how I'm improving each month (if I improve). I've already done a few things new that I'm pleased with - the trick is to keep it going for a decent period of time. I'll put something together for March.
I'd also like to prevent the relapse of freestyle skills on a snowboard by hitting up the UK slopes. That'll be Cas' and the 'Fax. I've had it in my mind for a while that it would be good to do 8 sessions in one month: every Friday at Castleford and every Saturday at Halifax. I'm fairly certain that with some motivation one could improve as much over the course of 4 weekends in the UK as they could doing a week away. That said, such a program traveling from where I live would probably cost as much as a week in Europe! But hey, it's something I'd like to try.
So for now, I'll be tied up working on a couple of unrelated projects. I'm trying to get out on the skateboard, film some, and of course, I've still got the footage from Morzine this year.
Gav.
Labels: skateboarding, uk riding
Notch Up A Couple More Skate Sessions...
Posted by on Sunday, March 22, 2009
Saturday morning was just a quickie :) I wanted some fresh air and decided it would be an opportunity to try filming some frontside boardslides. I don't have a tripod yet, but it's still possible to get by solo if you're willing to put up with limited angles and flexibility!
I wasn't really feeling it, but the session did the trick. 50 minutes or so, and something to show you guys.
Today I've been reminded of my frustration when dealing with the combination of my camera, Movie Maker and YouYube/Vimeo. Only it's worse this time.
I'm running on a beta of Windows 7 (after the hard drive failure) so I had to download Movie Maker. I exported the sequence twice, both widescreen and 4:3. I uploaded them both to Vimeo. I'm taller than I should be in both. I don't get it. I remember dealing with this rigmarole last time, but at least one of them ended up being right. Maybe I've got a different version of MM? When am I gonna stop messing around with a crap solution?
Anyhow, here it is. I look tall and skinny, which maybe isn't a bad thing as I'm a little out of shape :) Hopefully I'll fix the aspect soon...
Learning Frontside Boardslides from Gavin Hope on Vimeo.
7 Bails and 7 Makes... Just started to do front-boards on a skateboard. Wanted to get early makes on film. Five Bridges skatepark, Gateshead, UK.
Sunday, this morning, was an awesome session. Went to silksworth with Dave and Dan, they were keen to hit that bowl again... I knew they'd like it :)
A bit windy but no biggy. The bowl there is awesome. I didn't really learn anything new, rather I'm getting back to where I was last year, which isn't all that far. This seems to happen each year; I skate just enough to maintain where I was. Perhaps this year will be different. I'm pretty set on taking a step forward.
The park got real quiet at one point so we messed around in the large bowl trying some early grabs. That was fun.
Here are some pics. The first is just to show the bowl, the second two fall in the category of me trying things out. Nothing good mind, I just feel like I should post at least something when I've snapped with the camera...
Labels: editing video, skateboarding, video
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