Category: skateboarding

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Training the Magic Weasel

A new skate video…

Warning – I shot this video mostly to analyze my own skating – so yes — it is mostly the same footwork sequence over and over, from different angles. But some of it was kind of cool, so I decided to put it up here on youtube.

My friend Tony Gale says that freestyle skater Stefan Albert moves like “a magic weasel”. I decided to learn some footwork inspired by Stefan. The Magic Weasel is 2 end-overs into a 1-footed tail 360 into 2 end-overs, but the trick is making a smooth transition from endovers to 1 footed 360s and back to endovers, so it all appears to be one continuous movement.

This was my first day working on this sequence. Thought it went pretty well.

One really nice thing about freestyle is that if you get to your spot and you are tired, you can warm up by working on low-impact stuff like this, and then move to harder moves as your body wakes up.

 

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Some skating…

Yesterday I had my 4th freestyle practice. As noted earlier, it has been a long time since I’ve done this stuff. Thinking about it, really, it has been at least 4 years. Of course I’ve been skating a lot on longboard, so it isn’t like I’ve not been skating. Still feeling a little clumsy on the small freestyle board, but overall I think it is going well.

Video is a great learning tool. For example, this video brought a couple of things to my attention:

  1. On my 360 shove-its, when I hang my rear foot over the edge less during take-off, I get a much better landing — better style – with my foot really on the board nicely, rather than on the heel with my toes hanging off.
  2. I remembered that on fingerflips, if I keep my knees together and pointed slightly forward, it not only looks better, but improves the trick by getting both less functioning in better unison.
So I think if I can keep up these practices for a couple of months I’ll be doing pretty well. All the skills should be back. 
Oh, the crazy electronic music is mine too. Downloadable here.

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Almost Out of Control

Took some downhill runs to day at Mt. Richardson with Chris Smith. BIG tailwind. Riding the Comet Voodoo, set up for tight turning slalom runs — not a great idea. As you can see, it was very fast today. About 30mph on this run — about 3/4 the way down I got speed wobbles, but stayed calm and centered and just rode it out. Some nice adrenalin. Sorry for the crazy view for the sky toward the end, but at that point I was concentrating on staying alive and uninjured.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVN5NyFHnKE]

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Let’s skate….

Need to get some content on this blog, so here’s a messy little skate video I made last year. This is the kind of  video I put on youtube and usually get a bunch of thumbs-downs from teenage skaters because it didn’t amaze them, has horrible production values, or simply isn’t gay enough. Well, sorry guys, you and your boyfriends can make all the epic skate vids you want, with beautiful scenery to the soundtrack of some flaccid “World Music”.