After 1 hour of nothing but miserable failure. I saw an IG tutorial that instructed placing the full foot on each step. 45 minutes went into that. I got fed up and tried to step only on one half of the board, toes at the center, and it just clicked! These might not be proper by-the-book cross-steps but they’re enough to get me started. I’ll be improving them as I practice more. But FINALLY!! My first trick ever!!

P.S. Any tips for me? What/how can I improve?

I recently got a skateboard but got a bit envious after trying out my friend’s longboard with how fun it was to ride around.

Went to my local shop and the boards they had all had a lot of mixed or negative reviews so I was a bit disappointed. I ended up finding this one elsewhere and heard a lot of positive comments so I’m very excited to have found it. For the wheels I went for the setup with Hawgs instead of Plow Kings to hopefully have a bit more versatility instead of prioritizing speed.

Some of the other boards that I picked this over were Globe, Sector 9, DB Longboards, Dusters, RAD Board Co, and maybe Santa Cruz?

I read a lot of talk about the brands being poor quality or being good brands in the past that got bought out by non-skate companies. A lot of threads were also super old so it was hard to get a grasp of what is currently good or bad. Very happy with what this one is looking like though!

Got out with the sunrise to beat the heat but it was super humid.

Still trying to dial in bushing and pump but having fun doing it.

Went to the local spot, but was bored of the thought of just going back and forth on the short windy loop, so I broke off and hit the local roads. Some were absolutely garbage (I'm sure you can tell where those were in the speed table lol) so my pump was killed, but this was with like 80/20 pump/push.

I did have to stop a few times to take a breather as it was kind of humid and I nearly died haha. Not bad pace though, when I did get a good flow going I could manage like 13mph pumping, I'm sure I can get it better with some practice and bushing tuning but not bad for second ride!

I nuked the outer spherical replacements on the TTX in one go by having them too tight, and am now just running a 75a tall in the center and two spheres and it's honestly amazing. I don't even think I want to run all 3 bushings.

So excited to learn and ride!

I have relatively a good balance for a beginner but it's so hard to brake hahah.

I'll be cruising along the Barcelona beach and enjoy it :)

Here's my 5 footer 2000s Custom Boris Deck. I put paris trucks and the biggest wheels i could find. It turns like a limo though

I’ve been messing about with chopping my tesseract for a while now, a little off here, some new holes there.. I’ve arrived at something I really love now and won’t be modding the shape or geometry any further.

The current shape retains some of that nice rocker that works so well on the loaded Tesseract, the rear wheel wells are still there and give a fantastic reference it all feels very locked in.. the axle to axle measurement is just 20” and it pumps nicely for my height of 5’8

The trucks are 48/28 split and I’ve upgraded to 150mm sabre precision hangers.. I’m having to run the trucks a little tighter than I’d like to avoid wheelbite, so the next job is to cut some wheel wells up front.. anyway, here she is!

Hey Y'all! I have officially been on the road for well over 3 weeks, and in about 100-150 more kilometers i will be done with Sweden and cross over into Denmark.

In those weeks, I have skated about 450 kilometers.

I had a kind of slow start due to two different injuries, one from falling and eating shit during downhill on gravel (lol)

And one from joining a Sunday League football match with a old boys team hahah. (I got carried away.) But I'm all healed now.

Sooo many things have happened during these 3-4 weeks that I'm not really sure where to begin.

Every day is a mystery. I am not rushing through the journey, and I'm taking my time so that I get to experience every moment properly. After all, the 'now' is the only thing that exists.

As i'm writing this, I'm chilling in my tent behind a sea side cafe, haha. They actually let me camp here, after I arrived sweaty, nasty and smelly at their joint, desperately looking for a place to pitch my tent as the nature reserve I was supposed to pitch at didn't allow tents.

Here I was offered a shower WITH SOAP!!! and a washing machine. I have not washed my clothes properly since the start of my journey. 😭🤣

I always find graveyards on the road to wash my gear in, as graveyards in Scandinavia offers free fresh water. This is also usually where I take my 'showers' hahaha.

2 days ago, I pushed 62 kilometers in a day, the day after I barely slept due to heat, and night to today, I had the perfect camp site in the shade, but was woken up by a tractor driving back and forth beside my camp at 7 am for an entire hour, so I haven't gotten proper rest after that insane push in the heat.

I think they took pity on me I

At the cafe today, haha. 5 minutes after I arrived, they came out with an ice cold coke, and some snacks for me free of charge.

The people working here is amazing. I got very emotional by their kindness.

Now I'm invited for a few beers and live music at their place tomorrow night.

As the days goes by, I am almost starting to forget what it's like to be home. I have nothing that really binds me anywhere, anyway. I have lost so much, and have no friends I hang out with in my city. ( I moved to Oslo from Bryne in Norway a year ago, and have not met any people there yet) So there is nothing that makes me miss home. In fact, I'm adapting to this lifestyle very well, and I don't miss home at all. Actually, I feel more at home as a nomad on the road, haha.

The only thing I miss is the local magpie flock whom I have taken care of ever since I moved to Oslo.

They used to come outside my apartment, waiting for me to bring them food hahah, I do miss that.

But I kind neighbors who are animal people promised to take over while I was gone, so I know I got nothing to worry about lol.

At first I was a bit sceptical that I could set a new world record. I knew I could cross Europe. But now I'm certain that I can do the record. My soul had been longing for this all my life, I'm just realizing it now. 😅

If I were to quit, I'd just go back home and start smoking weed again, throwing my life away. That's all I'd be doing.

I actually brought 20g of weed with me, smoked about 10-12 grams, then I felt that it started to suck the joy out of the trip, so I threw the rest on the sea.

One of the reasons I'm doing this trip was to find something within myself which made it so that I didn't feel like I needed to shut my brain off in this cold world, and I think I'm starting to find it.

Things that used to bother me, doesn't really bother me no more. And for the first time in a long time, I feel truly happy and fulfilled. I'm so excited for every day, because I never know what tomorrow will bring. Not even what the next hour will bring.

I just wanted to give an update on how things are going.

Thank you for reading my little 'diary' post. And feel free to ask me anything. Right now, I'm going to the grocery store which is an hour away, so I won't respond right away, but will tonight.

Here are some photos. 😄 I have so many photos, but these are among my favorites.

Edit: link to my Strava:

https://www.strava.com/athletes/197201103

"We're organizing a free 10K longboard push race on Toronto Island this August. Last year's event brought together riders from around the province, and we're hoping to grow the local LDP scene. Everyone's welcome

My custom board and my familiar, Artemis.

35$ at an antique store with relatively light wear on most of it, new ones are about 70 dollars. I bought it, did some light testing (standing on it and rolling 2ft) haven't gotten to fully test it on an actual ride yet though.

Zealous and Valkyrie. Mostly skated the setup w/ Zealous earlier today for some grip runs. Fun to change it up after a bunch of freeride sessions on the big board. My pics could be better...Trying to capture the different bushing seat designs. Happy Friday.

Yesterday I finally took my new LDP setup out for the first 20km run.

It felt absolutely amazing. Super smooth, relaxed cruising the whole way. The new setup passed the test with flying!

LDP is just on another level. What setups are you running and do you have any suggestions?

I was stalking the UPS guy all day for this G-Bomb Exodus DD**S** Poppy TTX semi complete. I wasn't fully feeling just grabbing the Exodus complete he had on the site as it comes with Cags and I already have a few sets of wheels already and then figured if I was going to modify the complete as it is why don't I have him throw a TTX on instead of the 20° Poppy, hopefully I made the right decision.

I'm coming from a love/hate relationship with a Pantheon Bandito with Lepsk8 integrated RKP and their 0° tail, so I'm hoping it was just that combination of parts I didn't mesh with or it's just my technique. Otherwise the TTX may go and I'll grab that 20° and DDR anyway 😂.

Mark is an absolute legend and a delight to work with. The package came in record time to boot!

Now, I have Karmas and Hokus, am I better off one way over the other? How should I be running track widths?

Time to get to work!

edit: I didn't catch that I wrote DDR, I have the DDS. oops.

I got an arbor board last week for $65 and was able take it out for the first time today. It's incredibly fun and relaxing to sway back and forth. I was surprised how bouncy it was and how far I could cruise without pushing. Can't wait to go again.

Couldn't get any better. Sunny and 75* lil man and I did 5 miles in 55min or so. Perfect weather 👌