Oh, Justin James, the guy I simply refer to as Numb Nuts. We’ve been hanging out for over a decade, had our ups and down and maybe punched each other in the face a couple times, but we always make up. Today I was stunned, Justin actually committed to blunt fakies on a quarter pipe. It was at BCP, and the quarter isn’t that big, but there’s a story behind it which is why I was amazed…
When I first met Justin at Bear Creek Skate Park so many years ago, he was around 20 years old and had just started skateboarding. Skating is not an easy thing to start doing when you’re in your 20’s, it’s way harder to learn something new at that age, especially something as difficult and dangerous as skateboarding. So anyway, I remember he would always be riding the little quarter pipe at Bear Creek and couldn’t really do anything. This was back in the era when me (Hippie Mike), Jay Mykyte, Stu Benoit and Drew Boyle would go down to BCP and just play game after game of skate on this quarter. So numb nuts would get into blunt and then just pop it in to fakie. He would usually clip his front hanger or wheels on his way in but still ride away because he had no idea what he was doing and was just standing weightless on his board. I thought it was so crazy that this kid that could hardly do a 50-50 stall was doing blunt fakies, even if they weren’t that good… So we started hanging out, and I taught Justin a ton of the basics on that quarter pipe and he ended up getting pretty good, but the more tricks he learned the less blunt fakies he was doing, until he literally could not do them any more. For years I have watched Justin try blunt fakies in multiple places and never commit, and I honestly thought he would never do another one. Today I was proven wrong. We stopped off at Bear Creek on the way back from filming all day and he claimed, like usual, that he was going to blunt fakie the quarter pipe. I had not faith of course.
Then blam, like 3rd try he just commits and sticks a perfect blunt fakie. Then another, and another. The crazy part was that every one he did looked like he had been doing them all his life. It was crazy. It just goes to prove that you should never give up on your dreams and even if you struggle with a trick for years, there is still a chance you may land it, or even learn it someday…