ChicagBros

Summer is a time for riding, filming, going on trips, and maybe best of all, broing out with all your best buddies.  Filming and riding with the guys is one of my favorite things to do, as well as all the action that happens when not riding.  So when my good friend Josh Young asked if he could come down to film a Sky High edit at Tommy Daddono’s house in Chicago, I was naturally stoked. 


Josh, as well as Kelly Zmijewski and Brandon “Big Bitch” Rowell, came up on July 1st to the windy city.  Tommy and I drove in his little red Miata to the new Tilt shop/warehouse where we’d meet up with Collin, the owner of Tilt, and the Michigan dudes.  After about an hour’s drive we arrived, where the other gang had already got there and started fixing up their scooters.  The shop was pretty empty since Tilt was just starting to move in, but according to Collin when its done, it’ll be packed full to the brim with equipment/machinery. 

The “Big” dogs…at least in Collin’s case.  Sorry Tdadd.

Putting some fresh wheels on.

After hanging out at the shop for a while, we decided to go sesh a local park…not much went down, but Tdadd was getting some pretty high airs on the mini.  Josh got a pretty good pic of him boosting it, check it below.  After that we all headed back to Tommy’s town to ride this little lighted park and a ledge spot across the street.  This park had a little bit of everything, but of course Josh and I ended up riding a ledge haha.  After we tired of the park we headed to the infamous Mike Mo ledges at the school across the street…not actually ridden by the skater best known for his part in Fully Flared (to my knowledge) but they’re similar to a spot he skates in the video.  Josh gave his wheels a beating trying this lipslide but finally landed his trick on film.  Watching him ride that kind of set up there is ridiculous…he can go forever doing feebles, smiths, manuals, bars, and 180s in whatever combination possible.  We left at just the right time, as a cop pulled up.  Brandon surprisingly gave him the perfect answer as to why we were there and we were able to peace out to Denny’s for a late night meal and then back to Tommy’s for the night. 

Tommy “Steeze Monkey” Daddono.  Not doing a tuck no hander.

The next day Josh, Kelly, and Brandon drove to Northbrook skatepark to ride with Jeff Mroz, Justin Lacosse, Yemish Riccotish, Dylan Dorfler, and AJ Lohens.  Tommy and I unfortunately had to get some things done at the shop, so we didn’t make it to NB, but we did meet up with the crew at Glencoe skatepark.  Glencoe is the kind of park that looks really crappy and poorly built at first glance, but after a while warming up, you find it’s actually creative and fun.  At any rate it’s a nice change from Northbrook, which we headed to after getting some McDonalds.  Northbrook is the kind of park that looks really good and well built and first glance, but after a while warming up, you find it’s actually bland and boring.  Most of the kids around here dig it though, and its nice to just cruise around. 


Next up was Racine for the day.  Tommy couldn’t make it due to some family issues so it was just me, Josh, Kelly, and Brandon for the day.  We decided to trip it up to Racine, where a couple days of Transit Two were filmed.  Racine is always an interesting place…almost saw a fight between a 20 year old white guy and a 13? year old black kid go down, fortunately no fists were thrown…however we did get some funny footage from it.  The skatepark down by the lake there has a really fun ledge setup right up in front.  Kelly, if you don’t know anything about him, is mainly a park, jump box rider.  He also is one of the best I know at footjams and can toothpick anything.  So when he started busting out icepick grinds across entire ledges, we were all getting hyped.  Keep an eye out for this guy, I think you’ll be seeing more of him in the future…so anyways we took a little street mission and I got a clip and a picture I was stoked on. 


After Racine we headed to this park I had heard about, a new one in Kenosha…we looked it up on Kelly’s Iphone, punched in the address to my GPS and well…it wasn’t quite the park we were looking for.  It was probably the most podunk sorry excuse for a park you’ll ever see…yet we somehow managed to stay probably a couple hours and film a bit haha.  Kelly worked his butt off getting a clip, I was super stoked to see him try so many times and not give up on it.  That’s something I think a lot of scooter kids today don’t understand…sometimes you gotta work hard to get the clip, and when you do, the feeling is so much sweeter.  We got the directions to the real park from a local there, and got to ride there for a bit…it turned out to be a really sick park with some unique touches.  Sadly I messed up my wrist back at the smaller park so I was sidelined, and just filmed the whole time.  I actually had to do that for the whole rest of the trip, really bummed on that.

   Josh, Brandon, Kelly, and me.  Note my newly acquired height.  Hahaha

The next day consisted of a hot, sunny, sunburned filled day at Kenosha.  The Sky High local  team kids came along again and we all rode and clocked some clips.  Josh put in a ton of work getting some reallllll techy footage.  After that, since it was July 4th, we all went to our good friend Yemish’s (Owen Wilcox) house to grill out, jump on his trampoline, and chill on a lake.  Yemish is one of the craziest, most ridiculous kids you’ll ever have the pleasure to meet.  Nearly all of my vocabulary comes from this guy.   Words cannot truly describe him, so I’ll have to refer you to his “A Word from Owen” series on Youtube.  He lives on this neighborhood owned private lake, and the neighbors really put in a lot of work on a fireworks show.  They really topped off the day, it was super cool.

Jeff tossing a rotorwhip.  Photo cred to Brandon.

Finally it was the last day and we decided to hit up Chicago street.  We didn’t have any concrete plans other than checking out a school we rode about a month ago so after working most of the day at the office we headed to the spot.  Or spots, I should say.  This school has about 3 different areas, all with stuff to ride, different ledge and drop setups.  The cool thing about this place is a lot of the ledges actually have metal angle iron, so they slide super nice.  We somehow managed to stay afternoon/night at this place, getting a load of clips.  I was still hurting from my hand but even I got a little clip.  Josh got a really dope sequence shot which should be set up soon on the Sky High facebook.  Tommy and I definitely plan on going back to that place soon, its so much fun.  And it literally was all around one single school building.  Anyways we drove back to the shop late that night to get a couple things done, then cashed out for the night at the house.  The next day the Michigan crew had to leave early, so Tommy busted some front bris flat on Kelly’s spare scooter, and then we all said our goodbyes.   Overall it was a pretty fun trip, and I can’t wait for the next…which is on the way soon…might even be in “transit.”  Hm.  Be on the lookout for Josh’s Sky High edit coming sometime this week.

Final bro shot with everyone.  Check Brandon’s snazzy hat.