War of the Thistles 2009 Day 2

Day 2 of The War was held at the excellent Transition Extreme skatepark in Aberdeen. A bit of a drive, but well worth it.

Skater of the day today went to this man here. Stu Graham. Stu is another of the breed of professional scottish skaters who also, like Ben as brought up on Livingston skatepark's concrete. Stu is currently making some pretty big waves across in America just now. I did hear that he's having a bit of hassle with his working visa just now hence he's been kicking about this island for a wee while recently.

Stu absolutely killed it all day today and was a pleasure to watch. He absolutely attacked every ramp he was on going at ridiculous speeds. You can probably see his build from this picture and believe me, if he were to run into you mid skate, it would be like juggernaut hitting you. That said, the paradox of it is that he displays such finesse and control on a skateboard. In this shot he is just casually doing this 5-0 grind at the top of a 12 foot ramp with about 3-4 foot of vert. A scary ramp.

At one point he was doing a grind right across the love seat section of the halfpipe, going at some ridiculous speed. He noticed that the speed wasn't going to quite get him right across it so just in the blink of an eye, he popped the board off it early and right back into the ramp. It's wee bits like that really make him stand out. He just makes it look so easy without even thinking about it.