Week highlights from the Suzuki Nine Knights 2015
A one of a kind castle-themed setup with five massive features had been carefully carved out of 150,000 m3 snow as the playground for the Suzuki Nine Knights 2015 in Livigno, Italy.
The invited all-star line up consisted of skiers and snowboarders who arrived from all corners of the globe for the week-long session running from the 5th to 10th of April. Mottolino Fun Mountain saw riders stomp many personal first tricks and making the most out of the immense feature by working together with film-makers and photographers to document the action at the sunset, heli- and night shoots. The mini ramp placed on a snow cube at 12m hight, completed "Il Castello” and saw skaters ride in an unusual setting making for additional stunning visual material.
SNOWBOARD
Sven Thorgren was the first to test the 35m beast of a kicker out of the snowboarders and he kept up the momentum all week claiming the peer voted “Ruler of the week” prize, as well as winning the Big Air contests and, stomping his first frontside triple cork 1440. He was stoked on the week naming the helisession as one of his favourite moments and pointing out fellow Swede Tor Lundström’s achievements “He was sending it, learning a back triple 14 and new frontside 14”. Finn Peetu Piiroinen was the rider who got the loudest “wow” during the hip session flying higher than the 9.5 meter halberd, while the Belgian duo Sebbe de Buck, who claimed the “Best Style”- title, and Seppe Smits mixed it up with fun combos and handplants on the wallride. Halldór Helgason (ISL), did not fail to show one of his trademark methods and also went head to head in the Monster showdown edit with his fs 540 indy vs. Kevin Backström (SWE) fs 720 tailgrab. (watch it)
FREESKI
Jesper Tjäder (SWE) and Christof Schenk (ITA) claimed a shared “Rulers of the week” title, determined by their peers. Jesper upped the ante from last year’s huge 55m “death gap” with his super technical “Dream Line” (watch it here), which included an alley oop double flatspin. Christof charged all week, stomping a triple backflip and throwing down a huge flatspin 450 in the hip session. Big Air contest winner Luca Schuler commented; “I think every rider here used the setup in a creative finding new lines, but one of my absolute highlights was Jesper's double backflip over the big axe!” The various shoots saw many perfectly timed simultaneous double backflips and backflip trains, as well as the youngest participant, the14-year old Aspen Spora (USA) stomping a backflip on the huge kicker with ease. Nicky Keefer (USA) took home the “Best Style” always tweaking out his tricks to the max.
MORE…
The four invited photographers Alex Papis, Markus ‘Fischi’ Fischer, Cyrill Müller, and Christoph Schöch snapped away to take exclusive shots from the week as well as partaking in the photo competition. See all the winning shots on www.nineknights.com. Next up is the Suzuki Nine Knights MTB on 31st of August to the 5th of September 2015 in Mottolino, Livigno.