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Nine Knights’09-The full roundup!

Nine Knights’09, presented by Almdudler is over!  A stoked bunch of skiers, filmers and photographers left Oberstdorf in Germany on Sunday with big smiles on their faces, and a load of crazy memories from a great week that has been filled from begining to end with Bavarian banter, throw-down skiing, dazzling imagery, and medieval-style partying…messy!

Nico Zacek and Tobi Reindel getting all Bavarian. (picture courtesy of <a href= 
Nico Zacek and Tobi Reindl getting all Bavarian (Photo courtesy of www.stefcande.com)

After sessioning the perfectly shaped castle for two days at both sunrise and sunset,  riders and media were pretty happy with what they’d got in the can, and so with a couple of days of mixed weather everyone found time to chill out, party, edit their shots, or play football in preparation for comp day on Saturday. Sadly there’d be no participation from two of the Knights, as Paddy Graham (UK) and Oscar Sherlin (SWE) had been injured in battle!


Crill attempts to nurse Oscar back to life…we had suspicions that the illness was drink induced…hmmm (picture courtesy of www.stefcande.com)

Thomas Hlawitschka gets the better of Max Garhammer in the Redbull football tournament (picture courtesy of Christoph Schoech)

                                check out some action form the first two shooting days
                               http://mpora.com/videos/50CgLMMN7
                                          More Freeskiing >>

As competing photographer, I of course got stuck into….errrrr partying…and a bit of editing, so here is what i came up for the of  best Action/Black and White/Creative Angle/Lifestyle/

ACTION

Henrik Harlaut with his trademark Cork nine blunt over the castle

Paddy Graham prior to injury with a flatspin 5 Japan

 BLACK/WHITE

Germany's Thomas Hlawitschka rides high above the following heli-cam

...just as Xavier Ghering gets it just right with the light, the shadows, the grab....

 
CREATIVE ANGLE

Fabio Studer double nose grab through the window of the Almdudler Hut

Two legends: Nico Zacek and Steff Cande fill my frame with so much greatness that even the sun is dwarfed by their might!

 
LIFESTYLE

A little controversial here...Just documenting what Bavarian guys get upto...you've got to get loose once in a while eh!

Paddy Graham and his grilfriend are so beautiful that someone borrowed them for the day to try and increase sales of lederhosen...wow!

So after all that, it came to comp day, followed by the eagerly anticipated after party and prize giving. Plenty of spectators from near and far went up to the Nebelhorn to see the nine knights in action. The weather was not perfect, but the knights still showed the tricks they have practised all week.  Henrik Harlaut  was the outstanding rider of the Nine Knights 2009. The euro open champion was slaying the 21 meter box (best trick: pretzl 360 switch up, switch up, pretzl 270) and winning the „best jibber“ category. He also convinced the judges with his jumping skills and won a set of Dotz rims in the category „best kicker“. Thomas Hlawitschka was once more the ruler of the quaterpipe and also took a set of Dotz rims…lets hope hope Henrik learns to drive soon, and Thomas gets a better car!

Henrik cleans up! (picture courtsey of Christoph Scoech)

At the afterparty the riders and photographers judged the second highlight of the day: The Nine Knights photo competition. Johan Stahlberg (Swe), Pally Learmond (UK), Stef Cande (Fra), Klaus Polzer (Ger) and Alo Belluscio (It) created the most amazing images you can possibly imagine and it was very hard to pick the very best shots.

At the end though, Johan Stahlberg won the best action shot, capturing some amazing sunset doule action on the castle.

Best Action (pictiure courtesy of Johan Stahlberg)
Johan picks up his rims (picture courtesy of Christoph Schoech)

“Most creative angle” as well as  “best black & white photo” went to Stef Cande from france.


Best Black and White (picture courtesty of www.stefcande.com)

Best Creative Angle (picture courtesy of www.stefcande.com)
France's Steff Cande celebrates (picture courtesy of Christoph Schoech)

As for me, well i managed to pick up best Lifestyle for the revealing image seen above in the article, so instead i’ll leave you with this one that didn’t make the cut

more underground activites from the Lederhosen wearing fiends...
Danke! (picture courtesy of Christoph Schoech)

Of course, thats not all that happened at the after party…it got crazy (mainly started by Laurent Favre ripping everyones shirts off!) and went on way in to the small hours!

Paddy tries to escape from Laurent...in shirt ripping mode! (photo courtesy of Christian Worndle)

So then, many thanks  goes to Nico Zacek, Almdudler, Voelkl/Marker who made the week such a succes. Check out www.nineknights.com for further blogs, pics, videos and infos about the event.

words and pictures: Pally Learmond (except where stated)

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