Suzanne Graham

So the past week or so since we got back from Switzerland I have been so insanely busy with school, work, household stuff, and whatever else that the month I spent getting terminal in one of the top 5 most beautiful places on the planet seems more like a really good dream than anything else! To help remind myself, and all of you- Here is a quick little photo montage, and once I figure out videos on this I’ll get some of that up too

Home for 3 weeks

Current favorite place in the world

On top of a 2000 foot cliff

The typical landing area

Jesse sending it

baby sheep!!!

Me sending it

Happy Suz

24/7 petting zoo

Jesse landing in a really nasty, technical landing area

So, I want to go back- now! It was amazing, going back to jumping off our little cliffs around Salt Lake is going to be hard now, compared to what I’ve been doing. But all is well, I’m studying hard in one of my last semesters until I am finished with my degree, it’s going to be a busy summer but my life is pretty much a perpetual play time so I’m not too worried about it.

Made it to Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland- the land of big cliffs- and it is beautiful! This place is truly magnificent. Pics and vid to come

Just got back from a fun trip up to Twin Falls, Idaho to go spend some time jumping of the Perrine Bridge- Spent some time honing in on some skillllz and did my 200′th BASE jump! We also got to do some skydiving at Snake River Skydiving which was really fun, I got to jump my new tracking suit out of a plane before I go off to big cliff land (aka Switzerland) in a few days.

Me learning how to not totally fly out of control in a tracking suit

Then today we got to jump out of a helicopter, again some more tracking practice. It was awesome!!! Heli jumps are really cool because you aren’t moving so fast like you are in a plane, it is more like a BASE jump because of what we call a “still air exit.” Awesome.

Off to Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland in a couple days- I am crazy excited!!!

The hardest part about the lifestyle we choose to live is the inevitable fact that it will take some of us.

Shane McConkey died on Thursday in Italy while wingsuit ski-basing. When I got that call I couldn’t believe it- Shane was one of the few people I have looked up to for as long as I can remember. As both a skier, a base jumper, and a person.

Fly free, Shane- we’re going to miss you so much

75 degrees today- snowing tomorrow… The weather here seems to be a little confused. Not as confused as this hilarious little creature though.

The Mallagator

I wish I loved running as much as this girl does-

Like those people who say they just LOVE running. Maybe you just have to work up to it…. So I went running today, because it feels like spring, and the skiing isn’t so epic right now, and honestly, it felt great! The actual running part not so great… kind of a struggle honestly. But afterwords you feel pretty much amazing. These are also the times when I tell myself I am going to become one of those people who wakes up at 6 every morning to go for a morning run. But I’m not sure if I’ve actually gone through with that once. Hopefully once it warms up for good I can actually make it a regular part of my day.

Check out the final images all the photographers submitted for the Ski Salt Lake Shootout competition here

http://shootout.smugmug.com/

These photos are phenominal by themselves but when you consider the kinds of conditions we were dealing with… I skied some of the worst snow I have ever skied, normally on days like this I would never, ever, consider skiing some of the stuff we did, let alone hucking on it, but everyone stepped up to the plate regardless, and it ended up a huge success. Now I just need a few days off to recover from the whole thing!

I’m off to Taos, New Mexico for the Salomon Extreme Freeride Championships in a couple days, should be a really fun time!

And um…. pray for snow, or something…. please

The past 3 days i’ve been participating as an athlete in the Ski Salt Lake Shootout- Basically a competition that pairs athletes and photographers from all over the country and they have 4 days at each resort in the cottonwood canyons (alta, snowbird, brighton, and solitude) to produce the best images they can in different catergories, which are then judged and awarded at the end of the week. It’s been a lot of hard work so far but great meeting so many new people and getting some great shots out of it.

Check out http://www.visitsaltlake.com/ski/shootout/ for details and updates, as well as the winners in a few days! Now I’m off to go shoot some city lifestyles tonight- I think I might sleep for a day straight after this is all over! Just enough time to rest before I take off this weekend for Taos, for the Solomon Extreme Freeride Championships- which I’m pretty excited about!

A couple days ago, Jesse Hall, Max Kuszaj, JT Holmes, Clayton Bigsby, Brendan Nicholson, and I went on the ultimate mission to ski-base the castle. We had to traverse in on the ribbon of snow near the top, then rappel 200 feet down to the snowfield in the center. It was terrifying to say the least, and the snow on the snowfield was totally sugary, we were concerned that it would hold up long enough for all six of us to ski off the thing, not to mention it was steep and rocky. After all was said and done however, we all got off it safely and it was an amazing experience, we’ve been staring at that thing for a long time now, and I will never be able to look at it the same again. Hopefully we got some good footage and photos from the thing! I’ll hopefully be able to post some soon!

Here it is, Girl Next Door’s “Winter Game” music video that I filmed for about a month ago as the skier/BASE jumper stunt double. Enjoy!

*The you tube videos kept getting deleted, so hopefully this one works, if not just go to youtube and search “girl next door, winter game” and it will be the first to come up

Winter Game – GIRL NEXT DOOR / avex trax