Battleship Skate Competition

The Battleship North Carolina was used in battles during World War II, but on Saturday it was transformed into a skatepark as the Red Bull Battleship Competition came to town.

It was controversial to some veterans who found it to be disrespectful but others thought it was just good clean fun.

With historic downtown Wilmington in the foreground, teams from eight regional skate shops began by competing head-to-head and selecting two of their three riders to skate in a judged three-minute “jam”.

The combined judged score total for the riders of each team determined which rosters advanced within the “survival” bracket and which were relegated to the “sunk” bracket. The tournament concluded with the final teams from each bracket competing in the Red Bull Battleship championship.