Concrete's Harder Than Water - A Film About Lukas Skinner

Blog - Concrete's Harder Than Water - A Film About Lukas Skinner

Concrete's Harder Than Water - A Film About Lukas Skinner

4 Minuten Lesezeit

‘Concrete’s Harder Than Water’ is a new short film that follows dryrobe® Ambassador Lukas Skinner as he recovers from a freak skateboarding accident.

Directed by Seth Hughes, it recently won the Best British Film award at the London Surf Film Festival. Watch the full film below.

Lukas is one of the UK’s most exciting groms, at just 14 years old he’s racked up an impressive number of junior titles, as well as turning heads across the surfing world with his incredible aerial skills.

As Concrete’s Harder Than Water shows it’s been anything but an easy ride. Having ruptured his spleen whilst skateboarding, Lukas was airlifted to hospital and out of action for months.

Lukas Skinner and Ben Skinner wearing dryrobes

We spoke to Lukas last year about the accident and his long road back into the water:

“I was at Concrete Waves in Newquay and I was skating an 8ft quarter ramp. I did a frontside indy grab about 4ft high above the ramp and as I came down, my back truck caught on the coping of the ramp and I kept going to the flats onto my left side. I split my helmet in half and couldn’t remember what had just happened. I was in a lot of pain, I can’t even describe it.

Dad took me to Newquay hospital and I got put on a very high dose of morphine as I waited for the ambulance to take me to Treliske Hospital. I got a scan at Treliske after about 4 hours of waiting and it turned out I had torn my spleen. They wanted me to go to Bristol Hospital in case my internal bleeding started again and I needed an urgent operation.

The next day the Air Ambulance took me to Bristol. Me and Dad ended up there for two and a half weeks. It was the hardest and the most painful time of my life. After two weeks of being in intensive care (and on every medication they had), I was ready to go home. But as I’d been in bed resting for the whole time I’d forgotten how to walk! I had to get wheelchaired down.

At home, I had to have total bed rest for about four months and could only just walk to the toilet with my Mum’s help. I was sleeping on a double bed in the lounge as I couldn’t get up the stairs. All I was doing was sleeping, watching movies, playing PS4 with my mates and having friends come round to see me.

Knowing how much support I had made things a lot better - especially when people like Tom Holland, Italo Ferreira, Nic Von Rup, Jamie Brian, Ben Gravy and Mason Ho were all sending me video messages wishing me the best for my recovery.

After four months I could start going out for walks again. I was also face-timing Richie Inskip (@skatetillyoupuke) who had a massive impact, getting me back to 100%. We did two hours a week on FaceTime for four weeks before my scan, and we’re still talking now.

On the 12th of December 2020 I went back up to Bristol for my scan to see if I would get the all-clear to surf again. After my scan, we sat and waited to be called in by my specialist. Thirty nervous minutes later we were called in and I got all clear to surf. I couldn’t believe it. Everything I’d been through was about to stop and I’d be back in the sea again soon.”

Lukas Skinner surfing at The Wave in Bristol

Check out our full interview with Lukas here.

Follow Lukas…

Instagram: @lukas_skinner
YouTube: Lukas Skinner

Photos by Tom Young

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