(Los Angeles) Nobody embodies snowboarding better than Shaun White: the American, seeking a fourth title at the Beijing Games before retiring, not only has the finest track record in his sport, but in formal notice at 35, the superstar, pouring business like rock’n roll.
Posted at 8:12
Gold medalist in Turin-2006, Vancouver-2010 and PyeongChang-2018, the one nicknamed “Red Zeppelin” for his red hair, with long curls comparable to that of Robert Plant-high-pitched voice of Led Zeppelin-up until he cuts them, announced on Saturday that this fifth Olympic outing would be his last.
For extreme sports specialists, however, the Olympics are less important than the Winter X Games, where White won 13 gold medals. No one has done better since.
To his credit also two other victories at the Summer X Games. Yes. At the Summer X Games. Because not content with shining at 1080° above the snow, Shaun White also excels in skateboarding on asphalt. He is indeed the first athlete to have participated and won at both events.
Living, dreaming, flying away, twirling around on a board, with or without wheels, however, did not matter much to this native of San Diego, a Californian city rather keen on surfing, the passion of his father Roger, employed at the water utility of San Clemente (California), who chose the first name of his son in tribute to the South African Shaun Tomson, star of the waves in the 1970s.
heart defect
The youngest of four children, White was born on September 3, 1986 with tetralogy of Fallot, a rare congenital heart defect that required two open-heart surgeries before he was one year old and a third later.
Not enough to prevent him from enjoying the thrills, since he got on his first snowboard at the age of six, encouraged by his parents.
“They didn’t put any limits on me. I rushed to realize my dream, without worrying about anything, ”he summarized in 2017 on the show Jimmy Kimmel Live, during which he reassured the host who had just learned that his son was affected. of the same disease.
Very quickly, Shaun White distinguished himself, since he was only seven years old when the Oakley brand became his first sponsor. Many lucrative partnerships will follow one another, to the point that its net income is now estimated at $60 million.
Because the young phenomenon, who took part in his first Winter X Games at the age of 13, has kept his promises, forging an unrivaled record, from the first of his thirteen gold medals gleaned three years later in Aspen, the Mecca of extreme sports, up to his third Olympic title at the age of 31, including his four victories in World Cup events.
Its almost permanent domination for fifteen years is also marked by this perfect score of 100 points obtained in 2012, at the X Games in Tignes.
62 stitches
“Bankable”, he invites himself to the cinema (Sex with friends in 2011), participates in various television shows, lends his name and image to a video game license.
But what gives him almost as much thrill as snowboarding is the electric guitar. He released an album with the group Bad Things, performed at the Lollapalooza festival… A rock swerve tarnished by a complaint for sexual harassment against him in 2016, from the group’s drummer. A financial agreement is finally concluded.
White is not going through his best period, especially since he is no longer the best in sport, since his misstep in 2014 at the Sochi Games (4and). He will also confide that he “never recovered” from this failure, explaining “it’s like falling off a bicycle, you have scars that remain”.
Scars, he literally causes some in the face in October 2017, after a very heavy fall face against the edge of a half-pipe in training, which requires the laying of 62 stitches. But it took more than that for White to give up his passion, as he was crowned four months later in PyeongChang.
And it was not COVID-19, contracted last December, which was going to deprive him of a final challenge in Beijing. Because, he says, if “some people attach a snowboard to their feet, very few attach it to their soul”.