The Telescope

Issue Date: 2/13/06

Refreshing `Flying Tomato' takes stage

By David Whitley
KRT News Service

Media Credit: Andrew P. Scott/KRT U.S. snowboarder Shaun White kicks up snow during his final run in the Men's Halfpipe snowboard competition on Sunday, February 12, 2006 in Bardonecchia, Italy during the 2006 Winter Games. White won the gold medal, Danile Kass, also of the U.S. won silver and Markku Koski, of Finland, won the bronze. [Click to enlarge]

TURIN, Italy - GrandMaster Flash was about to perform Monday night. With any luck, Barbara Bush would rush the stage and trigger an international incident.

The president's daughter was supposedly in the crowd at the invitation-only party. From the spotlights to the red carpet, the night felt like a Hollywood premiere.

It would be enough to make a young man's head spin. Thankfully, Monday's guest of honor does 1080-degree spins for a living.

"Look at this," Shaun White said. "It's crazy."

About as insane as the thought that a pasty, 5-foot-8, 140-pound kid who looks like a young Carrot Top is the best athlete at the Olympics.

And it's not just what he looks like. It's what he does.

Halfpipe?

They used to arrest people for trying some of those tricks. Now they give them gold medals. White earned it Sunday by snowboarding his way into Olympic history.

Just that phrase is enough to make Baron Pierre de Coubertin do 1080s in his grave. The father of the modern Games envisioned Paavo "The Flying Finn" Nurmi, running to five gold medals.

Now we have "The Flying Tomato," a 19-year-old from San Diego who calls everyone, including his mother, "Dude."

But he means it with all respect.

"He's just a regular kid," Roger White said. "He doesn't diss anybody."

The fact White's 56-year-old father uses terms like "diss" and "gnarly" fits the snowboarding stereotype. It was cemented in 1998, when the first gold medalist in a snowboard event was disqualified for having drugs in his system.

Continued...

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