Being Ryan Sheckler 
1. By JEHAN CASINADER
It is a beautiful Saturday evening in the real Orange
County, California, and Ryan Sheckler is lying on the beach. This is a rare but essential chill-out
period, after an intense few weeks. But as his friends relax on the sand, Ryan is on his mobile phone
to a journalist in New Zealand. This is the somewhat sheltered life of a child superstar.
Sheckler's career as a child prodigy skateboarder
began accidentally, when he started rolling around on a skateboard at just 18 months old.

By age four he was teaching himself tricks, and it was a rapid progression from there: Sheckler won
over 50 contests, back-to-back, within a few years.

While skating legend Tony Hawk turned professional at 14, Sheckler broke that long-held record
when he made the ranks of international skating at just 13. He insists that he wasn't trying to ‘one-
up' anyone, but nonetheless made the Guinness Book of Records that year.

"When I started skating pro contest, none of the guys liked me. But I didn't care because I was
going out there and winning the contests that they were working so hard to get invited to. But it
always takes a while to get respect; with any sport you need to win your way in. I'm there now,
so it's good."

Sheckler never contemplated reaching such success by the tender age of 15. But once the winning
streak began, he realised that skating was going to stick.

"Everyone was noticing that I was coming up. I was finally getting the coverage I deserved, but I
didn't really expect it to come on that fast and that hard. I was stoked and kind of shocked.

"The media helps a lot, don't get me wrong, but if it's only because I'm the youngest skater right
now, then I really don't care if they don't take an interest in me anymore."

Sheckler accepts that he is living the life of a teen celebrity, but aims to stay grounded.

"I just look at my life as being normal, but it's not normal, at all! Sometimes I wish I was ordinary,
but I'm not socially deprived or anything. I just try to stay humble."

A life less ordinary

As more trophies are added to the shelf, the money comes in too. Sheckler is in the running for over
US$200,000 in the next six months alone.

"Every win makes me more determined to win again, if I can just stay focused and have fun. If
you're not having fun, then it's not worth it. But skateboarding is a job, basically. Some days I can
go from ten in the morning ‘til midnight, but other days I'll skate for ten minutes and be over it."

Sheckler and his parents have been fighting ‘posers' on the Internet all year, including one character
who they believe is a man, posing as a girl, trying to solicit young children.

"It's serious, man. There are, like, 12 Internet pages of people who claim to be me. There are
retarded people in this world, and they decide that they want to try to be me. It's hard to deal with."

The child prodigy has sustained an immense number of injuries during his short career, and even
faced death on occasion. Just a week before our interview he was rushed to hospital in Germany
with a suspected fracture in his leg. Even one such injury could ultimately bring an end to the reign.

There has always been pressure to keep up the circus, but Sheckler has realised that over time he
just cannot win every contest.

"Dealing with failure has never been easy, but I take it better now than I used to. I used to think that
if I did badly at a contest that my sponsors were just going to drop me. I flunked one contest and my
sponsors didn't care one little bit."

Sheckler is adamant that living the dream is no more of a burden than a privilege.

"It's my life; it's all I know, so I can't really say it's a burden. But it's a privilege, of course. I'm
very aware that God gave me this gift and that he can take it right away. This is not a walk in the
park."

Contracts are already signed for the next five years. But, at the back of his mind, Sheckler knows
that one day the ride will end.

"One day I won't be able to skate. I hope it's not soon, 'cause I wanna skate forever. But there's
gonna have to be that day when I can look back on my life, see that I have succeeded in a lot of
ways, and realise that it's time to lay down my skateboard for good."

Lucky for us we've got a couple of signed posters of Ryan Sheckler to give away – all you have to
do is write to us at Tearaway/Ryan, PO Box 473, Wanganui by August 31. Remember to include
your name, address and contact details.