‘Sad and surreal’: snowboard legend Shaun White to retire after Beijing 2022

The American snowboarder Shaun White, who turned the face of the game by profitable three gold medals, has introduced that the Beijing Olympics can be his final snowboarding competitors and he'll retire from all contests.

“I believe this can be my, nicely this can be my final competitors too, which is fairly particular,” White, 35, informed a information convention. Competing at his fifth Olympics right here, White had already stated Beijing could be his final look on the Olympic stage.

The American, who gained halfpipe golds on the 2006, 2010 and 2018 Video games, stated knee and again points had lingered, forcing him to tug out of competitions and miss coaching. “It’s this and it’s that, all these items are main issues that introduced me to this conclusion,” he stated, including that different riders’ tips have been getting “heavier and heavier”.

White stated he had determined to retire lately, throughout a quiet second when he received misplaced and needed to take a chairlift over an empty mountain by himself. “I used to be watching the solar go down and it simply hit me,” he stated. “It was very unhappy and a surreal second however actually joyous as nicely,” stated White, including that he “broke down” slightly earlier than calling his family and friends to inform them of his determination.

White is the oldest member of the USA snowboarding crew. He stated he was nonetheless in Beijing to compete, explaining that he had been visualising the runs he would put down throughout his occasion subsequent Friday.

Shaun White
Snowboarder Shaun White speaks at a press convention the place he stated different riders’ tips have been getting ‘heavier and heavier’. Photograph: Carl Court docket/Getty Photographs

White will face an ever-younger discipline of opponents hungry to problem his dominance within the sport, together with Japan’s Ayumu Hirano, 23, who beat the Californian on the Laax Open final month.

Australian Scotty James, one other of his rivals, stated White was abandoning a significant legacy together with his retirement.

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