The Complex 7: Shaun White

Photo by Adam Moran

Shaun White is both a professional skater and snowboarder, so it’s not surprising he wants to be pro-everything else, too. His clothing collection for Target is already available, and his second video game, Shaun White Snowboarding: World Stage (Ubisoft-Nintendo Wii), just dropped yesterday. Pretty impressive for a 23-year-old, but we knew that dude was an overachiever the first time we saw him land a 1260.

The Olympic gold medalist stopped by the ‘Plex to answer our notorious Complex 7 questionnaire and talk about his favorite features in the new game. Read on to see what he thinks about girls who snowboard, and what he’s embarrassed (or not embarrassed) to wear out in public…

Interview by Soo-Young Kim

 #1: WHAT’S YOUR NUMBER ONE DEAL-BREAKER FOR A POTENTIAL GIRLFRIEND?

Shaun White says: I like girls that snowboard, but I don’t like girls that are all about snowboarding. It kind of drives me nuts. I love to snowboard, but I don’t need my girlfriend to snowboard. But I like a girl that can ride ’cause teaching girlfriends to snowboard is brutal. It’s so brutal. ‘Cause you don’t wanna be the mean guy and leave ‘em, but then all your buddies are hittin’ the jumps. It’s my ongoing battle.

 #2: WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE SNEAKER OF ALL TIME?

Shaun White says: I’ve been pretty stoked ’cause I get to make my own shoes for Adio. I’ve been skating in a bunch of different shoes and they got it down. There’s a certain feeling where you feel your board on your feet, and some shoes just don’t have that feeling. You do your ollies and stuff and you just lose the feeling ’cause there’s too much sole or too much rubber, but I’ve been diggin’ Adios.

 #3: WHEN’S THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED?

Shaun White says: Marley and Me. [Laughs.]

Complex: Seriously?

Shaun White says: I think I almost shed a tear. Probably a couple. ‘Cause I just got a dog and everybody’s like, “You totally gotta watch this movie!” Marley and Me really got me. I’ll admit it. It was so sad. Animals get to me, man.

 #4: IF YOU HAD A WEEK HOLIDAY, WHAT WOULD YOU DO?

Shaun White says: I’d probably just pick a random place and go. [Laughs.] And not even tell anyone.

Complex: A hot place or a cold place?

Shaun White says: Probably warm, probably islands somewhere. I really like the Maldives. It’s just great surf. It’s just unreal.

 #6: WHAT HAS TO BE IN YOUR FRIDGE AT ALL TIMES?

Shaun White says: No food. [Laughs.] ‘Cause when I leave, it goes rotten. When I get home, I gotta take it out. Anything frozen is what I have to have. But it’s awful ’cause you sit at home like, “Orange chicken or burrito? Fuck! Decisions!”

 #7: WHAT’S THE WORST WAY YOU’VE BROKEN UP WITH SOMEONE?

Shaun White says: Oh man, I’ll tell you my friend got dumped over a blog. [Laughs.] That’s brutal right? I do the face to face usually.

Complex: That’s nice of you. [Laughs.]

Shaun White says: Yeah. Or I twitter it, you know what I mean? [Laughs.] No, I’m just kidding.

 #7: WHAT’S THE MOST EMBARRASSING PIECE OF CLOTHING YOU’VE EVER WORN?

Shaun White says: Embarrassing piece of clothing? Jeez.

[Shaun's friends]: The Duke is solid.

Shaun White says: The Duke’s solid, but it’s not embarrassing.

[Shaun's friends]: No, not for you.

Shaun White says: Oh! Like to admit I wore it? My friend had a joke about this thing, it’s called The Duke. You can see it in any mountain town, like in fur shops. And I’m not a big fan of ‘em ’cause me and animals, right? But he shows up for my birthday and gives me this ridiculous man-fur jock strap. [Laughs.] It’s like this white fur thing, and the tag on it says, “For the man that has everything—The Duke.” And I was so intrigued by it, I wore it out. And I wore it again during Halloween, when I was Freddy Mercury.

Complex: Is it supposed to keep you warm?

Shaun White says: I think it’s to keep others warm. [Laughs.] Nah, I don’t know. It’s supposed to keep…It’s gonna bring the heat wherever you…I should just stop while I’m ahead.

BONUS QUESTIONS:

Complex: What do you like most about your new video game, Shaun White Snowboarding: World Stage?

Shaun White: When I saw the Wii Fit board, it was cool because of the fact that it’s so responsive to what you do. When you lean forward it tucks and goes faster. And it’s funny because the first thing I did when I got on there was, “I want to go faster.” You tuck up and go for it and it was cool that you could be sucked into the game like that. This is our second game for Wii—I think the cool part is the MotionPlus. You plug in this pack into the outlet in the back of the controller and you can play without the board. Just flick it to do jumps. What’s cool is once you put the MotionPlus in there, it amplifies every single motion that you do. So, we developed this level where you actually can create your own tricks. Everything that you do with the controller, your character will do on the screen. If you spin it or whatever, it’ll fully simulate what’s going on. You basically make up your own trick and then you can save it and go on later. You can save up to 8 tricks, so it really lets you do whatever you want.

Complex: How else does it differ from your first game?

Shaun White: We added a lot from the first one where it’s the same style with racing, but we added more characters, more levels, more challenges, and definitely better graphics. It’s so much nicer to have the second version out because there’s so many things that happened in the first game where I was like, “Gosh, I wish we had time to fix this, or to fix that.” I didn’t know what I was doing the first time—I mean I made a video game, they asked me what I wanted to see in the game, and for me, I didn’t know what was possible. I was like, “OK, I want a dinosaur to come in,” and realized it was gonna take three months of programming to make a dinosaur or six months of programming to make water ‘cause the physics of how things move and the way everything’s created. So now that I know the restraints that I’m in, I’m able to have better ideas and go, “Well this is totally possible because we did it in this game, but I wanna change it in a certain way,” so a lot of the stuff you see is a bit faster, with bigger jumps. And then instead of the slope style, which was just jumps and rails, we added hip features, quarter pipes, and different set-ups. But I think the coolest thing is probably the fact you can make your own tricks.

Complex: What tricks are you determined to land for skating or snowboarding right now?

Shaun White: Ooh skateboarding, I’ve always wanted to land my 1080, but I haven’t. I always seem to be so focused on trying to just get a really big run together that I haven’t focused on one trick. And snowboarding right now is like 1260s.

Complex: What’s you’re favorite trick to do while you’re snowboarding?

Shaun White: I like to just do huge airs. It’s fun to just go ride and do simple things ’cause it’s so easy. I do certain flips where I can do them and look around. It feels so natural. Everybody thinks that 1080s and big spins are really fun, but it’s just big airs—with The Duke on.

VIDEO: Shaun White discusses his new game with the Los Angeles Times

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