Now that the season is over, is this a good time of year for you?
Yeah, it’s great to have time off to do other stuff.
Such as?
Vacation, skateboarding, not worrying about wakeboarding at all, hanging out, catching up on school.
Is being home schooled difficult?
Does it require a lot of self-motivation?
Yeah, a lot of self-motivation, but the hardest part is keeping yourself busy.
Who is your at-home teacher?
Me, myself, and I.
So you’re basically responsible for self-educating.
Yup.
Do you feel that you’re missing out on the typical 16-year-old girl’s social environment by not being in high school?
No, because when I was in school, I wasn’t the typical 16-year-old girl. I was always hanging out with the guys because I was more athletic.
What were you interested in athletically before you came and focused on wakeboarding?
Basketball, softball … all the school sports.
Did you kick ass in those?
Yeah, I was pretty good at those. I never ran track, though. I can’t stand running and stuff like that.
How long ago did you move to Orlando from Missouri?
November, 1998.
Did you get into home schooling then?
Yeah, for Nationals in ?98 I missed a lot of school. We talked to the school and they were all cool with it, but then when I missed my allotted days for the semester they kicked me out.
Let’s talk about this season. You had an all right season on the Tour, but you won a bunch of individual titles there.
Yeah, that’s my thing. I can’t keep it together for the Tour stops, but I can win big titles.
Being a big-event winner, do you think that helps your career?
I don’t know; it helps getting a board sponsor and that type of thing.
Let’s get to the bottom of that; again, you had an epic career, you’re only 16 years old, you’ve won a lot of prestigious events. Are people knocking at your door, have people made inquiries? Are you out of their price range, what’s the deal?
I don’t know, right now all the board sponsors have boiled down to two companies and their teams are pretty full.
Is it discouraging for you not having a board sponsor?
Yeah, because right now I don’t know if I’m going to be able to go on tour next year because it?s really, really expensive.
Well, now that you have this time away from wakeboarding, what have you been doing to take up your time?
I’ve been skating and shooting for videos.
There are all the new guys filming. What kind of impact do you think that will have on the sport?
I think that will be awesome, I think it will be cool that everyone will see their own perspective of the wakeboarding and how it?s gone.
Do you know of anything spectacular that?s going to be in one of the new movies on the spring?
Shane has got some picnic tables set up that are pretty crazy. He’s got really good footage of me crashing on that. I thought I was going to break my leg. I’m really surprised I didn’t.
Do you worry about going out there and beating yourself up, or do you just kind of throw caution to the wind?
Not right now; I have time to heal if I get hurt.
So it’s a time of year thing?
Yeah, right now it’s a really great time to ride. I wish I was more motivated to ride. It’s still warm enough that you?re not freezing when you go out there and ride, but still you have a long time to get reaady for next season.
