The athletes chosen for our Pro Spotlight section are more than just your top level riders. Skill and riding prowess make them names that we all know and enjoy watching, but a deeper story is what makes them intriguing enough to want to dive into their heads. Here we compiled the 10 best quotes from the Pro Spotlights done this year. There is so much more to each rider than these selected quotes so we linked there full Pro Spotlight feature as well. No no, thank you. It is our pleasure.
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Shawn Perry: It’s not your first Rodeo.
Danny Hampson: I’ve got rope burns all over me, Shawn. We’re just a couple of old dogs.
Danny’s full Pro Spotlight here
Erik Ruck: You were like, “Who is this kid? Who is this shrimp?”
Adam Errington: Fully. I was like, “Who is this little shrimp, just shrimping on my shrimp grounds right now?” But I think it went down more like, “Are you riding tomorrow?” And he said, “Yeah I ride down at Ski Rixen. My name is Jimmy (LaRiche). You’re Adam, right?” That conversation turned into, “Hey, we have a day until the event. Do you want to shred?” That was it. We started riding together and became great friends.
Adam’s full Pro Spotlight here
Parks Bonifay: You’ve had a very long, successful career, and you’ve been with roughly the same sponsors the whole time. This obviously paid off in the long run for you. Any advice to the pros nowadays and to future pros of the sport?
Zane Schwenk: Get out now?
Zane’s full Pro Spotlight here
Collin Harrington: I was actually always kind of scared of the water, but he would bring me out there and put me on the board with him.
Ben Greenwood: Really? At what age were you scared of the water?
Collin: Dude, I was seriously scared of the water till I was probably 14 or so. Like I would go in, but I was always looking around, just thinking something was there.
Ben: And then fast forward to what? Two years ago and you’re hired to film sharks for National Geographic, was it?
Collin: Filming tiger sharks. It was still nerve-racking, but I was a little more calmed down than I used to be.
Collin’s full Pro Spotlight here
Travis Moye: What’s it like riding against kids who are literally half your age?
Shaun Murray: Or could be my children. I don’t really think of them so much as being younger – I just look at their riding level. But it’s weird to think that when I was first standing on the dock at a Pro Tour in ’95-’96 some of these kids wern’t born. That feels weird. But I guss it may feel weird to them, riding against someone who’s old enough to be their Dad.
Shaun’s full Pro Spotlight here
Jeff McKee: I would rather go out and do some sort of different variation of a 180 or something new on that level than be the 12th guy to land an ungrabbed 1080 that just looks hectic. That’s not what it’s about for me.
Jeff’s full Pro Spotlight here
Dieter Humpsch: …the only ID that I had was my passport, which had been in the wash and was really mangled.
Shawn Perry: Wait. So you actually functioned in society, bought cars, rented houses, all without a license, and you were fine?
Dieter: Yeah. I can’t remember how I bought my first car. I had and Astro van that I bought privately and just didn’t put plates on it or anything for a while. I was riding dirty for a while; maybe don’t put this in the interview .
Dieter’s full Pro Spotlight here
Shawn Perry: Do you want to do this job-interview-style?
Danny Hampson: Whatever way you think is best for you journalistic integrity, Shawn.
Shawn: What three words best describe you?
Danny: Oh, God: fast, hard and strong. Wait, not that. I guess in a perfect world: nice, loving and friendly. Nice, loving and loyal. But I don’t know what other people think of me. I’m sure some people think I’m a jerk, but strong, for sure.
Danny’s full Pro Spotlight here
Erik Ruck: It’s no secret that you and Jimmy both wear energy drink diamond pendants. What’s up with that?
Adam Errington: Well, Ruck, I’ll tell you a little about that and by that I mean this.
Erik: Hey, isn’t that a Pete Bonifay line?
Adam: It could be, Ruck, it could be.
Adam’s full Pro Spotlight here
Travis Moye: You have a real issue with eating hot things, but your Dad, on the other hand, could eat a volcano. Why do you think he is so much tougher than you?
Shaun Murray: Because his taste buds have been blown to oblivion. He has to put his food on fire to taste it. And smell is obviously tied into taste, because I can fart around him and unless he hears it, he ain’t gonna say nothing. Me, my sense of smell is spot on. I can smell someone one a can of tuna from three rooms away. But, as you know, my nose sweats when I eat spicy stuff.
