To The Extreme

Connor Thomassen takes a deep breath, and peers down a ramp that would deter many people from scootering down it let alone do a backflip off of it. It’s not the steepness that scares him, it isn’t even the speed, or the exit. It’s the landing. By now he has practiced this trick so many times, that the fear has dissipated slightly and been replaced with a sense of thrill. With his right foot balanced one the bridge of the airplane grade aluminum scooter costing upwards of $500, he firmly plants his left foot on the ground and pushes. Everything whizzes past him as he uses the momentum to go down the ramp, through the bowl, get seven feet of air, and watch the world turn upside down and back again. All of this before he lands on the concrete—hopefully not on his head. A mere seven seconds, all of which will have the crowd of grass-stained covered soccer playing boys holding their breath in both fear and excitement before erupting in a smattering of applause. Around 16 boys, all under the ages of 12, holding up their thumbs and scrambling around each other to congratulate their hero. It seems odd to think that the boy who draws in the biggest crowds was the one that was initially mocked by skateboarders for scootering. Thomassen took their remarks in stride though, letting his tricks show that he was just as worthy to be at the skate park as the 30 year old skateboarders. Now a number of little boys even try to imitate him, toting their razor scooter under arm, and asking inreverent tones for Thomassen to perform certain tricks. Thomassen is the best scooterer at Fairmont Skate Park, and his tricks have made him a fan favorite but a mentor as well. While Thomassen currently enjoys the laid back atmosphere of the skate park by Sugarhouse, he is waiting for the day when his crowd will be a little older than twelve. With his hopes set high, Thomassen aims to be sponsored by a team like Envy or Apex before he graduates from high school. By the looks of it, one would think that the boy with bold blue hair is well on his way to achieving his goal of becoming a professional scooterer. Having mastered difficult tricks like the kickless, tailwhips, and barspins, just to name a few, it is becoming increasingly hard to believe that he only started scootering a mere two-and-a-half year’s prior. Introduced to the extreme sport by a friend, Thomassen was initially interested because of how entertaining it is and the joy that it brought his friends. After getting one of his friend’s old scooters, his love of the sport progressed from there.

He decided to invest in his own airplane grade aluminumscooter, trade parts with friends, and practice day in and day out. During the summer Thomassen spends up to seven hours at the skate park each day learning new tricks, refining old feats, and of course, trying to get sponsored.

“Connor is really good at scootering because he is committed to what he does,”

Thomassen’s friend Dominic Adams said.

Commitment, in Thomassen’s case, does not just include hours at the park, it also involves being persistent enough to try over and over until he gets it.

“I think Connor is so successful because he is confident with himself. You can tell when he is trying to get a trick that he is very determined and persistent. When he was first trying to get his backflip it was crazy because he kept doing it over and over again, after every time he fell. But he would not give up,” Morganne Miller, a friend of

Thomassen said.

This statement not only epitomizes Thomassen, but scooterers in general. Scootering is a dangerous sport as riders either land the trick- or they don’t, and when they don’t there is only concrete there to catch them. Two weeks before Thomassen’s first competition at SDX he was practicing tricks over a seven foot gap at a skate park in Sandy when things went terribly wrong. His front wheel hit the ground first sending Thomassen toppling over the bars of his scooter and rolling onto the unforgiving concrete, cracking his collarbone in the process. Needless to say, Thomassen refused to give up but instead entered the competition in the following weeks and participated, though in excruciating pain. “You just have to learn by having the bravery to commit. Sometimes you get hurt, sometimes you don’t.

“It’s better if you don’t,” Thomassen said. Even though Thomassen frequently returnshome from the skate park with heal bruises from landing seven foot jumps onto the concrete, or after receiving bruises on his chest from landing on his handle bars, Thomassen will return the next day prepared to work all over again.

“I enjoy scootering. There are a lot of things that I tried and I thought I really liked but ended up getting bored with after awhile. But with scootering there are endless trick varieties. You can make your own tricks. It never gets boring. One day you could be learning a barspin and then if it gets boring just doing that you could try landing a barspin with one foot, or a barspin with one hand. There are endless varieties and variations,”

Thomassen said.

Scootering is not just a sport that involves physical ability and practice. It requires people who are willing to do whatever it takes to get the trick down—even at the cost of injuring themselves. Thomassen uses his deep commitment to scootering to help him surpass his peers and get in range of accomplishing his goal of becoming a professional scooterer.