Kelly Clark
Kelly Clark
Kelly Clarkis an American snowboarder who won halfpipe gold at the 2002 Winter Olympics...
ProfessionSnowboarder
Date of Birth26 July 1983
faithful purpose endeavor
I feel like there is great purpose in a lot of my endeavors. I've seen God in the middle of them. I've seen Him be faithful in those things.
years careers three
I never planned to be at the height of my career when I was 30 years old and going to my fourth Olympics. I watched the 1998 Olympics when I was 14 years old. That's what I wanted to do with my life. I thought I might have a shot at three Olympics max. This is way beyond the parameters of what I set out to do.
jobs home thinking
I think I've done a pretty good job of not compartmentalizing my life. I take my core values and I live them out at home like I would in my snowboarding like I would at church with my friends.
successful hands snowboarding
Snowboarding was everything that I knew. That's what I did and I poured everything I had into it. I thought that being successful and achieving my goals would go hand-in-hand with being happy.
years two interesting
I've always lived a life where what you see if what you get. I've never wanted to live two different lifestyles. The initial transition for me was perhaps the most difficult. It wasn't easy communicating what I believed and what my values were. Establishing that as a young adult was interesting. I was 20 years old when I got saved.
successful thinking years
These have been the most successful years I've ever had. I've been placing well in the contests but more importantly I've been enjoying them. I think those two things go hand-in-hand.
growing-up people age
I'm not trying to snowboard for other people anymore. That just kind of comes with age and growing up. That's helped me a lot. Some of that started right after the last Olympics (in Vancouver).
teammate olympics strange
I was having a conversation with one of my teammates and she asked me, "Aren't you so glad it's over? We don't have to compete anymore." I thought that was a strange comment but in that moment I realized that I was doing it for the right reasons. I wasn't looking at the Olympics to define me. I wasn't to arrive somewhere by performing well in a contest.
sports growing-up creativity
I've got to fight for that connection with God all the time no matter what you're going through in life. I'm growing up. I'm maturing. But I definitely think that the backbone of this is the freedom and creativity I have without the fear of failing. If I fail, what's going to happen? Nothing. I'm not looking for my self-worth in the sport.
sports country team
Right before they named the (2014) team, I stepped back and I allowed myself to realize what I had accomplished. I got overwhelmed and the tears came pretty quickly. It's an honor to represent my country again and to represent my sport to the world and to hold it down for all those 30-year old athletes out there.
attitude giving community
Yeah, one of my approaches with my community, my friends, the companies I represent, has been to take the attitude of what I bring instead of what I can get. What can I give?
fun years games
So after those Games, I continued to compete that season and the year after that. I really had the goal of being intentional. I didn't want to do big tricks because it was an X Games final or an Olympics final. I wanted to call my own shots. I started to do that and I started to have more fun than I ever knew I could have.
heart years world
By the time I was 18 years old, I had achieved everything that was in my heart to do and at the same time I wasn't finding the fulfillment I was expecting to get from it. All of the experiences were incredible and I wouldn't trade them for the world, but it wasn't fulfilling me. I went through the motions for a few more years, but I was looking for something more.
bus fourth job looking ourselves tough until
We didn't get off the bus until the fourth quarter. I don't know if we were looking ahead, or what but we've put ourselves in a tough position. We need to get the job done Friday.