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Extreme sports, or action sports as they are also commonly called, is a term that refers to a wide variety of activities. The spectrum is so broad that the physical requirements can be quite different for athletes from one discipline to another. A rock climber and a powerboat racer will have very different sets of skills. In general, however, Chapter Competition Day

When it first started in the 1970s, skateboarding was more of a lifestyle than a sport, and those who did it did not consider themselves to be athletes.

when competition time approaches, these competitors are all athletes who need to be prepared to perform at a high level. Skateboarding is perhaps the one activity that epitomizes the slacker mentality of extreme sports. Old-school

skateboarders had a reputation for eating a lot of junk food and partying into the wee hours of the night, treating their bodies in ways that athletes in training would not normally do. In this century, however, skateboarding and many other action sports are big-time, big-money enterprises, and the

Do it (skateboarding) every day. When you do something every single day and you get really good at it, you’ll keep progressing to the level you want to get to. “ ” – Greg Lutzka, three-time X Games skateboard street medalist

competitors have evolved to take it all much more seriously. There is still some of that counterculture attitude, but when it comes to

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