FOR A SKATEBOARDING world champion hurtling toward Olympic gold, 22-year-old Heimana Reynolds doesn’t seem so stressed.
Most mornings, after an hour at the gym near his home in Carlsbad, California, he checks the surf forecast, catches a few waves at the beach, and then trains at his local skate parks for six to eight hours. Each day looks largely the same. “I never get sick of skateboarding,” he says. “This is what I love to do.”
Lucky for him, his hard work might pay off again. For the first time in Olympic history, the summer games will feature skateboarding. A Team USA member, Reynolds has spent more than two years competing in qualifying events, even after the Tokyo Olympics were postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. "We'd been looking forward to this for so long," he says. "We just want to be a part of history being made."
So now he’s back in California and Hawaii, where he splits his time, training under the sun and waiting for his chance at worldwide stardom. Even though he might just make history as skateboarding’s first gold-medal winner, it hasn’t gone to his head. When it comes to clothing, he puts a premium on layers that can keep up with his active lifestyle. At competitions, he usually skateboards in a pair of board shorts and Vans slip-ons. (Shirts are overrated.)
“Growing up in Hawaii, that’s how it was,” he says. “We’d wake up and put on a pair of shorts and just go back and forth from the skate park to the beach all day.” From time to time, he might put on a shirt (begrudgingly) and some jeans. He prefers a relaxed fit over skinny jeans, which aren’t so conducive to shredding at the skate park. “If I can’t bend my knees, I don’t wear it.”
Reynolds is equally relaxed with his grooming game, too. His iconic hairstyle is all natural. "My secret shampoo is salt, water, and sand," he says. "Honestly, I don't wash my hair. It's just kind of how it falls."
While Reynolds awaits megafame, his goal now is to combat misconceptions about skateboarding. “You hear a lot that it isn’t a sport,” he says. “I want [people] to look at all these athletes. Look at all these people training. Look at all these people working their butts off and making this their profession.”
A gold medal probably wouldn’t hurt, either.
To learn more about all the Olympic hopefuls, visit TeamUSA.org. Watch the Tokyo Olympics this summer on NBC.
