Aspiring Olympian Rolls Across U.S. on Skateboard

Chad Camilleri likes skate boarding. A lot.

He should. The 24-year-old Utah resident spent nearly the last four months rumbling across the country on a skateboard.

At 12:10 p.m. Saturday, under steel gray skies, Camilleri rolled into the parking lot at the Santa Monica Pier, to the applause of a few well-wishers and the honk of one car backing out of a parking space. His hands were raised in triumph, his head tossed back.

“It was just a breeze, a stroll,” he said of the 10-mile jaunt to the pier from his hotel.

Welcome to California

It was certainly a better experience than his introduction to California. Shortly after crossing the state line, Camilleri said, he fell, landing on an arm that had been in a cast since he “wiped out” in Indiana and broke his wrist.

“Not a real great way to enter California,” he said, showing off a healing cut between his thumb and index finger. Camilleri, blond, thin and tanned, bedecked in mirrored sun glasses, shorts and a T-shirt, wore no safety gear.

A free-style aerialist snow skier, Camilleri set off from Washington, D.C., on July 2 in an effort to raise money for other aspiring Olympic athletes and to draw attention to their often impoverished straits.

Camilleri’s wife Shauna drove a camper, plastered with stickers of sponsors, that provided a bed at night and a hot breakfast before the skating got under way each morning. Several companies donated equipment and goods. One provided a radar detector. “Like we really needed it,” Camilleri said, laughing.

Mileage Increased

On a “good day, good road,” Camilleri could clip along at 12 m.p.h. In six or seven hours, he could log an average of 30 miles a day. But toward the end, as his legs built up, Camilleri was up to 50 or more miles a day.

Camilleri said he doesn’t know how much money has been raised, but several corporations have pledged to donate more now that the trip is completed.

“Whatever it is, it wouldn’t be enough for the athletes,” he said. “If we raised a million, it wouldn’t be enough. People aren’t really aware of the high cost of training.”

Funds will be disbursed to athletes via SPAN--Support Potential Athletes Now--a nonprofit foundation Camilleri started from his home in Park City, near Salt Lake City.

Camilleri said he is lucky because his parents are financially supportive of his efforts. Although Camilleri, a skier since age 5, is hopeful of making the 1992 Olympic team, he said it looks probable that aerial skiing will remain only a demonstration sport.

The cross-country skate was a little different from what Camilleri usually does on a board, which, as on his skis, involves gravity defying stunts, flips and spins.

The sojourn was suggested by Camilleri’s mother, Linda. She said her enthusiasm waned as soon as she saw the traffic her son had to compete with on the road. For the most part, Camilleri stuck to the less well traveled roads as he cut across the middle of the country.

“He kind of snuck across America,” his mother said.