By Shannon Russell
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Professional BMX freestyler Chad Kagy learned to ride a bike at age 4 and has been nursing injuries ever since.

Kagy, 24, frequents hospitals the way other people go to movies, and he boasts scars from six knee operations to prove it. He has torn through his right rotator cuff, had bone spurs shaved from his left ankle and has countless bruises, cuts and scrapes.

SCHEDULE

Mobile Skatepark Series at Sawyer Point

PLAY IT SAFE

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission makes these recommendations for safe skateboarding: • Learn how to fall in case of an accident. • If you are losing your balance, crouch down on the board so you won't have far to fall. • If you fall, try to land on the fleshy parts of your body. Try to roll instead of absorbing the force with your arms. • Try to relax your body during a fall instead of stiffening it. • Never ride in the street or hitch a ride from a moving vehicle. • Only one person at a time should ride a skateboard.Safety dance To reduce the risk of extreme-sports injuries, skateboarding associations agree protection is imperative. Nick Accurso, co-owner of Anonymous Skateboards in Clifton and Florence, names the most important equipment, with average costs.

Although Kagy once smacked his chin so hard on pavement that part of his front two teeth "disintegrated on contact," he insists his injuries are worst-case scenarios.

"Most people doing what I do have less injuries than me," Kagy said.

Research from America Sports Data, Inc. supports Kagy's claim. Although extreme sports are perceived as high-risk activities, the ASD reports that last year more athletes suffered injuries in basketball, running and soccer.

Only 2 percent of 3,000 U.S. athletes surveyed reported injuries from skateboarding, inline skating and BMX riding combined in 2002. Tackle football's injury rate was the nation's highest, with 18.8 injuries per 100 players.

As the Mobile Skatepark Series launches its second annual tour Friday at Sawyer Point, chances are its 200 professional and amateur athletes will fall on the street course or 60-foot-wide halfpipe.

Rick Bratman, Aggressive Skaters Association events president and Mobile Skatepark Series manager, has seen nothing worse than broken arms and concussions in 1,000 ASA-produced events in the last decade.

"In football you see players colliding with 270-pound men, which has as much impact than (an extreme athlete) falling off a rail. You're so used to it, you don't even think about it," Bratman said. "Ninety-nine times out of 100, action athletes get right back up."

Every MSS participant is required to wear a helmet. Amateurs also must wear knee and elbow pads.

Clifton resident Tony Heitz, 30, has broken his ankles, wrist and elbow and has had stitches on his head from a skateboarding collision. He said he has suffered more injuries than that playing baseball over the years.

Though no one wants to get hurt, Heitz said wounds sometimes give skaters reason to boast.

"(Injuries) are kind of like your medals, like the scars in the war you were in," Heitz said.

Many local skateparks are outdoors and unsupervised, with "Skate at your Own Risk" signs posted nearby. Kim Laing, community relations coordinator for Miami Township, Clermont County, said skaters have summoned EMS only nine times since the Miami Township Skatepark's June 2002 opening. The most severe injuries were broken wrists.

Catastrophic injuries are always a risk for extreme-sports athletes who suffer back, neck or head trauma.

According to the Louisville Courier-Journal, a Tennessee boy suffered brain damage last summer after falling head-first into a 12-foot concrete bowl at Louisville Extreme Park. The park is unsupervised and is open 24 hours a day. The boy, now 12, was biking without a helmet.

Kagy said he wouldn't have attempted gravity-defying tricks like the X-up - flipping backward on a bike while coordinating its spinning frame with stationary handle bars - without a safety net. He practices in foam pits at Pennsylvania's Woodward Camp.

Wyoming resident John Scott, 19, said TV broadcasts of professionals - who emerge relatively unscathed from gravity-defying tricks - send kids the wrong messages.

"The kids just think, 'I'll get back up when I'll fall and be fine,' " Scott said. "But I couldn't get back up."

Scott suffered a traumatic brain injury Dec. 27 after falling off a skateboard and down a hill at night. Scott, who had just completed his first semester at the University of Colorado, wasn't wearing a helmet. He was comatose for two weeks.

"Our lives revolved around going to the hospital every day," said Scott's mother, Mary Beth.

Scott has problems processing and remembering information and he still can't "walk (and carry) a full glass of water." Though he doesn't plan to skateboard again, Scott has become a safety equipment proponent.

"I wouldn't have been in this situation if I had worn a helmet," Scott said. "I didn't, and that was a big mistake."