WHITE STRUGGLED in his grom days, too. His family—parents Roger and Cathy, older brother Jesse, and older sister Kari—lived in Carmel Valley, outside San Diego, and traveled to the slopes in a beat-up van. They cooked in hotel rooms, and White's parents took out a second mortgage to pay for travel, equipment, and lift tickets. Then, after his mom made a promotional video of White snowboarding, he got what he calls a "lifeline" from Burton, his first sponsor, at age seven. In 2002, he was the first athlete signed by venerable talent agency IMG to its new action-sports division.

Before the Turin Olympics, White had deals with Target, Mountain Dew, and PlayStation, among others. He's since signed with Hewlett-Packard, starring in one of its lauded "hands" TV

HAWK: A lot of choices are intuitive. Someone came to me once and wanted to do a Hawk cologne. I was like, "Of what? Sweaty pads?"

spots for personal computers, as well as Motorola, and as of late 2006 he was negotiating with several other big-name companies. Industry insiders estimate White's income is now $6 million a year. His trajectory is markedly higher than that of the last American to win snowboarding gold, Ross Powers, who in 2002 stood atop the podium at Salt Lake City flanked by countrymen Danny Kass (silver) and J.J. Thomas (bronze). Those guys clung to snowboarding's bad-boy image, then, according to White, stumbled badly in their first post-Games commercial choice.

WHITE: Right after, they did a commercial for iced tea. Those were the first dollars that came their way, and they just jumped on them. "Yeah, dude! Love the tea, bro!" Everybody was just like, "You guys suck. What are you thinking?" It was horrible.
HAWK: Instant cred killer. But that also shows how far snowboarding has come. In Nagano, the first time snowboarding was in the Olympics, it was the bastard child. They showed some highlights, and then the only thing you heard about was that snowboard racer testing positive for weed. Then at Salt Lake, they're showing mosh-pit highlights on NBC. "This punk band played! These kids got crazy!" And all of a sudden we go to Italy and all eyes are on Shaun.

How do you work with big companies and not get branded a sellout?
WHITE: I think of selling out as saying, Thanks for the check, here's my name, do whatever you want. But I'm so involved with every sponsor. I do a clothing line with Burton and I'm in there looking at fabric and coming up with names. We've got a new puffy jacket for next year that we're calling Puff the Magic Jacket. Sweet. That puts a little personal touch on it. If you're a kid and you're shopping on the Web site, that stuff goes a long way. That's why I won't even start with a company unless I can do my own thing.

But you did a TV commercial with Hewlett-Packard and you have their stickers on your boards. How can you get away with that?
WHITE: My joining with HP was rad because, besides laptops, they make all this other crazy stuff, like TVs that you can Airport all your information to. And then I saw the commercial material before I signed with them, and it was awesome.
HAWK: Look at the company he keeps with those ads. Pharrell was in one.
WHITE: Exactly. And Jay-Z. Where's the downside to that? Same with Motorola. I just shot a commercial with them for the Red campaign. They sell a phone and $17 goes to fight AIDS in Africa. Bono's involved, other people are joining, it's a good cause, and I love the Razrs. That's a home run.
HAWK: A lot of these choices are intuitive. You know right away whether something will work or if there is gonna be such a compromise that it's not worth it. I've definitely had my share of calls where I just laugh. Someone came to me once and wanted to do a signature Hawk cologne. I was like, "Of what? Sweaty pads? Am I wringing out my pads into a little perfume bottle?"
WHITE: I've been sent like 20 movie scripts. And the first lines are always "What up, brah?" Nope, nope, nope.

Shaun, say Tony hires you to be his brand manager. What should be his next move?
WHITE: Grow out the hair and dye it red.
HAWK: Oh, God.