Quotes from Mike Schultz

I'm a huge patriot, and what holds a lot of value for me is to be part of Team U.S.A.

Being an athlete, my job was to physically perform.

You know you've made it to the big time when you're on a cereal box.

I know firsthand the way that Fox supports their athletes because they've been there for me since the beginning. I know that I can count on them.

To be able to wear your country's colors and compete in the Paralympics for the snowboard team... it's pretty powerful.

The crazy part, with all of the surgeries I had, I retained water from the IV fluids, and I gained 60 pounds. I was 247 pounds at my maximum. I couldn't even touch my face because my joints were swollen. I was so big, it was ridiculous - just insane.

To me, there's two symbols for Team U.S.A.: the national anthem and the American flag.

For my equipment, we're not about running. We're about wheels, action sports, and that type of thing. So we want range of motion and shock absorption. The foot itself has 28 degrees of ankle motion as you press into it or you put weight into it. A typical running or walking foot has kind of around 10 to 12, at max, flex at the toe.

Having adaptive events televised in the X Games is huge. There are people out there who might want to do this but don't think they can. They can see us out here tearing it up. That's going to help people realize that if you want something bad enough, you can get there.

When I originally started looking at different prosthetic components, most of them were just set up for walking.

I am the owner of my prosthetic manufacturing business, BioDapt, which manufactures lower-limb prosthetics for sports.

Building prosthetics that allow people to get back to the fun activities in life is as rewarding a job as I can imagine. It's just as fulfilling for me as winning at the racetrack.

I'm from Minnesota and have always lived there. And my competitive career actually started in the late '90s racing motocross, which then turned into racing snowmobiles professionally. I turned pro in 2003, racing with the best in the world and living my dream as a professional athlete.

I remember my dad telling me that if I wanted to start racing motocross, I had to get a job and pay for it myself. So I did. As soon as I was able to drive myself to work, I got into racing motocross at age 15.

I bought my first dirt bike when I was 12, and I started racing motocross when I was 15 and started getting pretty successful. Then I started racing snowmobiles at 17 and decided I wanted to focus on that and see if I can make a career at it.

I was in the garage fixin' things, and I'm like, what better project than building your own leg?

It was a true honor to have represented my country at my first Paralympic Winter Games and proud to bring home gold and silver medals for the U.S.

After snowboarding a fair bit in 2011 and 2012 to test equipment, I got pretty good at it, and some friends at Adaptive Action Sports talked me into competing at the exhibition event at the Winter X Games in the adaptive boardercross. I was able to step up my game pretty quick and compete. I took last place, but knew I could improve.

Once I started feeling better and healthier and learned to walk on my first prosthetic leg, I realised I'm not going to be satisfied with just walking around.

I loved to go hunting out in the woods and hiking, and that's just not easy anymore. For me, to walk up and down hills in the rough terrain, it just doesn't work very well. It can, but it's three times as hard as it used to be.

For the most part, if you're willing to work hard enough, you can recover from most injuries. Having that mentality really helps you keep moving forward.

It is definitely easier to deal with injuries on the mental side after you've had a few of them, since you are aware of the recovery process.

As a kid growing up in a rural area, I was always tinkering with parts and machinery.

I'm helping people do things they haven't done since they had two good legs, and that's worth it right there.