BY DAVE GEISLER

Dave Downing’s life is a Generation X dream come true. According to Transworld Snowboarding (the snowboarder’s  bible”), he’s one of the top 20 snowboarders in the world. He’s also a world-class surfer, and is recognized as one of the top  extreme” athletes on earth.

Dave has snowboarded on ABC’s “Wide World of Sports” and Fox Sports featured him on its “Boardwild” program. They showed him launching off a snow rock cliff, riding the air and ripping through the Southern Alps in New Zealand. “It’s close to flying,” he says. “When you know how to control your board in the air without thinking, it feels really free.”

On a trip to France, Dave snowboarded in the Pyrenees Mountains and surfed the waves of Biarritz. When Dave snowboards and surfs, he’s  usually endorsing products for Burton Snowboards, Standard Films and Mac Dog Productions. . . and he earns some very BIG bucks in the process! But for Dave, life is not just about money or competition. It’s also about joy and appreciating the beauty that God created in nature and in human life.

In other words, there’s more to Dave Downing than extreme sports. Dave is also a dedicated Christian. “For some  snowboarders, the sport is all they have, but my faith is what’s most important to me,” says Dave.

Dave is very open about his faith, and his belief that young people should save sex for marriage. Speaking from experience, he says he’s learned about regrets the hard way and he wishes he had saved sex as a gift to be shared after marriage.

But Dave believes in second chances. He’s changed his life and made a commitment to save sex for marriage. “Sex is a beautiful gift that God made for us to share with that special person we marry,” says Dave. That’s why he and Shannon Dunn, a world-class snowboarder who is now his wife, lived a commitment to purity during the years they dated each other.

Knowing about celebrity status and the sexual opportunities it brings, Dave is fully aware of the temptations facing today’s young people. The temptations are strong, but having been there, he knows that giving in only brings heartache in the long run. True freedom, Dave believes, comes to those who wait – and when you control your sexual desires, it frees you to have the best life possible.