In 1995, the Entertainment Sports Programming Network, an American cable television network, launched the X Games in an effort to target the generation X market, a large, young group of “extreme sports” fans. At the time, extreme sports included daredevil versions of mountain biking, bungee jumping and skateboarding. The X Games were modeled after the Olympics with the top competitors awarded gold, silver or bronze medals. ESPN was pleased with the success of the X games and launched the first Winter X Games in 1997, featuring snowboarding and skiing competitions.
Location
The Winter X Games were first held in 1997 in Big Bear Lake, California. The next year, the games moved to Crested Butte, Colorado, where they stayed until 1999. In 2000, the games moved again to Mount Snow, Vermont, and since 2002, the Winter X Games have been held at Buttermilk Mountain in Aspen, Colorado. In 2006, ESPN signed a contract with the Aspen Skiing Company to keep the Winter X Games in Colorado through 2012.
Attendance
While the Summer X Games has attracted hundreds of thousands of spectators each year since its inception, the Winter X Games has a smaller, but growing, fan base. In 1997, the Winter X Games’ inaugural year, 38,000 spectators were in attendance, and the next year, attendance dropped to 25,000. In 1999, the number of spectators grew modestly, with 30,000 attending. Attendance more than doubled in 2000 with 83,000 spectators and has remained strong ever since.
Events
Snow BMX racing was featured in the first two Winter X Games but was discontinued in 1999. While ice climbing and ski boarding events were discontinued in 2000 and 2001, snowboarding events have been a staple since the first games. In 2001, the superpipe, a snowboarding competition, was added to the event lineup. The superpipe, a steeper, larger version of the half-pipe, allows snowboarders to attain maximum spin and “big air.”
Highlights
One of the most exciting and talked about events in the history of the Winter X Games occurred in 2002 when every member of the current U.S. Olympic freestyle snowboarding team arrived to compete only weeks before the Olympic Games in Salt Lake City. In 2007, Peter Olenick landed “The Whiskey Flip,” the first double-flip landed in the half-pipe competition. In 2009, world famous skateboarder and snowboarder Shaun White won the first back-to-back gold medals in the superpipe snowboarding event.
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