Sport Description:
X Games features six
disciplines of Skateboard competitions: Big Air, Street Women’s, Street Men’s, Vert Men’s and Vert Women’s.
The newest addition, Big Air, features athletes skating down a 60-80-foot high roll-in, choosing to launch over a gap 50 or 70 feet long and continuing into a 27-foot quarter-pipe. This discipline was developed by skateboard legend Danny Way and is showcased exclusively at the X Games. The Street competition showcases skaters performing tricks in an existing concrete plaza, complete with stair sets, banks, manual pads and ledges. Vert features competitors on 120-foot wide ramp, complete with 11-foot transitions and two feet of vert. Skaters flow wall to wall, combining big air and technical lip tricks.
Scoring:
Big Air – In the Selection Session, nine skaters will each take four jumps vying for three spots in the
Finals where they will meet last year’s top three finishers. In the Finals, each of the six skaters take five jumps. The highest score wins. This competition is not timed and is judged on style, creativity and amplitude.
Street Men’s – The Selection Session for Street features 19 skaters who will be narrowed down to an elite 9 for the finals. The first place skater from last year’s competition will automatically qualify for the finals to round out the number of competitors at 10. The Finals will be broken into three fifteen minute sessions. At the end of each session the judges will rank the riders from 1-10, then assign each rider a score from 1-100, based on aggressive execution of maneuvers: content - the number, difficulty, originality and variety of tricks successfully performed; style – the fluid linking of individual tricks; and, the use of the course and course obstacles, such as ramps, boxes, handrails, etc. Each skater can hit the feature as many times as they choose in the allotted time. Judges again rank the riders 1-10 and assign each rider a session score from 1-100. The three session scores are combined and divided by three to give each skater an overall score. Skaters are ranked 1-10 on the Finals leader board.
Street Women’s – The Street Women’s contest will follow the same format as the men’s with the following small changes: there will be eight competitors, no selection session and there will be three seven minute sessions.
Vert Men’s – Each of the 10 competitors takes three 45-second runs with the best score of the three serving as the final score for the standings. Competitors will be judged based on aggressive execution of maneuvers, degree of difficulty, variety, continuity of run, originality and style, amplitude and use of the ramp.
Vert Women’s –The eight skaters will skate in a 30-minute jam session and will be judged on the originality, variety and difficulty of the maneuvers performed. At the end of the session, they will be ranked 1-8.
Thanks to ESPN for providing this information for publication, and for providing excelent X Games coverage! Watch the X Games on ESPN and EXPN, and get more X Games info on the Guide to the X Games.
