It’s No Longer Only Fun and Winter X Games

Dawn broke Friday with a blanket of fresh powder covering the ski slopes, the streets and the cars around town.

And giant white flakes were still floating from the gloomy heavens when Devan Cormier greeted the day. But what a glorious day it was, as far as she was concerned.

She and best friend Kelsey Lewis, both 13, were ditching school to beat the weekend crowds and steal a glimpse of their favorite athletes: snowboarders Gretchen Bleiler, a local resident, and Shaun White, the sport’s biggest celebrity.

“Is he here yet?” Cormier wondered aloud, sounding hopeful as she gazed up and into the glistening superpipe.

White, it turned out, was just arriving, along with dozens of other snowboarders, skiers, snowmobilers and even freestyle motocross riders who are competing in the Winter X Games, which began with practice and qualifying sessions Friday and get seriously underway today.

And as the parting clouds began to reveal magnificent patches of blue, Buttermilk Mountain became all about big air. Some of the athletes were more graceful than others and one of the riders -- snowboarder Anne-Flore Marxer -- landed poorly in the pipe and nearly bit her tongue off.

The crowd hushed briefly, then roared anew. Nobody’s emotions were as high as those of Stephanie Tankersley, a 13-year-old from Detroit, who was fortunate enough to meet her favorite athlete after one of his practice runs.

“I just shook Shaun White’s hand,” she announced to her mother, smiling broadly. “It was sweet. He’s so cool.”

Everything else, she acknowledged, would be just a bonus.

*

The X Games are the coolest thing to hit Aspen all year -- or at least the craziest. The partying “vibe goes right in the face” of the posh and quiet atmosphere generally associated with the secluded resort city, Aspen/Snowmass resort spokeswoman Kristin Rust said.

It’s huge with the kids. Many parents not only allowed theirs to skip school on Friday but accompanied them to the slopes in advance of thousands who will come for the weekend’s competitions from Denver, Boulder, Fort Collins and Colorado Springs.

The school district canceled classes for Monday, knowing that few students would attend anyway. Nearby hotels have been sold out for weeks.

All of which says heaps about the Winter X Games. In their ninth year overall and fourth at Aspen, they’ve grown more popular annually -- not only among the local populace but in television viewership, according to ESPN executives.

And as such spectacles have grown -- several others have followed the lead of the X Games -- so has a culture in which competitors can not only make a decent living by feeding their passion, but in some cases get ridiculously wealthy along the way.

This is especially true in snowboarding. White, 18, reportedly makes more than $1 million annually in contest winnings and through endorsements. He bought his first home in Carlsbad before he turned 16 -- so he’d have a place to park all the cars he had won. He now owns two other homes nearby.

One of his neighbors is Keir Dillon, 27, a fellow pro who says, “The exposure through TV and then the sponsors that followed has allowed snowboarding to become a legitimate sport and a sport where you can make money.

“I mean, when I was going to school and telling my teachers I was missing school to go snowboarding, they were like, ‘Oh, you’re wasting your life; you’re wasting your talent.’ Now I have houses, I have money and I’m living a dream.”

Dillon cautions against giving X Games too much credit for the burgeoning snowboarding phenomenon, saying to do so would be “like saying ‘Monday Night Football’ made football.” He added that another popular event -- the U.S. Open of Snowboarding -- has been around for 22 years.

But neither Dillon nor any snowboarder would discount the impact the newer events have had on them personally. The X Games, for example, is offering not only exposure but $657,400 in prize money. First place in several events -- including the men’s and women’s snowboarding superpipe -- will be worth $20,000.

“I’ve got, like, two cars out of the sport and, like, decent cash and the ability to see the world,” says Hannah Teter, 18, last year’s X Games superpipe gold medalist, from Belmont, Vt. “I mean, the money’s not what I look for or anything -- like, ‘Wow, I’ve got to get some cash.’ But on the other hand it’s, ‘Wow, I just won some money.’ Oh that’s cool!”

It’s equally cool for an elite few in some of the other disciplines -- such as Tanner Hall in skiing (slopestyle and superpipe); Blair Morgan in snowmobiling (Snocross), and Brian Deegan and Mike Metzger in freestyle motocross (Moto X).

But the coolest thing of all, as far as Aspen-area residents are concerned, is that they get to enjoy the games first-hand.

“The best part for me,” Cormier said, “is seeing all these people go so high in the pipe and over all those jumps, and knowing that I could never do that.”

*

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

The Action in Aspen

Highlights from the ninth Winter X Games, today through Tuesday at Buttermilk Mountain near Aspen, Colo.:

* MOTO X -- Motorcycles fly and flip off a ramp over a 90-foot gap, earning points for style and difficulty. Finals Sunday night.

* SNOWBOARD SUPERPIPE -- Riders shred up and down the walls of the 500 foot-long pipe, scoring points for style and difficulty as they flip and twist dozens of feet in the air. Women’s final tonight, men on Monday night.

* SKI SUPERPIPE -- Same thing as snowboarders, only higher and more visually appealing with skis and poles crisscrossing at all angles. Both finals Tuesday.

* SNOWMOBILE SNOCROSS -- Riders trade paint in a race up and down the slope of the mountain through tight corners and huge jumps in Winter X’s fastest event. Finals Tuesday night.

* SNOWBOARD/SKIER X -- Races in heats of six on a course filled with jumps, sharp turns, gaps and jumps. Snowboard and men’s skier finals today, women’s skier finals Sunday.

* SNOWBOARD/SKI SLOPESTYLE -- Competitors earn points for execution, difficulty and use of a course that includes rails, tabletops and jumps. Snowboard finals today, skiers on Sunday.

Associated Press