Sport like it oughta be

X Games athletes put competition and fans first

So here I was, a couple months ago, standing at the top of a halfpipe in Oceanside, Calif., watching skateboard legend Tony Hawk run through a succession of tricks for a photographer. Then the photographer finished. And Hawk kept skating. And crashing. And sweating. And crashing. And swearing. And crashing. Until, in the cloudy California twilight, he finally landed this sick trick he'd never landed before. Then he stripped off his pads, climbed into the car and went home for dinner with his family. Just like that.

I remember this scene -- part of the work I did for a Sports Illustrated piece on Hawk that appeared in June -- because I've spent the last few nights watching ESPN's coverage of the X Games, which concluded last weekend but which the network doles out in small increments for the public in the days following the actual end of the Games.

Background: Reader response to my story on Hawk was largely divided among: 1) football-baseball-basketball fans who were hacked off that SI would waste space on a friggin' skateboarder; 2) skaters who were hacked off that millionaire Hawk has sold out their grass-roots sport; and 3) fans who love Hawk. That's cool. Takes all kinds. If everybody loves a story, there's a problem.

Personally, I was conflicted. Not about the tired, old issue of Are skateboarders/in-line skaters/surfers athletes? That's a joke. To do what Hawk and his peers can do on a vert ramp requires spectacular athleticism (and no small amount of stones). Period. But as I watched the X Games last weekend and this week, and against the backdrop of an impending baseball strike, I became more sold than ever on their place in the sports world.

Don't get me wrong. The X Games are a derivative, manufactured, commercial venture designed to enrich ESPN, Mountain Dew and various video-game companies. Many of the athletes who compete in them, like Hawk, BMX superstars Mat Hoffman and Dave Mirra, and motocross riders Mike Metzger (who does back flips on a 240-pound dirt bike) and Carey Hart (who dates Pink, for crying out loud) are wealthy celebrities in their own, growing world. This is not a neighborhood jam. Competitions are scored by judges, which is always dicey and contrived (see: Olympic figure skating).

But they have energy. And energy is what is so often missing from the games we are accustomed to praising. Near the end of the X Games, skateboarders have this competition called Vert Best Trick. It's exactly what is sounds like: Five of the best vert skaters in the world take turns laying down ridiculous and innovative tricks, and judges pick the best one. Right before the time limit expired, 22-year-old Pierre-Luc Gagnon won the gold medal with a Heel Flip McTwist completed while gyrating some 10 feet above the top of the 13-foot-high halfpipe. Brazilian Sandro Dias, who went ever bigger than Gagnon, earned silver.

Then it got better. After the competition was finished, Bob Burnquist nearly broke his body into small pieces trying repeatedly to land a Gay Twist Heel Flip. (I learned in doing the story on Hawk that describing tricks is neither fruitful nor cool; suffice it to say that at this level, everything these guys do is impossibly contorted and complex.) Eventually, Burnquist landed the trick. Hawk wasn't finished, making nearly a dozen attempts at the 360 varial 540, in which (here I go) his body and the skateboard are spinning wildly in opposite directions. It's insane. Late in the evening, Hawk stood at the top of the pipe as organizers began dragging out the awards podium; Hawk waved them aside to try his trick again.

To me, it was a seminal moment and one that not only explained in vivid language the culture of skateboarding (and many extreme sports), but also underscored the difference between these sports and those in the mainstream. Translation: Never mind the medals podium, let's elevate the sport. Entertain the crowd. Hawk landed the trick, the first time any skater has done it. The arena went nuts and Hawk's fellow skaters mobbed him. It was pure joy. I'm sure baseball was that way once, a long time ago.

Sports Illustrated senior writer Tim Layden is a regular contributor to CNNSI.com. Click here to send him a question or comment.

 

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