X Games 17 Meets Sports Science

As my boys moved past training wheels and tricycles and started building ramps in my driveway, to accommodate their scooters, rip sticks, roller blades and bikes,we started a new tradition in our television watching habits. Suddenly it was inconceivable that we would ever miss a broadcast of the X Games on TV.

We got sucked in when we accidentally found the Winter X Games being broadcast. This was a few years ago, when there wasn’t days full of coverage and the crowds didn’t consist of a lot more than a lot of moms and girlfriends of the athletes. The super fans were soon created, as more coverage was introduced in the more recent years.

My boys related most to the Winter X Games. They all love to ski. They tackle the black diamonds like I approach my safe bunny hills. My youngest did his first black slope before he started kindergarten. Taking dares on skis made sense to my boys. So the X Games were even more exciting than the Winter Olympics.

It’s that time of year again. We are watching more and more of the summer version, as my oldest boys reach the older teen years and can truly appreciate the skill it takes to make some of those jumps on bikes and skateboards. They drape their long legs across the couch, flanked by their tall teen friends, and mumble out “Sick!” and “Cool!” every now and then.

I was pleasantly surprised to see, during a commercial break, a video piece created by ESPN, about the Sport Science behind the X Games. I loved that it brought a level of math and science to the raw adrenalin that pumped through my boys veins. I even coerced the gang into discussing the science facts they’d seen, after the broadcast was over. It’s always fun to find ways to make science more relate-able to the real world. Tying it into the X Games is pure genius.

Some of the best videos of the different X Games events, broken down into Sport Science, are found on the ESPN website.

The one below came from You Tube. There are several others there also.

X Games 17 is playing almost non-stop right now, on ESPN, and will run through tomorrow night. The science behind them will live on forever.