X Games

Since the beginning of times, the idea of flying have been fascinating to humans,even in our modern days of jet travel and space shuttles,we have not lost our private dream of personal flight.There have always been people prepared to take remarkable risks from the first daredevils who attempted to conquer Niagara Falls to risk takers such as American motorcycle jumpers.Although we have created our own myths of flying heroes such as Superman or Batman, the ability to fly is not limited to movies.The expression extreme sports is a relatively recent media creation, popularized by international events such as the ESPN "X Games" and the Australia "Gravity Games".The largest demographic in the extreme sports is between the ages of 12 through age 35. While males constitute the majority of the participants, most extreme sports are not restricted by requirements of greater muscularity or speed. Extreme sports tend to place primary emphasis upon the technique used and the profound excitement ,an adrenalin rush, while requiring the athlete to assume significant physical risks.

Extreme sports have become huge since the early 90's as a reaction to the sedentary modern life ,but can be traced to the early 1970s, when rock climbing and marathon running ,then considered extreme ,gained popularity.In 1995 ESPN televised the first Extreme Games, now known as"X Games"the event is broken into the Winter X Games and the Summer X Games,both seasons have specific sports, just like the Olympics.Some of the events include aggressive in-line skating, bicycle stunt riding, snowboarding, sky surfing, street luge,ice climbing and skateboarding. Several sports go beyond what some call extreme.Jumping from an aircraft at 10,000 or more feet puts skydiving in a different category. Some might call it ultra extreme.

Some of the most popular sports that can have extreme elements are extreme snowboarding, mountain biking, in-line skating, and whitewater kayaking. In these activities,athletes exceed traditional safety limitations to create new disciplines in the sport. For example, people who engage in extreme skiing make dangerous runs down mountains over uncharted terrain. One of the best examples of this sort of transition is found with sky surfing, which first became popular in the 1990s. The sport combines skydiving and snowboarding. Experienced parachutists perform acrobatic stunts on boards similar to snowboards.Individually, skydiving and snowboarding were once considered extreme.And snow boarding's own development owed much to the sports of skateboarding and surfing, which were considered nontraditional when they were first popularized in the 1960s. Street Luge is another ultimate gravity sport where racers can reach top speeds previously found before among Ice luge racers. The riders constantly adjust their body weight to steer the luge, while using the force of gravity to go even faster .

One of the newest and most radical extreme sports around today is called Kite surfing. Huge colorful kites, power up riders on tiny surf ,propelling them at huge speeds up to 100m in the air! The kite sizes can range from 5m to 25m and the equipment packs up so small, it can easily fit in the boot of a car.

Extreme Sport, Extreme Chic

Gone are the days when skateboarding was a simple glide down a flat sidewalk,today's skateboarders stretch physics to the limit and thrive on the thrill of risk taking.Television coverage of competitions and events has brought "X Games" and their participants lots of attention.One result of the growing interest is that those who pride themselves on participating in challenging, cutting-edge activities are constantly searching for new ways to test themselves which ensures the continuing development of newer extreme sports.Also, the fashion world, was one of the earliest to latch onto the image of extreme sports with clothes that work with the body's movement .Snow boarding's baggy clothing and in-your-face attitude has inspired designers from the avant-garde to borrow the rebellious image of extreme sports. The "Tag-heuer" watch company quickly became recognized for a high degree of accuracy suitable for timing sports events because of its innovation in water resistant watches. The company’s website promotes its status as the official timekeepers of the Indy Racing League and the Indy 500. But it's not all image. Beneath the hype, lifestyle sports are a new kind of sport for a new age.While traditional sports elevated the values of commitment and fair play, these new sports offer individuals a more personal kind of challenge where each individual is really competing against himself,an opportunity to find out where his limits lies by conquering fear one adventure at a time.

In the near future "space diving" could be the next ultimate extreme adrenaline pumping daredevil stunt where space divers will jump off commercial spaceships and hit the atmosphere at supersonic speed until their parachute deploys so they can glide safely down to their home planet.