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| | Wednesday, 27 December, 2000, 19:11 GMT Extreme sports move into mainstream  Cesar Mora has emerged as a genuine skate star BBC Sport Online examines the continued surge in extreme sports By Andy Critchlow The winter season 2000/2001 is already upon us and as always there is a plethora of extreme sports that thrive on the harsh winter climate attracting thousands of devoted followers to their mountain shrines. The recent surge in alternative sports has fuelled the rebirth of skiing and aided the relatively young sport of snowboarding in its quest of world domination. It never set out to be as big as it has become but like skateboarding and bicycle stunt-riding it has become a mainstay of extreme sports with an undoubted fashion cachet. Since the mid-80's when skateboarding reappeared, extreme sports have developed into officially backed sports with governing bodies and official world championships. Official sanctioning Some have even been given the prestige of Olympic status. However, after the 1996 Atlanta Games when half the US snowboard team were disqualified for cannabis usage, the powers that be realised that your everyday action athlete was a far cry from the traditional fitness fanatic that they expected. So extreme sports formed their own Olympics, with the aid of America's two biggest sporting TV networks, ESPN and Fox. The Summer X Games from ESPN and the Fox Sports Gravity games have set the standard for all extreme sporting events. Through these competitions, people like Tony Hawk, Dave Mirra and Cesar Mora have become household names. Earning on an average of US$500,000 (about �340,000) per annum theses atheletes have shot to near rock star status with their own brands of equipment and shoes, computer games, videos, movies and even their own TV slots.
Each year these events are watched by over 150m viewers world-wide. Latest figures for TV viewing in the US show that more 12-18-year-olds watch the ESPN X Games than the World Cup, Olympic Games and Major League Baseball. Take our homegrown king of the BMX Vert, Jamie Beswick. He has been riding BMX for 20 years, skipping days from work to practise and compete. He came third in the world while still engineering aircraft propeller blades at Rolls Royce in Derby. In 1999, he left Derby for Pennsylvania to become a full-time BMX rider and by 1999 he was number one after winning the X Games and Gravity Games. Extreme sports have yet to achieve mass market appeal in the UK. But it's a different story elsewhere in the world. That's why a company like Infiniti Sports Management has become one of the largest and most respected athlete-management agencies in the world. Tapping the youth market With headquarters in London, New York and Melbourne, they pride themselves on representing the finest action athletes in the world. From 10-times world BMX champion Dennis McCoy to Aggressive Inline world champion Thiag Khris, they have over 200 athletes on their books and many more queuing up to sign on. Paul Malina, athlete liason and media spokesman for the ISM, explains his company's role. "There are athletes who don't know how to go out there and sell themselves and then there's big corporations such as Levis and Nike who are wanting to tap into this youth-fuelled market but just have no idea how best approach it". Bigger and better And its not just on a managerial level that these sports are gaining credibility. The Melbourne County Cricket ground is a place where every young Australian cricketer dreams of facing an over but this summer the ground will house a full facility skate park. The park's launch in February 2001 has led to the Australian Rules Football Hall of Fame being taken over by skates, bikes and all kinds of as it is transformed into the Extreme Sports Hall of Fame. And with the sports still in their infancy you just know that bigger and better things are still to come. | | See also:  Other top Other Sports stories: Links to top Other Sports stories are at the foot of the page. | |
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