As a former Freestyle skier, I can well relate to the overwhelming skew of Racing over Freestyle in the racing-oriented world of international competitive skiing. I loved my time as a competitive freestyle skier, but fortunately for me renowned greats such as my long time coach Bruce “Bogue” Bolesky helped forge the path to the Olympics for freestyle when I was first starting out in the sport.
Even so, there was never any question amongst us that freestylers were seen as the black sheep of the ski world. We took flak at the many mountains for going fast, jumping, and generally having a good time skiing (even from those mountains who had established programs, yet gave us less training grounds than the race teams). Freestyle skiers still take a back seat in exposure and earnings compared to their FIS racing counterparts. Many parts of the ski worlds still give racers more respect over freestylers. Racing holds such dominance, the relatively newer event skiercross has been named a freestyle event just to get it in the Olympics, when most all skiercross racers will voluntarily say it is racing, not freestyle.
Things have changed for the better over the years, though, and that is because of long-standing events such as the X Games, and the emergence of Freeskiing as a sport. Freeskiing has helped evolve the sport of freestyle while at the same time defining it’s own uniqueness. I remember many of us having to make the choice to attend Junior Nationals or the first Winter X Games big air contest- though the fact that it was on snow-blades helped make that decision easier for some of us!
Yet the X Games were the first to recognize the movement of freestylers into the previously snowboard-only park and pipe scene, and helped birth an entirely new sport. With the support and exposure of the X Games, many freestylers made the switch to freesking, and numerous skiers have since chosen to start in freesking over freestyle or racing.
Thanks to the X Games, instead of struggling for acceptance and slowly, eventually, finding their own place within the world of the FIS (i.e. taking a back seat to racing), freeskiers exploded onto the scene, gaining action sport celebrity status. While it’s incredible to see pipe and slopestyle in the Olympics, it’s by established freeskiers mollifying themselves and taking that back seat to racing that these freeskiing events were even added to the Olympic roster.
Despite Olympic acceptance, the X Games have continued to be the dominant force in showcasing freesking to the world, and gathering the very best in the world to compete with full NFL/MLB/NBA/FIFA style exposure.
Without the X Games there would be no freeskiing in the Olympics today. Maybe eventually, but who can say when. Without the X Games, who is to say what freeskiing would be at all? That is why I fully respect reigning FIS World Champion David Wise’s decision to skip this years World Championships, absurdly scheduled at the same time of the X Games, and instead attend the X Games, where he is the defending 4-time gold medalist.
Check out Dave Wise’s eloquently written words as to his reasoning on his blog.
