Photo: Doug Pensinger/Getty Images
The 2012 Winter X Games wrapped up on Sunday, and this year’s competition was no disappointment. From Shaun White’s stunning fifth straight win and first X Games perfect score to the touching tribute to freeskier Sarah Burke, here are the top four moments from the four days of terrific snowboarding, skiing and snowmobiling.
1. Shaun White’s Five-Peat & Perfect Score
Coming into this week, Shaun White had won the gold medal in the superpipe four years in a row and held the record for best score ever, 97.33. When he had to pull out of the Slopestyle event due to a sprained left ankle, the chances of his securing a fifth first place finish seemed slight. But White showed up anyway and threw down a 94 on his first run, good enough to secure the gold. He didn’t stop there, looking not just for the hardware but the chance to show off the frontside double cork 1260, his newest trick.
White fell trying the move in his second run, setting the stage for his third run. Instead of cruising through a victory lap, White went for the 1260 and nailed it. The rest of the run wasn’t too shabby either, considering that it earned him an X Games first: a perfect score of 100. “I’ve been to the X Games plenty of times,” White said, “but I will forever remember this.”
2. Marte Gjefsen’s Skier X Gold
Photo: Doug Pensinger/Getty Images
Much like White, Norwegian Marte Gjefsen suffered a potentially sidelining injury during the Games. And like White, she didn’t accept sitting out- so she skied with a cast on each arm, one for a broken right wrist, the other for a torn ligament in her left thumb. Despite barely being able to hold on to her poles, Gjefsen outraced five competitors on her way to the podium and narrowly avoided being brought down when the only racer in front of her took a spill.
3. Heath Frisby’s Snowmobile Frontflip
The physics of it don’t make much sense- how do you take a 450 pound snowmobile off a jump and make it flip forward? (Not to mention coming back to Earth without needing an ambulance.) That’s why the trick had never before been landed at the X Games, and why Heath Frisby wanted to be the one to do it. So he committed to figuring out how to make the impossible possible months before the X Games, and his hard work paid off- and got him a gold medal.
4. Tribute to Sarah Burke
Photo: Doug Pensinger/Getty Images
If there was a cloud hanging over the 2012 X Games, it was the death of Sarah Burke, the freeskier who was a pioneer in her sport and largely responsible for its inclusion in the Olympics, on January 19. There was no place more fitting to remember Burke than the halfpipe where she spent so much time and won six gold medals. To honor her memory, her fellow friends, athletes and family held a candlelit vigil in the pipe, slowly skiing towards the bottom.
X Games host Sal Masekela delivered a brief eulogy that was followed by a video about Burke’s life.
Tags: Adventure, Extreme Sports, Snow Sports, Winter
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