Reaching Record Heights

Buyten sets an X Games Moto X Step Up record with a height of 37 feet.

 

Matt Buyten soared over the bar at 37 feet, setting a World Record and capturing his fourth X Games gold – second in a row – in Moto X Step Up.

“It’s everything,” Buyten said. “This is everything. Everything is on the line right here. This is the X Games, there’s no backing down. You can’t explain the pressure. The bar just keeps climbing and climbing and the pressure keeps building.”

His record jump broke the previous record of 35 feet, set in 2000 by Tommy Clowers, and did so with plenty of room to spare.

Buyten and second place finisher Ronnie Renner were neck-and-neck throughout the competition, but Renner was unable to clear 37 feet, finishing with a top height of 36 feet, 5 inches.

“The last five years I’ve had some great battles with Renner,” Buyten added. “He’s definitely my biggest competitor.”

Moto X Step Up features six riders lining up 30 feet from a near vertical wall of dirt in an attempt to jump over a horizontal bar positioned between two vertical bars at a height determined at the competition director’s discretion, above the lip of the jump.

If a rider knocks the bar to the ground, that rider has one additional chance to clear the bar at a height or else is eliminated.  After each round, the bar is raised in increments determined by the competition director and the entire process is repeated until one winner is determined.

For X Games media information, including press releases, logos and additional images from past events, log on to www.espneventmedia.com. To view medalist runs, visit the Winter X Games You Tube Channel – https://www.youtube.com/xgames and follow the X Games on Twitter at Twitter.com/xgames

 

X Games 17

In its ninth year in Los Angeles, X Games 17 will feature more than 200 athletes at competition venues and event spaces including STAPLES Center and Nokia Theatre L.A. LIVE. The 17^th annual action sports competition to be held in Los Angeles July 28 – 31 and will debut the new discipline of Enduro X, as well as the first-ever rally street circuit running through the downtown area. ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC will combine to telecast 25 hours of live X Games 17 competition. In addition to the 25  original hours in high definition, the Worldwide Leader in Action Sports will also televise 18 hours of X Games action on ESPN 3D. More than 25 hours will also be distributed on ESPN3.com.   

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Contacts:

Danny Chi, (Print Media), 310-500-5699, [email protected]

Katie Moses-Swope, 310-339-4552, [email protected]

Alex Rozis (Broadcast media), 415-609-0749, [email protected]

Grace Coryell, 310-956-5098, [email protected]