So with what seemed like a pretty short build up, the Winter X Games kicked off pretty quickly with superpipe and slopestyle getting everyone’s attention on the slopes. With spectators stopping in the middle of a run in Tignes, much to the annoyance of every middle-class skier that didn’t want to be involved in anything that us ‘whipper-snappers’ get up to, you can imagine that the riding was as jaw-dropping as everyone had expected it to be.

It would take me a decade to properly talk about every event, riders competing in them and everything in between, so I’ll just talk about a few people in particular before you watch all the highlights we have below.
First up – Kevin Rolland. I’m only bringing up the French shredder because, personally, I thought he was pretty much done for the season. He’d be struggling for form after returning from injury and I’d already written him off for the X Games but he definitely surprised! It seems that I shouldn’t have shut off my faith in the Frenchman as he managed to qualify first in the superpipe and also managed to take the bronze medal in the final.

Another notable performance was from Iouri Podladtchikov in the men’s snowboard superpipe finals. If any of you managed to catch it, you’d have seen a ridiculous performance that left me questioning my very existence. A bit dramatic, I agree, but his run was insane. After failing to stomp the landing in the competition, he came to his final run and STOMPED the ‘yolo flip’. All he had to do after that was a clean 540 but he was so amped on what he’d just done that he nailed himself on the next flip and ended up in fourth. Not only that but he was so happy that he threw his helmet, goggle and his board into the crowd! Definitely worth a watch!

So here we go. All the edits from the European Winter X Games 2013 from Tignes.

If you don’t already know, and we’re surprised if you don’t, but one of the greatest events in the action sports calendar is descending upon us. What’s the event? It’s the European Winter X Games in Tignes! Like I said, if that’s the first time you’re hearing about it then we’re shocked but we’re also here to deliver you something pretty special.

As European media partners to the European Winter X Games, we’re celebrating the fact that we’ve got the world’s best talent in Europe for a good few days and that they’ll be showing off all over the internet and TV, we don’t want them to be the only people that win something. Sure they might win a medal and pride but who wants that when there’s a chance to win a full snowboarding set up?! Intrigued? Well, read on…

As we know, you lot out there love Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. So much so that we’ve designed a little prize for those of you that interact with us during the X Games through these sites and we’ve even roped in our fellow magazine sites too. Starting Wednesday March 20th the guys from Whitelines, Onboard, SnowboarderMBM and Skiing Mag will be giving away 10 one year’s subscription to their magazines per day to one lucky person, for three days. Not one person for all mags but one person PER MAG. So there’s 30 subscriptions up for grabs! All you have to do on Twitter is tweet a photo, share your thoughts or just generally say something about the X Games. When it comes to Instagram you can upload a picture of you watching the X Games, your disbelief of how good a run was… anything really but there is one condition – you must use the hashtag #XGAMESNOW. Whether you’re tweeting or instagram-ing you need to put this hashtag on it and we’ll be able to pick winners.

But that’s not all!

Aside from subscriptions, at the end of the ten days the editors from the magazines will sit around a large table and argue about which one lucky git will be able to take home ‘the big prize’. The big prize will be:

TTR x Nitro Snowboard
Onboard x Union Bindings
Onboard x 686 Jacket
Onboard x Level Gloves
Whitelines x 7-9-13 Shoelace Belt
Onboard Tee
Whitelines Tee
Onboard x Neff Beanie
Whitelines Beanie
Onboard Sub
Whitelines Sub

Not bad eh? All for sending a tweet of a picture with a hashtag. But it doesn’t stop there!!
That’s what the guys at the magazines are giving away but there’s also the people that are huge Facebook lovers too! For everyone that fancies winning this huge prize:

Onboard x Head Snowboard
Onboard x Union Bindings
Onboard x 686 Jacket
Onboard x Level Gloves
Whitelines x 7-9-13 Shoelace Belt
Onboard Tee
Whitelines Tee
Onboard x Neff Beanie
Whitelines Beanie
Onboard Sub
Whitelines Sub

All you have to do is visit the Mpora page on Facebook and make sure you enter – for all you people who are already fans, you just enter your details on our comp page and you’re there. For those of you that aren’t friends with us on Facebook (and shame on you for it!), just ‘like’ us and then enter your details. It’s as easy as that! Hopefully you’ll be the one walking away with this huge swag we’ll be giving you.

Don’t forget to check in on Mpora though as we’ll be getting highlights and exclusive edits from Tignes as the Winter X Games kicks off!

Tweets about “#xgamesnow”

With the first event of the 2013 global expansions completed, X Games returns to the centre stage in France with X Games Tignes, March 20-22. And as we turn our heads to see what’s going on we’ll soon see that they’ve announced the schedule and a few more riders! Want to know who? Thought so…

Snow: Mark McMorris, Iouri Podladtchikov, Louie Vit, Torstein Horgmo, Kelly Clark, Jamie Anderson, Elena Hight, Torah Bright, Shaun White and rookes Arielle Gold, Yuki Kadono and Max Parrot.

Ski: David Wise, Kevin Rolland, Thomas Krief, Anais Caradeux, Torin Yater-Wallace, Bobby Brown, Tom Wallisch, Nick Goepper, James Woods, Kaya Turski and Maddie Bowman.

All the athletes are here if you want a full list!
http://xgames.tignes.net/en/competitions/athletes-1119.html

The event will feature eight different events for men and women over three days, including Ski and Snowboard SuperPipe and Slopestyle.

Schedule highlights include:
„Monday 18th and Tuesday 19th : training
„Tuesday 19th : X Games Tignes 2013 opening press conference
„Wednesday 20th : Two Women’s finals:
- 1pm – Women’s Ski Slopestyle Final
- 6:30pm – Men’s Snowboard SuperPipe Eliminations
- 8:30pm – Women’s Snowboard SuperPipe Final

Press information February 14th 2013

„Thursday 21st :
- 1pm – Men’s Ski Slopestyle Final
- 6:30pm – Women’s Snowboard SuperPipe Final
- 8:30pm ­‐ Men’s Ski SuperPipe Eliminations
„Friday 22nd : 4 finals
- Men’s (10:30am) and Women’s (1pm) Snowboard Slopestyle Finals
- Men’s (6:30 pm) and Women’s (8 :30pm) Ski SuperPipe Finals

Are you lot ready for it?

Shaun White you sneaky little bugger. You can’t help yourself can you? You announce that you’re going to be at the Winter X Games Europe in Tignes this year and you go and piss off every other rider in the competition! How did he do it? Well, read on and you’ll find out!

The Winter X Games are pretty much the pinnacle of our winter sports world and when it comes to the Winter X Games Europe in Tignes, then we tend to go a little crazy in the office. It’s so close that you can smell it (in distance and not literally smell it of course) and there’s always a mountain of videos on their way in so we get to feed that lot to you as well. But what would the X Games be without controversy? We’ll get to that in a bit though.

First things first! There’s been a lot of practising in the pipe and on the slopestyle course for all the riders. Videos have been flying in left right and centre but they’ve all been skiing ones so you snowboarders out there will have to wait! Here’s some updates from the Atomic team:

Atomic: Euro X Games Training Day – SS

Atomic: Euro X Games Pipe Training

Seems that the slopestyle course has been trimmed down this year after losing the dog leg that slowed the riders down, and the gap between the jumps is a lot shorter as well. With those factors put in place it should make the course pretty competitive when it comes to the crunch. Halfpipes don’t really change much when you’re at the top events around the world so this isn’t going to be much different to other pipes that the riders have taken on but I’ve heard it’s super steep and super icy so we should have some pretty fast runs going on!

But the halfpipe is where the controversy is being held. I did mention that Shaun White may have pissed off the other riders and this is because of a ‘private training session’. There was meant to be a private training session in the pipe for only one rider between 9.30pm and 10.30pm – this was for Shaun but he decided not to turn up. It was under the guise of shooting for his sponsor, GoPro, but with him not turning up at all, the rest of the riders were pretty pissed off with the outcome. There was talk of him not being turning up to the event at all but that rumour has passed.
Our good friends at Snowboarder MBM and Mpora.de have filmed an exclusive interview with Shaun in his chalet and this will be posted up on Mpora tomorrow morning! But for now keep coming back to Mpora for highlights.

burn energy are adding another string to their bow with Real Snow. It’s going to add a new dimension to the Winter X Games in Tignes and it’s part of Human/Machines so, all in all, it’s set to showcase the contrasting schools of snowboarding. Still a bit confused?

Short version is that 8 big name riders will travel the globe to seek the best backcountry hotspots to films their 90 second video part. With the riders that have been announced we’re expecting some huge airs, epic lines and a few ridiculous cliff jumps to say the least. Out of the 8 riders, 3 winning films will be picked and awarded with European Winter X Games medals and a €10,000 prize for the fan’s choice!
Who’s competing for this prize I hear you shout? It’s a who’s who of snowboarding as burn throw together Gigi Rüf, Mathieu Crepel, Iikka Backstrom, Devun Walsh, Nicolas Müller, Jussi Oskanen, John Jackson and Mark Sollors. All the video parts dropped yesterday on the burn energy Facebook page so head over there to watch the fruits of labour!

But before you do, make sure you get teased here with this little edit. Ladies and Gents, I introduce to you – Real Snow Backcountry.

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