X Games started off 2013 in Aspen Colorado with Shaun White and others making it happen in Colorado and now things move to Tignes in France for the next round of competition.
The Thursday events include medal events, with the Men's Snowboard SuperPipe Final and Ski Slopestyle Final, while on Wednesday things heated up with the Women's SuperPipe, as there was a snowstorm that went down for the event. Kelly Clark was dominant once again, winning her third straight gold in the final at X Games Tignes, adding to her third consecutive X Games Aspen gold from earlier in the year.
There was heavy snow on the slopes on Wednesday and kept her from doing some of her new tricks, but that didn't stop her from winning the event. She had planned to use a Cab 1080 and others, but instead she started with a frontside 1080 before pulling off a Cab 720 mute grab, backside 540 mute grab and frontside 540 for a score of 87.66 that took the top spot.
"It's never easy. There are always challenges," said Clark when asked what it means to win her 62nd pipe title. "I've historically been very poor in riding in snow conditions. My mechanics are really slow. So for me to try to do a trick as big as I normally do, it is a nightmare."
Clark was able to stay ahead of Elena Hight and Arielle Gold, who couldn't muster up enough to make it for the gold. Hight won a silver in Aspen, but her run on Wednesday wasn't as good and she was unable to pull of her alley-oop double rodeo.
The events in Tignes were changed up a bit after the death of Caleb Moore in Aspen in January, with ESPN deciding to take out the Moto X Best Trick and Snowmobile Best Trick events. The company said it was unrelated to Moore's death, but no one believes that.
Moore suffered serious injuries after crashing at an event in Aspen with his snowmobile, as he tried to attempt a flip and lost control, having the vehicle fall on top of him. He suffered head and heart injuries and died days later in the hospital. The incident brought questions to the games and to ESPN about what they should do in the future.
Many athletes have been injured at events before, but no one had ever died in X Games competition before Moore did.
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