Thursday, April 12

BMX Downhill to Make X Games Debut

Oklahoma City, Okla. - Planet Seven Productions is pleased to release the list of athletes who have qualified for or have been selected to compete in the inaugural downhill BMX event in this year's ESPN X Games.

The format for the downhill BMX race to be held August 11-12, 2001 at Woodward Camp in western Pennsylvania calls for four groups, or "motos," of eight riders each for a field of 32 racers total. Twenty-seven names on the official list of the world's most elite BMX professionals were selected from the group of athletes who made semi-main and/or main events during the three-race downhill BMX series that was televised on ESPN and ESPN2 last year.

The final five racers on the list of 32 qualified athletes were handpicked by event officials based on their achievements in other forms of professional BMX, dirt-jumping and/or high-speed downhill bike competition.

Listed below are the 32 athletes that comprise the field of downhill BMX competitors at the 2001 X Games (listed alphabetically):

ERIK ABBADESSA
THOMAS ALLIER
KYLE BENNETT
WADE BOOTES
ANDY CONTES
DAVID CULLINAN
ROBERT DEWILDE
JASON DONNELL
ALAN FOSTER
BRIAN FOSTER
CHRISTOPHE LEVEQUE
JUSTIN LOFFREDO
BRIAN LOPES
BRANDON MEADOWS
MARK MELTON
ROBBIE MIRANDA
LANCE MOSELY
KEITH MULLIGAN
JOHN PURSE
ZACK ROEBUCK
KEVIN ROYAL
CHRIS SANCHEZ
BRIAN SCHMITH
JAMIE STAFF
BRIAN STRIEBY
TIMMY STRELECKI
KEVIN TOMKO
TRAVIS TURRESON
STEVE VELTMAN
JOHN WHIPPERMAN
NEAL WOOD
SCOTT YOQUELET

In addition to these 32 riders, race officials have selected the following first-choice alternates:

DANNY NELSON
GREG ROMERO

Should any athlete(s) listed among the top 32 qualifiers not be ready to compete by August 1, 2001 for any reason, they will be replaced by one or more of the alternate riders listed above. Should additional alternates be required to replace more than two missing riders, event officials will select additional alternates from riders among the top-10 in this year's ABA and/or NBL senior professional national points series.

Every effort possible was taken by event officials to both reward those athletes who excelled in last year's downhill BMX series and to acknowledge other BMX athletes who could not compete last year for whatever reason. In the collective opinion of event organizers, X Games officials and the ESPN network, these athletes represent the absolute cream of the crop for BMX competition of this extreme and unprecedented nature.

Construction of the high-speed downhill BMX track that will play host to this inaugural X Games event begins at Woodward Camp in mid-May. The size, variety and number of hair-raising obstacles on it will exceed even the high standards set by the three breathtaking facilities at last year's series.