The EXPN Invitational… What the hell is that? Well my little friends it's a fun and furry little creature of an event that takes place for the first time ever this year. But "first time ever" might be a bit misleading because the EXPN Invitational actually has a couple of ties to the past, and for us internet jockeys anything that isn't happening right this second might as well be ancient history. So here I am trying to give a little history lesson on the birth of this new event.

I don't know if you remember the day of the B3s and X Trials, but last year these were the events that led up to and qualified athletes for the X Games in Philly. There were four of these events total last year but some bigwig at ESPN decided that four was just too many. Four may not seem that much to you, but combine these with the International X Games Qualifiers and all the other X Games qualifying criteria and you have a big chunk o' events. So in an effort to streamline the whole qualifying process the B3 and X Trial events have basically been combined to form a new series of two events - the illustrious EXPN Invitationals.

EXPN Invitationals

April 26-28, 2002 Grand Prairie, TX - GPX at Lone Star Skatepark
May 17-19, 2002 Gwinnett County, GA - X Games Skatepark

Not only do you get big prize money and points for WCS type rankings in your respective sports, if you do really well you get a special invitation to X Games VII this summer in Philly. What do I mean by really well? If you win in the following categories you get the invite:

Skateboard Park

Skateboard Vert

BMX Park

BMX Vert

BMX Flat

Inline Park

Inline Vert

So if you're in Texas and feel like seeing some of the world's best competitors go for their X Games VIII qualifying chance, stop by the GPX skatepark in Grand Prairie and get your fill of action sports competition. Yeehaw!

Currently qualified X Games VIII athletes:

Skateboarding
Park:
Chad Bartie (World Street Rankings 01)
Kyle Berard (World Street Rankings 01)
Pat Channita (North American Street Rankings 01)
Rodil De Araujo (X Games 01)
Kerry Getz (Globe World Cup Skateboarding 02)
Omar Hassan (European Street Rankings 01)
Frank Hirata (World Street Rankings 01)
Eric Koston (North American Street Rankings 01)
Rick McCrank (World Street Rankings 01)
Wagner Ramos (Crail World Cup 01)
Bastien Salabanzi (Vans Triple Crown of Skateboarding 01)
Chris Senn (World Street Rankings 01)
Darren Kaehne (Asian X Games 02)
Rodolfo Ramos (Latin X Games 02)

Vert:
Bob Burnquist (X Games 01)
Sandro Dias (Crail World Cup 01)
Anthony Furlong (North American Vert Rankings 01)
Pierre-Luc Gagnon (World Vert Rankings 01)
Rune Glifberg (Vans Triple Crown of Skateboarding 01)
Omar Hassan (World Vert Rankings 01)
Neal Hendrix (World Vert Rankings 01)
Juergen Horrwarth (Globe World Cup Skateboarding 02)
Bucky Lasek (North American Vert Rankings 01)
Andy Macdonald (World Vert Rankings 01)
Cristiano Mateus (European Vert Rankings 01)
Renton Millar (World Vert Rankings 01)
Lincoln Ueda (Latin X Games 02)

Bicycle Stunt Vert:
Mat Hoffman (X Games 01)
Jay Miron (X Games 01)
Dave Mirra (X Games 01)
Kevin Robinson (X Games 01)
Simon Tabron (X Games 01)
Seiji Saito (Asian X Games 02)

Flat:
Stephen Cerra (X Games 01)
Phil Dolan (X Games 01)
Martti Kuoppa (X Games 01)
Trevor Meyer (X Games 01)
Matt Wilhelm (X Games 01)
Ito Takashi (Asian X Games 02)
Marco Jesus (Latin American X Games 02)

Park:
Bruce Crisman (X Games 01)
Tom Haugen (X Games 01)
Jay Miron (X Games 01)
Alistair Whitton (X Games 01)
Colin Winkelmann (X Games 01)
Steven McCann (Asian X Games 02)
Samuel Shinogaki (Latin X Games 02)

Agressive Inline Vert:
Marco De Santi (Latin X Games 02)

Park:
Dalmo Travaglini (Latin X Games 02)

   Send to a friend  | Submit your photo or video
   Top Rated Photos |  Top Rated Videos |  Most Sent