PHILADELPHIA -- All week long at the X Games in Philadelphia we have been tracking down some judges to give you a different perspective on things. During practice for the Step Up competition, we caught up with Eric Johnson, Freestyle and Big Air Motocross judge.

Name: Eric Johnson
Age: 35
Hometown: Torrance, Calif.

What pays the bills? My partner Davey Coombs and I own and produce a magazine called Racer X Illustrated, which is an all-color Motocross magazine real heavy on lifestyle. We've been doing that for years and it has been pretty successful so far. That is my seven-day-a-week job.

Eric Johnson, right, poses with Mike Cinqmars.

How did you get your start in judging? When freestyle really took off, it was my partner Davey that did most of the judging. The first time I judged was last winter at the X Games in Vermont. Then I started to do more and more events.

What is your judging style? It's pretty tricky. For example, there are five of us here in Philadelphia, and we all have different ways of seeing things and different personalities. But we are all pretty much on the same page. I know what I look for is originality, a rider that does a lot of different tricks. At the freestyle finals here in Philly, a lot of the riders were just doing variations of the same tricks. I was looking for guys who were doing all kinds of tricks. Like cliffhangers, superman seatgrabs, kiss of death, I was looking at how smooth they were and how long they could hold their trick for. Also just how many tricks they did and how many they pulled off cleanly. What Travis did, so many tricks, so smooth, and so quick. With all respect to the other riders, nobody was really close to him. I had heard some rumblings about Clifford maybe should have been scored higher. He was definitely the second best rider but he wasn't close to what Travis did.

What is the relationship between judges and the riders? We all get along good. We all know each because we all love motorcycles and motorcycle racing. Everybody is from that background so we all get along. As far as the judges, everybody has their theories about what goes on and people think there is favoritism. But I've talked to several people just in the last couple days and all of us just want to be honest. We are all trying our hardest to be honest and everybody wants to do the right thing. Sometimes a guy will get a score he doesn't like, but the bitching only lasts awhile. It blows over right away.

What is the highlight of your judging career? The first X Games qualifier in Salt Lake, there was a new wave of kids who came off a tour produces by SFX which is now Clear Channel, they were doing these series' across the U.S. in arenas and everyone had viewed them as being kind of second rate. But these kids pretty much came out and dominated. What was good about it was we all judged honestly. They just pretty much kicked everybody's ass and everybody knew it. It was like the old guard just got completely replaced that night by the new guard. When we stepped away from that competition, we felt good in that we had done the right thing.

What is the difference between judging freestyle and an event like Big Air? Big Air has only been done one time, at the Winter X Games in Vermont. They only have two chances so it's tough. You really have to look at it closely because it is very tough to call. It was difficult there and it will be difficult here. You just do the best you can.

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