X Games 2021 Research Update for June 28, 2021

Attached and below is Research’s first 2021 packet. I've also attached the Master Athlete List for XG 2021 that is current as of today, June 29. Updates from X Games Research will be frequent. Let me know if you want off this list or would like someone added to it. Thanks.

Look Out Below! • This Update contains an overview of X Games 2021, including medal disciplines, athlete numbers, etc. • A gold medal edition: Included below are profiles on former X Games champs Leticia Bufoni, Kevin Peraza and Jimmy Wilkins. Pat Casey -- two-time X Games medalist and the host of four XG 2021 BMX contests -- also is featured.

Say What? (All quotes provided directly to X Games researchers unless otherwise noted.)

--Leticia Bufoni, on competing at X Games a week before the Olympics: “X Games has always been really important for me, and I think it’s important to remember that wouldn’t be in the Olympics at all if not for X Games. X Games is the reason I first came to the U.S. in 2007, and it’s the reason I’m still here and have had any of the success I’ve had. I love everything X Games has done for me and for skateboarding. So, no matter what else is going on, every time they say there’s X Games happening, I’m the first one to want to go.”

X Games 2021 Competition Overview

• Dates: July 14-18 • Where: 3 locations in Southern California: Pat Casey’s backyard (Dream Yard) in Riverside; Axell Hodges’ compound (Slayground) in Ramona; and the California Training Facility (CATF) in Vista. • X Games 2021 is the 62nd X Games.

Reminder: The official name of the event is X Games 2021. Research often shortens the name to XG 2021 when referring to the event in writing.

Overview • X Games 2021 will feature roughly 80 athletes. • Medal disciplines: 17 • 43 medals will be awarded: gold-only for BMX Dave Mirra’s Park Best Trick, BMX Dirt Best Trick, SKB Street Best Trick, SKB Vert Best Trick. • Gold/silver/bronze for the other 13 disciplines.

The below is accurate as of June 28: • Oldest athlete: Bucky Lasek, 48, Vert • Youngest: Gui Khury, 12, Skateboard Vert/Vert Best Trick • Number of countries represented: 11 • Number of U.S. states represented: 11

X Games 2021 Disciplines:

• BMX: Street Dirt Dirt Best Trick Park Dave Mirra’s Park Best Trick

• Skateboard (tri-code SKB): Men’s Street Men’s Street Best Trick Women’s Street Men’s Park Women’s Park Vert Vert Best Trick

• Moto X (tri-code MTX): Freestyle Best Trick QuarterPipe High Air Best Whip 110s

The Venues --Pat Casey’s backyard (Dream Yard) in Riverside, CA --Axell Hodges’ compound (Slayground) in Ramona, CA --California Training Facility in Vista, CA

Dream Yard • 4 X Games 2021 BMX contests will be held in Pat Casey’s backyard in Riverside, CA: Park, Park Best Trick, Dirt, Dirt Best Trick. • Dream Yard is comprised of more than 10,000 square feet of BMX features. • Pat began building Dream Yard in 2013. Several major additions have been made since then. • For more, see researcher Nicole Dreon’s Update piece on Pat Casey below.

Slayground • All X Games 2021 Moto X contests will be held at Axell Hodges’ compound, Slayground, in Ramona, CA. • Slayground sits on 15 acres. Hodges plans to develop more of the surrounding property. • Ramona is northeast of San Diego. Slayground is in the hills outside the town of roughly 21,000 people.

California Training Facility (CA|TF) • All X Games 2021 Skateboard contests and BMX Street will be held at CA|TF in Vista, CA. • The facility was finished in December 2017. The building is 30,000 square feet.

SKATEBOARD

Bufoni: “I Want to Be Remembered as the Best” Leticia Bufoni is the most decorated woman to compete in X Games Skateboard. The four- time Women’s Street champ owns 11 total medals, including 2013 Real Women gold. Her 10 Street medals (10) is tops in the discipline’s history, and she’s tied with Elissa Steamer for most Street gold.

And she’s not done. Bufoni says those kinds of career stats are newly important to her, and that hanging out with high-profile athletes from other sports over the last few years has hardened her resolve to stack gold, blaze past personal heroes like Steamer and set new records of her own.

“I never thought I’d be friends with someone like Lindsey Vonn, or Neymar, or Gabriel Medina -- all these people who, whatever they do, are the best at what they do,” Bufoni says. “Being around them makes me want to keep going in skateboarding for as long as I’m still capable of winning, because I want to be remembered as the best in my time. This next generation of girls in skateboarding is coming up fast, and I want my records to be the bar they have to reach, just like I’ve had to catch up to what Elissa did before me.”

Younger Brazilian skaters like and consider their countrywoman Bufoni a mentor and role model, as do many of Leticia’s 2.8 million Instagram followers.

“It’s amazing to see how all these girls are killing it now -- they’re doing so good!” Bufoni says. “It’s also amazing to hear them say that I’ve inspired them. To have girls from all over the world say that watching me at X Games helped encourage them to skate makes me feel blessed to be in this position.

“My whole life I’ve focused on two things: Showing my dad how good girls can skate, because he didn’t believe it in the beginning, and being that person I didn’t have to look up to when I started skating in Brazil and was looking for role models,” she continues.

Bufoni is competing at both X Games 2021 and the Tokyo Olympics (one week later, on July 25). She finished the qualification process for the Olympics in 4th place overall. She’s one of just three skaters on the athlete list for both events (Sky Brown and Poppy Olsen are competing in Women’s Skateboard Park at X Games and in Tokyo), and says it’s a point of pride for her.

“X Games has always been really important for me, and I think it’s important to remember that skateboarding wouldn’t be in the Olympics at all if not for X Games,” Bufoni says. “How could you choose one over the other? X Games is the reason that I first came to the U.S. in 2007, and it’s the reason I’m still here and have had any of the success I’ve had. I love everything X Games has done for me and for skateboarding. So, no matter what else is going on, every time they say there’s X Games happening, I’m the first one to want to go.”

Most X Games Gold By a Woman Total Sport Lindsey Jacobellis 10 Snowboard Jamie Anderson 8 Snowboard Kelly Clark 7 Snowboard Fabiola Da Silva 7 Aggressive In-Line Chloe Kim 6 Snowboard Leticia Bufoni* 5 Skateboard Kelly Sildaru 5 Ski *Competing at XG 2021 (other women with 5 gold are now retired from competition).

• DOB: April 13, 1993. Age: 28. • X Games medal count: 11 -- 5 gold, 3 silver, 3 bronze, including Real Women 2013 gold. She owns the most medals in X Games Women’s SKB Street history (10) and most overall SKB medals of any woman (11). • Bufoni’s 4th SKB Street gold at XG 2019 tied Elissa Steamer’s record for most titles in the discipline, a mark set in 2008. Bufoni matched another Elissa Steamer highlight in 2020: she’s now a playable character in Tony Hawk Pro Skater. Steamer was the only woman featured in the original game in 1999. Bufoni says playing the game as a kid was her first introduction to the name Elissa Steamer and to nearly everything about pro skateboarding outside of Brazil.

• Could tie Lindsey Jacobellis for 3rd-most medals of any woman at X Games. Currently: Jamie Anderson (19), Kelly Clark (14), Lindsey Jacobellis (12). • Plagued by foot and ankle injuries in 2018 and 2019, Bufoni says the pandemic cancellation of her busy contest calendar turned out to be just what she needed. “I broke my foot twice in 2019, so I needed to rest and get my body in shape again. As terrible as the pandemic has been, I realize now that I needed that time off.”

• Bufoni, a tremendous all-around athlete, incorporates soccer, yoga, weightlifting, swimming, surfing, wake surfing, BMX and dirt bikes into her cross-training. She’s also been indulging her love of cars. “Over the pandemic I started doing a lot of drifting and racing, and I’m building my racecar right now. I’m really excited.” In August 2020, she drove a Formula 4 racecar in Spielberg, Austria. “It’s addictive! I’d like to keep seeing what kind of racing I can get into.” • Though Bufoni has now lived exactly half her life in , she’s become an increasingly big star back in Brazil. Among other recent media attention, she’s on the June/July 2021 cover of GQ Brasil.

• In Sept. 2019, Bufoni parted ways with Plan B , two years after the company released her first signature deck. Now, she’s teasing a new partnership with Sky Brown, Monarch Project, right before X Games. We can’t tell you exactly what it is yet, but look closely at Leticia’s board in this clip for another clue. • Instagram: @leticiabufoni, 2.8 million followers.

X Games Vert Threepeat for Wilkins? Jimmy Wilkins is unassuming. But you should assume that the 27-year-old is the favorite in X Games 2021 Skateboard Vert. The two-time defending XG Vert champ and five-time medalist has become the dominant force in the discipline.

But Wilkins assumes nothing. And don’t bother trying to get him jazzed up about it. He’s almost hype-proof.

“I'm not the most competitive-minded person, so I’m not the best at giving the gung-ho ‘I'm shooting for the threepeat!’ type quotes,” he says. “I just enjoy skating! I never really have any expectations of how I’m going to place, so I’m always surprised when I do well.”

Only two men have taken three straight gold in X Games Skateboard Vert. They happen to be a couple of (much more competitive-minded) skaters Wilkins says he’s idolized since he was 10 years old. Pierre-Luc Gagnon won XG Los Angeles 2008-2010, while Bucky Lasek swept all four events in 2013: Foz do Iguaçu, Barcelona, Munich and LA.

For his part, Wilkins says he's just glad to have X Games back on the calendar: 2020 hit him hard, and not just because of the pandemic.

“I went through a rough relationship breakup last year, got super heartbroken by all the continued police violence and racism in this country, was completely bummed out in the strictest part of the quarantine here in California, and even took a rare break from skateboarding after seven months of basically doing nothing else and just getting burned out,” he says. “Now that I've been getting my life going and skating again, it’s strangely been nothing but good news: I just found out X Games is coming back, and the same week I also learned I’d be on the cover of Thrasher for the first time. I’ve never felt as down as I did this past year, and I’ve never felt as up as I do right now.”

Overall SKB Vert Medals Total Breakdown Bucky Lasek 14 8 gold, 4 silver, 2 bronze Pierre-Luc Gagnon 13 7 gold, 6 silver Andy Macdonald 8 2 gold, 2 silver, 4 bronze Mitchie Brusco* 6 1 silver, 5 bronze Jimmy Wilkins* 5 3 gold, 1 silver, 1 bronze *Competing at X Games 2021

• DOB: Sept. 10, 1993. Age: 27. • X Games medals: 3 gold, 1 silver, 1 bronze in SKB Vert, including wins in the two most recent comps (XG Minneapolis 2018 & 2019). He’s made the podium in 4 straight (silver at Minneapolis 2017, bronze at Austin 2016). • Wilkins’ first XG gold, Austin 2014, made him the youngest SKB Vert gold medalist of all time -- 20 years, 9 months -- in a discipline that’s been dominated by elder “skatesmen.” • Wilkins’ 3 gold are the 3rd-most gold in SKB Vert behind Bucky Lasek (8) and Pierre- Luc Gagnon (7). His 2019 title pushed him ahead of Tony Hawk, Andy Macdonald and Shaun White (2 each).

• Watch for Wilkins’ no-grab backside 540, a highlight of each gold medal performance (2014, 2018, 2019); it’s become his signature. He’s one of the only people who does the trick on a vert ramp and nobody does it quite like him. • It’s not just the Ollie 540. Wilkins has made the X Games judges recalibrate their devotion to spins, flip tricks, solid grabs and technical mastery in favor of his personal brand of vert skating. He loves tricks like the Ollie to fakie, fakie Ollie, switch Ollie, 360 Ollie, Cab Ollie and frontside alley-oop Ollie. He doesn’t spin more than 540 degrees and sometimes does entire runs without grabbing his board. • When he does get the grab, he makes it look good -- fans and judges go especially wild for his backside 540 tailgrab. • Wilkins graces the cover of the August 2021 issue of Thrasher Magazine, firmly planting his front hand midway through a frontside Ollie at a friend’s whimsical DIY backyard concrete near San Bernardino, CA. Thrasher editor-in-chief Michael Burnett shot the photo, and Wilkins says he counts the cover as a crowning achievement of his career: “As a kid, before it ever occurred to me that I could win contests or have a signature deck or anything else, I had in my head that getting the cover of Thrasher was when I'd know I'd truly made it.” • Instagram: @jimmy_wilkins, 63,000 followers

BMX

Backyard Advantage: Pat Casey Pat Casey has been building a super park at his house for the past eight years. Now he can push the limits of BMX right off the back patio while spending more time with his young family. At X Games 2021, Casey’s Riverside, CA, backyard will serve as the venue for BMX Park, Dirt, Dirt Best Trick and Dave Mirra’s Park Best Trick.

“I never imagined it getting to the scale it is now,” says Casey, who owns a two-story Victorian home on 1.25 acres. “It just kind of happened.”

Casey’s backyard, which is the backdrop for his popular Monster Energy video series, Dream Yard, became vital in March 2020, when closed throughout Southern California. It wasn’t just a place for practice -- it was a place for community. X Games athletes like Kevin Peraza, Andy Buckworth, Larry Edgar and Dennis Enarson have frequented Casey’s house, riding together and staying in touch.

It’s also been a dream yard for his children, who were out of school for most of the year. His oldest child, son Reid, 6, now rides all of the features and can even land 360s (as featured on his own Instagram feed, which has nearly 25,000 followers).

But box jumps and dirt hits aren’t the only things you’ll find on Casey’s property. There’s a pool that helps with Riverside’s 100-degree days, three dogs (one Labrador, two pugs), an outdoor cat, four tortoises, 16 chickens (whose coops are underneath the ramps) and pigs named Bacon and Boris who wander the perimeters.

While the BMX features at Casey’s house will be modified for X Games, he’s still one of the chief designers. “X Games told me, ‘Okay, go ahead and design this course, but design something that you’re going to be happy with after we leave,’” Casey says. “I’ve never been in that position before. I’ve never even really been asked my opinion about a course.”

• DOB: Dec. 26, 1993. Age 27 • 2 X Games BMX Park medals (LA 2012 bronze; Foz do Iguaçu 2013 silver). X Games 2021 will be his 12th XG appearance.

• Loves spending time with family. Met his wife, Chase, when he was 16 and married her at age 19 in August 2013. Son Reid was born Sept. 2014, daughter Taytum in April 2016. One of the few active action sports athletes with children. “Home is where I feel happy. It’s what I put my energy into and a place where I can help my family -- and everyone -- grow. Everyone’s on the ramp all the time. We swim. We have a lot of animals. We hang out as a family.”

• In an X Games Being piece from 2020, Casey’s mom, Molly, says Pat knew what he wanted from a young age. He closed on his Riverside home the same year he graduated from high school (2013). • The Facility: his compound is absolutely huge and has hips, spines, box jumps, a “spox” (which is like a spine and a box), berm walls, step-ups and dirt jumps ringing the park features. (The dirt course will be rebuilt for X Games.)

• How much work has Casey done? Monster Energy has documented the building and expansion since 2013 in this short video series, which now features four parts. Here’s how it’s described on Monster’s website: “What started in 2013 as a “basic” backyard ramp has grown in stages over the years: a massive set of trails were added in 2015 (see Pt. 2) the ramp was boxed in and nearly doubled in size in 2017 (see Pt. 3), and now, the ramps have evolved yet again. At nearly 10,000 square feet, the new additions include a truly daunting line that wraps around the entire structure -- and an open loop.”

• Casey says he won’t be the only rider with the homefield advantage: fellow XG 2021 competitors Buckworth, Peraza and Enarson all frequent Casey’s compound. “They put the same hours on the ramp as I do,” Casey claims. “They’re literally all locals, too.”

• On why he has so many animals: “I’ve always loved animals, and I think it’s good for my kids to learn the circle of life and really take care of things.” But pigs? “Bacon was an inside pig. He’s super nice, like a dog. The only thing is, I was getting sick of him walking around and just eating all the plants everywhere, like succulents, everything. That’s why I had to put him outside. But then we worried he’d be lonely, so we got Boris. But Boris has a bad attitude and isn’t nearly as nice.”

• Friends with motocross star Axell Hodges and says the pair progressed the riding on 110cc dirt bikes by just playing around. The Moto X 110s discipline will make its X Games debut in 2021. Casey doesn’t have an extensive moto background but is looking forward to the new contest. Son Reid races motocross. • Instagram: @patcaseybmx (178k followers)

Peraza: Silver Linings in San Diego Kevin Peraza found a silver lining early in the pandemic: The deserted streets and businesses of San Diego made for great BMX riding. Schools -- with their big rails and stair sets -- were closed. Loading docks were empty. And marble ledges downtown, normally swarmed with people, became fair game for grinding. All those hours spent on the streets will assist Peraza in his attempt to become the first to earn X Games medals in Park, Dirt and Street.

“San Diego was a ghost town,” says Peraza, who moved there in February 2020 from Tucson, Arizona. “We took advantage of that to the fullest, which was really cool. We did a lot of filming and shot a lot of photos. We had access to spots and things that we couldn’t normally ride because they’re either too hectic with traffic or there were security guards. The city was one big skate park.”

Born and raised in Tucson, Peraza lived with his parents and three brothers until the move to San Diego. Leaving was a difficult decision; he’s very close to his family and active in the Tucson BMX community.

But after marrying longtime girlfriend Itsel Martinez in a civil ceremony on Nov. 17, 2019, the two decided they were now their own “little family” and made the move. They’d only put down roots for a month before San Diego (and the world) shut down.

Ironically, stay-at-home orders gave Peraza a chance to really explore his new hood. Since moving to SoCal, he’s also spent more time with good friend Pat Casey at Casey’s expansive compound in Riverside, and he started working with the same Carlsbad-based personal trainer as Dennis Enarson and Ryan Sheckler.

Known mostly for his park and dirt chops, Peraza used the street footage he captured around San Diego to win a virtual street contest hosted by FISE Montpellier in September (the clip looks very much like an X Games Real BMX part). He also won the street contest at the BMX Triple Challenge in Arlington, Texas, in March 2021.

In June, he earned his first X Games Street invite along with invitations to Park and Dirt. No rider ever has competed in all three disciplines at the same X Games. Enarson, who took double silver in X Games Park & Street in 2010 and 2011, is the only rider to medal in both of those disciplines. An X Games BMX judge recently said that Peraza has a solid chance to medal in Street in July.

The list of BMX athletes to score three medals at one X Games is short: Only three have turned the trick. It hasn’t happened in 15 years, and it’s never been done on three completely different courses.

X Games BMX Triple Club Year Medals: Disciplines Chad Kagy 2006 Gold: Vert; Silver: Vert Best Trick & Big Air Dave Mirra 1998 Gold: Park, Vert & Vert Doubles Dennis McCoy 1998 Gold: Vert Doubles; Silver: Vert; Bronze: Park

• DOB: Sept. 2, 1994. Age 26. • 2 X Games medals in 8 appearances: Austin 2016 Dirt gold; Minneapolis 2017 Park gold. • Married Itsel Martinez on Nov. 17, 2019 in a small ceremony in Tucson, AZ. They’ve been together for almost 8 years. Itsel is from Hermosillo, in Sonora, Mexico, where Kevin’s parents are from. She graduated from college in 2019 with a degree in graphic design. • Kevin and Itsel are planning a big wedding reception in Oct. 2021 in the beach town of San Carlos, Mexico, which is two hours outside of Hermosillo. X Games friends Pat Casey, Coco Zurita, Chad Kerley and Larry Edgar are among those invited.

• Kevin and his 3 brothers all have competed in BMX. David, 30, is the oldest. Kevin is followed by Victor, 20, and Eddie, 19. Their father, “Big Victor,” is a former BMX racer who still goes to the park a few times each week. Mom, Maria, is known for waving the Mexican flag in the crowd at events like X Games. Kevin speaks fluent Spanish. • Stayed away from his parents and grandparents in the early months of the pandemic. They did a lot of FaceTime calls, and his parents and brothers eventually visited. A set of Kevin’s grandparents -- who live in the Mexican beach town Bahia Kino -- got COVID-19. His grandfather was hospitalized for 16 days. They recovered and are now vaccinated. • Hoped to represent Mexico at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo but was penalized for switching countries during the qualification process. Additional qualifying events were canceled because of the pandemic and he didn’t accrue enough points. • Why Mexico? “Even though I was born in Tucson, I always try to represent my culture and give an example that there are good riders that come from Mexican heritage.”

• Kept all his sponsors during 2020 in part because he stayed active on social media. “I tried to do my job the best that I can without having to compete. Thankfully, all my sponsors were really happy with all the work that I did.” • Rides often at Pat Casey’s house. Casey is one of his closest friends. “I’m really excited for the Dirt contest at Pat's house, and then obviously the Park contest is going to be insane. There are so many things you can do at Pat’s house. We’ve gotten super creative and learned a lot of stuff there together. But Street is just as exciting, because I've been riding a lot of street, and it's going to be completely different for me to compete in an actual X Games Street contest.” • Instagram: @kevinperaza (249k followers)