ESPN Winter X Games 13 Sets Records Across Platforms

A record
number of fans consumed the extensive Winter X Games 13 content offered across
ESPN’s various distribution platforms, including television and the Internet. The multimedia offerings provided complete coverage of the world’s
leading winter action-sports competition, held Jan. 22-25 in Aspen, CO,
to fans everywhere. An announcement was made during the event that the Winter X
Games will remain in Aspen/Snowmass until 2012.

“Once again,
the Winter X Games delivered the best in action sports to fans worldwide,” says
Rick Alessandri, SVP, X Games Franchise. “The continued
growth across all our multimedia properties is a testament to the passion,
athleticism, and drama the X Games athletes deliver each event.”
Television: Winter X Games 13 was ESPN’s
highest-rated and most-viewed Winter X Games in history. The eight telecasts
averaged 942,000 homes, up 9% from 2008. Young-male and people 2+ demos
were up double digits from last year. Three of ESPN’s eight Winter X Games
telecasts delivered more than a 1.0 rating this year: Friday primetime, Sunday
afternoon, and Sunday primetime. Sunday night’s 1.3 rating and 1,242,210 homes
made it the highest-rated and most-viewed Winter X Games telecast ever. ABC’s Winter X Games 13 telecast on
Saturday averaged a 1.2 household rating and 1,376,481 households.
Fan Voting: Fans in attendance and
viewing Winter X Games 13 in the U.S. registered record voting via text messaging
to determine the winners of the Ski Big Air and Snowboard Big Air
competitions. Each competition logged more than 100,000 votes via text messaging in less than 10 minutes. Fans
gave gold medals to Simon Dumont in Ski Big Air (for his double front flip with
a Superman extension) and to Travis Rice (for his double back
flip 1080).
Apple iTunes, Microsoft Xbox, and
ESPN TV VOD: Winter
X Games premium video content was available on-demand on ESPN TV VOD and
available for purchase on Apple’s iTunes Store and Microsoft Xbox Video
Marketplace, including complete ESPN event coverage of the four-day event — as well
as a Best of Ski, Best of Snowboard, and Best of Snocross compilation following
the games.
ESPN Action Sports Video (ESPN.com/action):
The new ESPN Action
Sports network (espn.com/action), including XGames.com,
delivered more than 680,000 views of
video Jan. 22-26, a 60% increase over the same period
for Winter X Games 12. The new online network of sites offered complete
coverage of Winter X Games 13, including news, event info and schedules,
and athlete bios. For more on ESPN Action Sports, click here.
Mobile: ESPN Mobile TV offered 12 hours of live Winter X Games 13
coverage. Additionally, ESPN’s mobile Website and ESPN MVP mobile application
delivered complete editorial coverage: news, features, results,
alerts, and video highlights.
ESPN360.com: ESPN360.com offered more than
20 hours of live online coverage of Winter X Games 13, including eight hours of
exclusive coverage.
ESPN International: Winter X Games 13 was televised
on ESPN’s international networks in Australia
(including HD), New Zealand,
Israel, Africa, Latin
America, the Caribbean, and the Middle East.
This event was televised on ESPN’s International networks to more than 122
countries and was syndicated to an additional 20 countries in Europe, the Middle East and Asia.