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For Immediate Release
February
2,2009
ESPN Winter X Games 13 Sets
Records Across Platforms
Record TV
Viewership, Viewer Text Voting, Online Video and More
A record number of fans
consumed the extensive Winter X Games 13 content featured across ESPN's many global
ESPN and ABC distribution platforms, including television, Internet and more. The unprecedented multimedia offerings
provided complete coverage of the world's leading winter action sports
competition, held January 22-25 in Aspen,
Colorado, 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," said Rick Alessandri, senior vice president, X Games Franchise.
"The continued growth across all our multi-media properties is a testament to
the passion, athleticism and drama the X Games athletes deliver each event."
The events success this
year included:
- 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 nine percent from 2008. Young
male and people demos were up double digits from last year. Three of ESPN's eight Winter X Games
telecasts, delivered over a 1.0 rating this year -Friday prime time,
Sunday afternoon and Sunday prime time. Sunday night's 1.3 rating and
1,242,210 homes makes 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 US 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 ten minutes. Fans gave
Simon Dumont the gold medal in Ski Big Air (for his double front flip with
a Superman extension), and gave the Gold 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 from
January 22 - 26, a 60 percent 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, athlete bios and much more. 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 industry-leading mobile Web site and award-winning
ESPN MVP mobile application delivered complete editorial coverage, including
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
networksin Australia (including HD), New Zealand, Israel, Africa, Latin
America, theCaribbeanand the Middle East. This event was televised on ESPN's
International networks to more than 122 countries and it was syndicated to an
additional 20 countries through syndication to Europe, the Middle East and Asia.
-30-
Media
Contact:
Katie
Moses Swope, ESPN X Games (310) 642-1507; Katie.moses@espn.com
Paul Melvin, ESPN Communications,
(860) 766-9581; paul.melvin@espn.com
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