ABSTRACT
In the introduction to Understanding Lifestyle Sports (Wheaton, 2004a), I outlined that a wide range of labels were used to characterise these sports, including: extreme, alternative, lifestyle, whiz, action, panic, postmodern, post-industrial and new sports. I noted that, while these terms were used synonymously by some commentators, there are differences which signal distinct emphases or expressions of the activities. For example, Rinehart (2000: 506) suggested that alternative sports are activities that ‘either ideologically or practically provide alternatives to mainstream sports and to mainstream sport values’. Thus forms of alternative sport can be very diverse, ranging from indigenous folk games and ultimate fighting to jet skiing, scuba diving and ultra-marathoning (ibid.: 505): indeed, pretty much anything that does not fit under the Western ‘achievement sport’ (Eichberg, 1998) rubric. Extreme, on the other hand, is a media-driven, all-embracing moniker that quickly became prevalent in media and consumer discourse fuelled by the emergence of ESPN’s Extreme Games (later renamed the X Games) and widely adopted to signify these exciting, youthful activities (Rinehart, 2000). As Kusz outlines, extreme sport was initially ‘decried’ by sports fans and pundits, who saw them as made-for-TV pseudo-sports created solely to market products to the much-coveted teen male demographic (2004: 198). It is a term that many participants of the activities continue to reject, seeing it as an unashamed and cynical attempt to capitalise on and appropriate what were seen as alternative and oppositional sport forms (Rinehart, 2000: 508). Furthermore, while some ‘extreme’ sport activities such as BASE and tomb stoning 1 clearly involve great physical risk (and in some contexts are illegal), the majority of participants in lifestyle sports activities practise in safe and controlled ways. Indeed, many activities labelled ‘extreme’ are actually relatively safe (Booth and Thorpe, 2007c: 173) and, according to statistical evidence, cause fewer injuries and deaths than sports like rugby and boxing (Clemmitt, 2009: 297). Yet, as Chapter 3 explores, the perception of risk pervades, fuelled by the antics of the minority that make the headlines, driving debates about risk and irresponsibility.
