 Crispin Cannon.jpg "Canadian Crashed Ice action")
"Red Bull Crashed Ice" will become a "world championship" in 2010 after 14 spectacular winter extreme sporting races organised individually in the last 9 years - with two races set for Munich (GER) for the eastern hemisphere and Quebec (CAN) for the western hemisphere.
"It's a sport for the new century," is how the renowned British newspaper "Independent" described the breathtaking competition. Hundreds of thousands of spectators have been captivated by the events taken place in eight different countries. Even the International Olympic Committee has had its eyes on the action – Ice Cross Downhill and Red Bull Crashed Ice.
The sport made its debut in January 2000 in Stockholm. Wearing ice skates four racers at a time compete to advance by hurtling down a steep 400-metre long ice-covered track that is on average about five metres wide. They have to leap over hurdles, jumps and ledges and deal with hairpin turns in a scintillating battle to the finish line. The sport - which is a symbiosis of downhill skiing, ice hockey and boardercross - has turned into a huge attraction because of the high-speed action, the man-against-man battles and the spectacular settings in Europe and North America with locations such as Moscow, Prague, Lausanne and Quebec.
While the races have been staged as individual events in the past, there will now be a formal world championship for the first time in 2010. The first race will be the "Eastern Hemisphere" event in Munich's Olympiapark on 16 January 2010 followed by the "Western Hemisphere" event in Quebec on March 20. After Qualifying events around the globe, a total of 64 competitors from about 15 countries will be selected for the two main events. The overall winner will take the crown.
There is one name that is already considered the favourite for the first world championship - Sweden's Jasper Felder, who plays on Sweden's international Bandy team, the Scandinavian version of hockey, - and who is a trained dancer, has won seven of the races so far. He can hardly wait for the new championship format to start: "That's the ultimate sport for me and obviously I would like to be the first world champion."
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