The 2025 Winter X Games are just around the corner, and we can’t wait to see our favorite skiers and snowboarders ripping it up on the slopes. This year’s Winter X Games will return to Buttermilk Mountain in Aspen, Colorado, from January 23 – January 25, 2025. In addition to the breathtaking ski and snowboard competitions, the Winter X Games will be home to some great live music.
“The music talent for X Games Aspen 2025 includes some of the best in the business when it comes to bringing a party to life,” says Rich Bigge, X Games vice president of live events. “Between the competitions and music lineup, this winter’s X Games is one fans won’t want to miss.”
Two of the biggest names in electronic music, deadmau5 and Illenium, will be spinning live sets on Buttermilk Mountain and whipping the fans into a frenzy. New fans of the Winter X Games might not know all the lingo (or how to pronounce deadmau5’s name), so we’re here to be your personal Winter X Games glossary. Let’s jump in and get excited for the Winter X Games!
Don’t forget: You can watch the Winter X Games action with DIRECTV!
Weddle grab/Mute grab
A lot of X Games fans know this trick as the “Mute grab,” but back in 2020, Tony Hawk formally started the process to rename it the “Weddle grab.” To do the Weddle grab on skis, you grab the opposite ski with your opposite hand. This crosses your skis while bringing your knees up, and your body looks like an “X.” On the other hand, pulling off one of these grabs on a snowboard looks a bit different. Snowboarders pull this off by grabbing the toe edge of their board with the front hand.
Hawk pushed to rename this trick the Weddle grab because he wanted to honor the inventor of the trick, Chris Weddle. “They referred to him as the ‘quiet, mute guy,'” writes Hawk. “So it became known as the mute air, and we all went along with it in our naive youth.” However, when Hawk recently talked to Weddle, he learned that the “mute grab” was an incorrect name. “His exact quote to me was, ‘I am deaf, not mute,'” Hawk says. As a result, he renamed it the “Weddle grab” in the 2020 remakes of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2.
Japan grab
On a snowboard, you can do a Japan grab by putting your front hand around your front knee to grab the toe edge of your board between your bindings. If you’re a skier, you pull off a Japan grab by reaching behind your bent knee to grab the inside edge of your opposite ski.
Once again, the name of this grab goes back to Tony Hawk. “There was a TWS [Transworld Skateboarding] article with a feature on Japan around ’84. The first spread was a huge picture of a Japanese guy doing a tweaked mute air with the headline ‘JAPAN’ above it,” Hawk says. “We had never seen an air like that and immediately started calling it by that name because the magazine layout almost named it by default.”
McTwist
The McTwist is a wild name, and the trick is kind of tough to explain to a new fan. It’s a forward-flipping backside 540. Shaun White’s signature move is the Double McTwist 1260.
SuperPipe
The SuperPipe has been home to some of the most exciting tricks in X Games history. The SuperPipe is about 567 feet long and 66 feet wide and features 22-foot walls.
Knuckle huck
This is one of the newer events at the Winter X Games, and it has quickly become a fan favorite. Snowboarders and skiers perform tricks while jumping over the knuckle of a jump. The knuckle is the small hill at the top of a transition. It’s a more chill way to get some air compared to a full-on jump. As opposed to other events that have a defined amount of runs to impress judges, knuckle huck gives riders 20 minutes to leave a lasting impression on judges. It’s the closest thing to being judged based on vibes. It’s really the perfect way for riders to highlight their style.
On top of that, this is an event that really got its start through social media. In 2018, Norwegian snowboarder Marcus Kleveland started sharing videos of himself doing insane tricks off of knuckles on social media. Many of the videos went viral within the snowboarding community. Kleveland’s videos sparked other snowboarders to do the same types of tricks off knuckles, and there was a palpable energy among snowboarders. This eventually culminated in knuckle hucking becoming an official X Games event in 2019.
Roast beef
This isn’t the sandwich, but it’ll probably make you hungry if you manage to pull it off. This snowboarding trick is when you reach your rear hand through the legs and grab the heel edge of your board between the bindings.
Keep up with the Winter X Games action with DIRECTV.
DIRECTV Insider brings you our views on what’s happening in streaming, t.v., movies and sports. Companies and persons mentioned are not necessarily associated with and do not necessarily endorse DIRECTV. We will disclose sponsored content on our site when we show it to you, and some of the links on the site may be ads or affiliate links which means DIRECTV may earn compensation from your purchases.
