Ski Racing Sells Its Soul For the Cool Kids

The New York Times investigates the next great Winter Olympic sport: ski cross. It's described as a NASCAR version of ski racing. Instead of being timed individually with the fastest receiving the spoils, ski crossers all race at the same time. As such, accidents are a bit more regular. The sport will make its Olympic debut in Vancouver next year ... if all the racers aren't already paralyzed by then.

Here's a crash from a competition last year in which the fellow in third place took a jump at such an angle that he landed on the fellow in second place's head.

As TSB's basketball writer can attest, skiing is dangerous enough without elbows and people landing on other people's heads. But even the civilized of the younger generations will watch ski cross before they'll turn to straight alpine or slalom. It's a sad but irreversible fact of modern society: you must be extreme to get our attention. Makes me wonder why SlamBall never eclipsed the NBA.

This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.