I love extreme sports (gnarly shizzle dizzle)

This is an interesting one for me. I remember being introduced to one of my current flatmates as a snowboarder, mountainboarder and skateboarder. All pretty accurate, and those 3 activities do occupy a fair amount of my free time. Now here's the thing - the guy commented that "So you're an X-treme kinda guy" (or words to that affect). This started me thinking on the topic - am I X-treme?

The thing is, the use of the X in X-treme is a bit of a marketing gimmick, it's not something that should be taken too seriously, and if I'm honest I find the label extreme sports a bit naff. I'm not saying that there are any viable alternatives out there but if we accept that X is used to describe a certain subculture from a demographic viewpoint, then I'm pretty certain I don't really fit that well.

Let's face it, the mass media have a prestigious history of not getting what extreme sports are about. Last year at the winter olympics the Beeb's Clare Balding managed to put her foot in her mouth by suggesting that snowboarding wasn't a real sport, and I know from my own work in mountainboarding that PR companies really don't get what these sports are all about.

I guess however that I'm going to be stuck with the label for a while longer. It's not so bad after all, I mean at least I'm not being called boring. the other definite plus is that it seems us extreme sportists get our own language to confound the rest of you with. So keep your shiz tight, and gnar out folks.