Brace yourselves for an extreme slice of sports action!

X-Games

Calling all extreme sports fans! Make sure to have your popcorn at the ready as X-Games makes its triumphant return to the sun-drenched plains of Southern California. With a total of 18 exciting skateboarding, BMX and moto X disciplines set to take place over a number of venues, this year’s summer X-Games is one event that you definitely won’t want to miss.

Perhaps the pick of the bunch are two new “innovations” which will shake up the X-Games formula. The first of these is the addition of a real street best trick competition, which will do away with the traditional format of riders submitting a 60-second video part in favour of a 30-minute live jam at an as yet undisclosed legendary location.

What’s more, with skateboarding heavyweights such as Nyjah Huston, Yuto Horigome, Dashawn Jordan and Jamie Foy all in the hunt to bag gold, this is one event which is bound to have us glued to our screens.

The second such “innovation” is the addition of the new "SloanYard" venue. This super gnarly backyard ramp is the brainchild of 13-time X-Games medallist Elliot Sloan and will be the first venue in X-Games history to host the skateboarding and BMX MegaPark disciplines.

So, if you’re a bit of an adrenaline junkie, you know what you need to feast your eyes in the near future.

Tour de France

Run to the hilllllsss! Run for your biiiikkkess! Cycling fans will have plenty to rejoice about over the coming few days as the Tour de France grows ever closer to an exceptionally exciting conclusion. This weekend’s cycling action take as the competitors travel from Tomblaine to Chatel Les Portes du Soleil in the space of 3 days, traversing gruelling and treacherous mountain terrain in the process, before being rewarded with a rest day on Monday.

Can anyone beat Tadej Pogacar? That’s the question that’s on cycling fans’ around the world’s lips at the time of writing. The 23-year-old Slovenian came into this race as the clear favourite on account of his red-hot recent form and his performance so far has more than justified pundits’ high expectations.

However, last year’s surprise package Jonas Vingegaard will be hoping that he has what it takes to overcome Pogacar. The Dane showed what he was capable of in stage 7 where he finished with exactly the same time as Pogacar and, as if that’s not enough, he repeated the same feat two stages later.

However, the question is will he be able to keep this up as things draw to what will no doubt be a very dramatic finish? With notoriously tricky mountain stages on the way, we could be set for a whole host of twists and turns.

IEM Cologne

CS:GO fans from around the world will be glued to their screens this weekend as we find out who will take home the bacon at IEM Cologne. All eyes will be on both Natus Vincere and FaZe Clan in Saturday’s semi-finals as both of these titans will be eager to book a place in the final where they could meet each other. 

FaZe have made a rip-roaring start to 2022, which has seen them emerge as top dogs at Intel Extreme Masters XVI – Katowice, PGL Major Antwerp 2022 and BLAST Premier: Spring Groups 2022, as well as being crowned ESL Season 15 champions and they’ll no doubt be eager to taste the sweet nectar of victory here as well.

That being said, Natus Vincere are another team who love the smell of victory in the morning and they’ll no doubt be in a bullish mood heading into this tournament after bagging the grand prize at BLAST Premier: Spring Finals 2022, where, incidentally, they knocked out FaZe Clan on their way to the final.

However, it’s far from a foregone conclusion that these two teams will face each other in the final. After all, at the time of writing, we don’t even know who they’ll be facing in the final four.

Friday’s first quarter-final sees Mouz and Astralis lock horns, with the winners set to take on NAVI in the semi-finals. On paper, these teams look very evenly matched with Astralis arguably having a slight advantage, having won 4 of the last 5 meetings between these teams. 

That being said, Mouz are on a 3-match winning streak heading into this tie and will be eager to show everyone what they are capable of on home soil.

It’s much the same story in the second quarter-final, which pits Movistar Riders against Team Liquid, as well. Movistar Riders made a solid start in this tournament with their only defeat so far coming in round 3 of the Group A upper bracket, which saw them narrowly lose to Natus Vincere.

Although Team Liquid had to qualify for the last 8 via the lower bracket of Group B, they have made a strong recovery after slumping to a defeat in their first match at the group stage. They’ve now won 3 matches on the bounce and will no doubt fancy their chances of making it 4 wins on the trot here. 

No matter what happens, one thing’s for certain, it’s going to be a thrilling weekend of esports action.