Entertainment at the Metrodome on Sunday will begin prior to kickoff of the Vikings-Falcons season-opener. Freestyle Motocross (FMX) legends Tommy “Tom Cat” Clowers and Jeff “Full Titlt” Tilton will awe observers on the Metrodome Plaza at 10:15 a.m. and 11:15 a.m. just before kickoff of the game.
Clowers and Tilton will throw huge tricks such as “Superman”, “Nac Nan” and “Heart Attack” off 60 to 90 foot jumps in rapid-fire succession. The event first took place last season prior to the home opener against Carolina.
Clowers, 33, is one of the most recognizable names and faces in the sport, a status validated by ten X Games medals (four golds, three silvers and three bronze). He also holds the current world record for step-up at 35 feet even (from the 2000 Summer X Games). Tilton, 30, is a regular competitor in FMX events and, like Clowers, one of the elite step-up riders in the world. Step-up is similar to the Olympic high-jump event… just on motorcycles.
Before freestyle motocross took hold as a discipline in its own right, the expression “freestyle motocross” was used during motocross races to describe racers who, while hopelessly trailing in the actual race, would launch big tricks for show anyway. In turn, motocross magazines used the term to categorize innovative tricks and jumps that motorcycle enthusiasts were experimenting with while free-riding on natural and
man-made features. The majority of freestyle motocross tricks can be traced back to moves first perfected by BMX riders in the 1980s and popularized in documentary videos by the early 1990s. The first-ever freestyle motocross events took places in 1998, the same year the International Freestyle Motocross Association (IFMA) formed as a sanctioning body.