Gov. Cox said during his monthly PBS Utah news conference Thursday the Beehive State is always looking to attract more sporting events.
“That's something we're in favor of,” Cox said. “It's good for the economy. It's good for our people. It's good for our athletes, and we have a lot of X Games athletes that live and train in Utah and we want to be supportive of them as well.”
A year after it was announced the 2034 Winter Olympics would be in Salt Lake City, the Summer X Games and the Red Bull Soapbox Race made their Utah debuts in June.
Park City Chamber President and CEO Jennifer Wesselhoff also previously said the city is courting the Winter X Games, and Cox said the state would love to see more X Games events.
He said that would be part of a phone conversation he’s set with X Games CEO Jeremy Bloom Thursday afternoon.
“We would love to see more of that happening here and that's certainly going to be part of the conversation, is just to see what, you know, what the future looks like for the X Games, what their numbers look like here,” he said.
The Colorado mountain town of Aspen has hosted the Winter X Games for over two decades, but doesn’t have a long-term contract with the action sports organization. Its current contract expires after the 2026 Winter X Games in January.
X Games is currently working on expanding, aiming to introduce a new global, team-based format with year-round competitions in 2026.
