YOU ARE LYING ON YOUR BACK, PRECARIOUSLY balanced on a wheeled aluminum slat, screaming downhill at 65 mph, your skull inches from the pavement. You plummet from a 160-foot tower, tethered to a long, elastic cord. Or you free-fall from 13,000 feet, a plank strapped to your feet so you can surf ether. Are these the dreams you have after eating jalapeños too close to bedtime? Perhaps. But they are also athletic events—street luge, bungee jumping and skysurfing—in the aptly named Extreme Games on ESPN and ESPN2. The demented decathlon—which also includes skateboarding, mountain biking, barefoot waterski jumping and other guerrilla sports—will take place in Rhode Island and Vermont from June 24 to July 1. Some 350 alternative athletes, as ESPN calls them, will participate. Has a nice gen-X daredevil ring to it, eh? If the crash helmet fits...
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