Jarryd McNeil on X Games Best Whip Gold Medals in FMX

“I love trying my best to whip a dirt bike,” proclaimed the native of Kerang, Australia who now calls Southern California home. “I am always showing off. It always makes me want to do bigger and better whips. That’s why I love the X Games and Best Whip so much.”

Jarryd Mcneil, an X Games stalwart who has been up in the air over the X Games (literally) since 2010 where he won a silver medal in MTX Best Whip his first time out, will now look north to X Games Ventura 2024 next week where the Yamaha YZ450F pilot hopes to leave Ventura, California with another chunk of precious metal. While going through the X Games website and scanning his results from Summer X over the last decade and a half, McNeill reflected back on what has ben his FMX trajectory.

“I’ve been riding since I was two and a half years old. My first real year of riding freestyle motocross was 2007 and in 2008 I got on the Crusty Demons tour for two shows. That was my first big-time FMX gig. In 2009 I got on the Crusty Demons New Zealand Live tour. 2010 was my big break when I got on Nitro Circus and got my very first invite to the X Games.

“It was pretty crazy because that year 2009, coming from meeting my childhood hero, Travis Pastrana, and then getting an invite to X Games, was just amazing,” continued McNeill. “I remember being at home in Australia and just getting a phone call from Travis Pastrana saying, ‘Hey, be on the watch. Looks like you might be coming to X Games.’ Right after that I got an e-mail and a phone call saying, ‘Hey, pack your bags. You’re coming over to X Games.’ So I got on over to the Unted States for the first time. I got to meet my childhood hero and then I got to come to America, which is a place that I always wanted to visit. And not only was I visiting the United States for the first time, but I was actually going to compete at the X Games with the best of the best in Best Whip. On my nineteenth birthday I got an X Games silver medal, which was pretty crazy. That was pretty mind blowing.”

A part of the X Games and all that goes with it for the past 15 years, McNeill is simply amazed with what the X Games have become and thrilled to still be a part of it all.