The who’s who of the sports world cruised the red carpet yesterday in their Sunday’s best at the 2011 ESPY Awards in Downtown Los Angeles.

Dominated by mainstream sports, ESPN was kind enough to acknowledge Action Sports with a couple of categories; “best female and male action sports athletes of the year.”

As you would expect the popularity contest was dominated by Shaun White who won “Best Male Action Sport Athlete.” You think in a year that Kelly Slater won his 10th world title the fans might be inclined to vote for Slater. But this award isn’t to acknowledge the athlete’s accomplishments rather their popularity and White is still king of the mainstream.

Four-time defending world champion Stephanie Gilmore won “Best Female Action Sport Athlete.” Coming into the award show this category was wide open, it was a debatable argument to who was known in the mainstream more. It’s hard to argue the four-time defending champion didn’t deserve the award but in a year in which Kelly Clark won every contest she entered it seemed like she was a lock to win the award.

In reality the ESPY’s are not a big night for Action Sports but it’s always nice to be invited to the dance.

Photo Note-Since there wasn’t any pictures of White and Gilmore receiving their award, the pictures are of Bethany Hamilton and Sarah Burke walking the red carpet.