Mustard’s off the hot dog

BARDONECCHIA, Italy – She struggled through so many close calls to put herself in position to win the gold, only to throw it away at the end.

Lindsey Jacobellis opened a lead so large during the culmination of Friday’s snowboardcross competition that Olympic glory must have seemed palpable.

But Olympic glory eluded the athlete like a runaway train after she fell during what looked to be an ill-advised freestyle trick and watched helplessly as someone else sped by and claimed the top spot on the podium.

Indeed, the sport’s dominant athlete settled for second, her impulse to showboat opening the door for Switzerland’s Tanja Frieden, who might as well have had the gold medal handed to her by Jacobellis.

Jacobellis, 20, the sole U.S. representative in the 23-rider field, insisted immediately afterward that she was not showing off when she soared over the second-to-last jump, turned her snowboard perpendicular to her downhill line, reached back with her left hand and grabbed her board between her boots.

“I’d been having trouble with that jump all day; the wind was catching me weird,” she said.

“I tried to grab it to try to stabilize myself in the air and it didn’t work.”

She later wavered slightly – saying that she was just trying to “have some fun” – but she did not openly back away from her original claim. She said she wanted to “share her enthusiasm” with the loud crowd at the snowboarding venue.

After catching an edge and tumbling backward upon landing, Jacobellis managed to get up and back on the course in time to earn the silver medal.

But the story was how she seemed to give away the gold.

Seth Wescott, winner of the gold medal in the men’s competition when snowboardcross made its Olympic debut Thursday, said, “Sometimes it’s subconscious, but that was putting on a show.”

Wescott added, “It’s one of those things. I did it in my early rides yesterday but you’ve got to choose your time and make sure you don’t miss.”

Peter Foley, coach of the snowboardcross team, said the reigning world champion, the overall U.S. Grand Prix champion and three-time X Games champion, had a tendency to grab her board over small jumps.

But he acknowledged that the trick Jacobellis seemed to be doing – it’s called a method air – was a reasonably difficult one performed by experienced freestyle riders, which Jacobellis happens to be.

After watching a photo sequence of the jump, Foley later confessed, “She definitely styled that a little too hard.”

Frieden, who was involved in a tangle with Canada’s Dominique Maltais near the top of the course, kept riding because, she said, in a sport over such a long course with so many turns and jumps, falls can occur anywhere.

“I was in the last turn and I was pretty stoked to get silver, because I knew I was going to have this heavy thing around my neck,” she said, smiling. “But I knew I had to concentrate because you’re never finished until you’re finished.”