Lindsey Jacobellis, the world’s most dominant athlete within the quick historical past of snowboard cross, delivered the USA its first gold medal on the Beijing Video games on Wednesday.
Jacobellis, 36, led the ultimate from the beginning, her acquainted golden curls spilling out of her helmet. When the end was in sight, she saved her crouch low. As she crossed the road, she beamed an enormous smile and put her arms to her coronary heart, as if to carry it in.
Coasting towards a gold medal on the 2006 Turin Video games and, including just a little model to a coronating soar, Jacobellis slipped and skidded to the snow. Handed solely yards from the end, she completed second, one of many saddest silver medals of all of them.
Within the 2010 Winter Video games in Vancouver, British Columbia, Jacobellis swerved off target in a semifinal warmth and missed the ultimate. And in 2014, in Sochi, Russia, she was main a semifinal warmth when she discovered a set of late-race rollers and missed the ultimate once more.
On Wednesday, as Jacobellis took the center step on the stand for the flower ceremony, a broad smile on her face appeared to say, “Oh, now it occurs!”
Her teammate, Stacy Gaskill, stated it meant every part to see Jacobellis lastly win the highest medal.
“I don’t assume there’s any phrases that may seize that second,” Gaskill stated. “For Lindsey to win in her fifth Video games and be on the pinnacle of this sport so lengthy and encourage so many younger ladies like me — she is the face of this sport.”
