Lindsey Jacobellis, the world’s most dominant athlete in the short history of snowboard cross, delivered the United States its first gold medal at the Beijing Games on Wednesday.
The win was redemption for Jacobellis. She had not simply come up short of expectations in three previous Winter Games: She committed what may still stand as the best-known Olympics blunder in history.
Coasting toward a gold medal at the 2006 Turin Games and, adding a little style to a coronating jump, Jacobellis slipped and skidded to the snow. Passed only yards from the finish, she finished second, one of the saddest silver medals of them all.