The historic showing of the US Nordic combined team at the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games closed with a crescendo Friday afternoon as Billy Demong (Vermontville, N.Y.) claimed the first American Olympic gold medal in the sport and teammate Johnny Spillane (Steamboat Springs, Colo.) took the silver in the individual large hill/10km cross country event at Whistler Olympic Park.
Demong started the skiing portion of the event in sixth place. He quickly closed the gap to Spillane, who'd started second, and they teamed up to make history. Demong's final time was 25:32.9, four seconds ahead of Spillane. Bernhard Gruber of Austria won the bronze, fading to 10.8 seconds back after staying with the Americans until the final 500 meters.
Todd Lodwick (Steamboat Springs, Colo.) finished 13th, 1:10.3 behind Demong, while Taylor Fletcher (Steamboat Springs, Colo.) was 45th, 6:40.6 off the pace.
Spillane, who collected his third silver medal in Vancouver, becomes only the fourth athlete to win medals in all three Nordic combined events in the same Olympic Winter Games. Austria's Felix Gottwald achieved the feat twice (2002 and 2006), while Finland's Samppa Lajunen (2002) and Germany's Georg Hettich (2006) each did it once. His silver in the normal hill/10km event on Feb. 14 was the first Olympic medal won by the US in the sport |
