Russia's Alena Zavarzina competes during the women's snowboard parallel giant slalom finals at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympic Games in Rosa Khutor, Feb 19, 2014. [Photo/Agencies]

Wild said the choice was easy: Russia wanted him. The United States did not.

"If I was still riding (for the United States), I'd be back home with some mediocre job doing something mediocre," he said. "That's not what I wanted to be. I wanted to be the best I could be. I'm so stoked to win for Russia."

He said he's not tying this victory to any message for the powers that run snowboarding in America. The US has won a world-leading five snowboard medals at these Olympics, four of them in the halfpipe or slopestyle course and one in the more TV-friendly racing discipline of snowboardcross.

The country sent only one parallel giant slalom rider to the Olympics - Justin Reiter, a longtime friend of Wild who finished 24th.

"People in the US don't understand it, and if they don't understand it, they don't connect with it," said Wild's mother, Carol Wild-DeLano. "So, then, it's less TV coverage. The funding gets reduced. It tunnels into the ground eventually."

Maybe in America. Certainly not in Russia.

The Russians have been looking for a foothold in the action-sports world for a while now but have had trouble finding it amid all the flips and spins. They found it Wednesday on the giant slalom course, and it was a perfect pick-me-up for a nation of sports fans reeling from the men's hockey team's loss in the quarterfinals a few hours later down in Sochi.

There could yet be more fun on the mountain for Russia.

In an effort to get more Europeans, and Russians, involved at the snowboard park, the International Olympic Committee added another version of this event - the shorter parallel slalom - to the program for this year.

The debut of that event is set for Saturday, and Zavarzina and Wild will be in those races, too.

"It's a beautiful sports story," said Svetlana Gladysheva, the former Alpine skier who is now the president of Russia's ski and snowboard federation.

Someday, maybe they'll call it "To Russia With Love."