Whistler, British Columbia » They swore they didn't care which one of them won gold to become America's first Olympic champion in a Nordic sport.

But anyone who watched knew that Billy Demong skied to win.

The Park City resident attacked on the final hill, hustled into the stadium and raced across the finish line well ahead of three-time silver medalist Johnny Spillane, giving the United States a historic 1-2 finish in the large hill competition at Nordic combined on Thursday. No American had previously won gold in ski jumping or cross country or combined.

"I'm still trying to wrap my mind around that," Demong said. "I'll let you know in 10 or 15 years from now."

Spillane was four seconds behind Demong, and Bernhard Gruber, of Austria, who had a 34-second head start after jumping the farthest off the large hill following a restart, was 10.8 seconds back and won the bronze.

"It's not possible to watch this and put it into words," said one of the program's key architects, former coach Tom Steitz. "What do you say? You just watch."

Twice before at these Vancouver Games, Spillane was edged for the gold medal on the stadium straightaway, first by France's Jason Lamy Chappuis in the normal hill race and then by Austria's Mario Stecher in the team relay.

"Whoever was first and whoever wasn't second didn't really matter that much," said Spillane, the only U.S. multi-medalist in Nordic sports. "Skiing into the stadium down that final stretch was quite a bit of fun."

He knew he couldn't catch Demong and couldn't be caught by Gruber, so he had a leisurely finish to relish his third silver.

Demong started in sixth place and 46 seconds back, but quickly caught his teammate and Gruber on a one-man breakaway from the chase group for a three-man race the rest of the way.

They didn't have to worry about some of the best World Cup athletes catching them after worsening weather in the morning hampered the top jumpers on the large hill, relegating them too far back in the field to be a factor.

The cross-country race was run in much better weather, but the soft, sometimes choppy snow put a premium on the proper wax and ski setup. Unlike the team relay when Demong was done in by bad skis, he had the perfect combination this time to put the Americans atop the podium.

But the damage had been done to the sport's better athletes, including the top five in the World Cup standings, who had terrible jumps in horrible conditions.

"It's a joke," Norway's Magnus Moan fumed of final Nordic combined race at the Winter Games after managing to jump just 112.5 meters in a driving, wet snow and tail wind that pushed him down early.

That had him starting 2 minutes, 21 seconds behind Gruber, who jumped in much better conditions after a restart earlier in the morning. Gruber, ranked 22nd in the World Cup standings, capitalized on a rogue headwind that helped him stay aloft for a top jump of 134 meters.

"It's like a lottery. Some guys got good conditions, some others terrible conditions," shrugged World Cup leader Jason Lamy Chappuis, of France, who won the gold in the normal hill 10K but started this race in 29th and finished in 18th.

The complaints about the wintry weather didn't faze the Americans.

"This is an outdoor sport," Spillane said. "And I can tell you that most of the time, the last five or 10 guys have the best conditions. So, it trades off all the time."

Todd Lodwick, America's only five-time Olympic skier, did his part to help his teammates after also being done in by weather woes.

"Once I saw those two guys pull away, I jumped in front [of the chase group] and tried to slow down the pace," Lodwick said.

It worked perfectly.

"I could see that Todd, in his own way, was doing a job for the team, and not attacking," Demong said. "He was just always at the front, covering those strong guys like Hannu [Finland's Manninen] and [Germany's Bjoern] Kircheisen. ... It shows again that we operate on a team basis."

With Lodwick doing his part, Spillane and Demong took turns trading the lead and using tactics they learned while doing bicycle intervals in France during training last year: accelerating at times, decelerating at others, a tactic that eventually did in Gruber.

"They were just too strong," Gruber said.