Olympic Snowboarding was not a concept in 1986.

Personally, this concept blows me away. I'm a 33 year old dude, who grew up skateboarding in Richmond, VA. I still maintain a skateboard in working order and could prbably still do a kickflip ollie most days. So, basically since I was old enough to know what what was going on, I was paying attention to 'extreme' sports.
The fact that the whole wide world is displaying massive stokage over dudes in halfpipes throwing 1080s & 1260s is amazing to me. Let's just say that in Richmond in the mid-1980s, skatebaording was not considered cool. It was actually illegal to do in almost all public places ("skateboarding is not a crime" used to mean something). It was not considered manly by any means and any god-fearing, tobacco spittin, 'real'-sports loving man would just as happily kick your ass for riding a skateboard and having funny hair as not. Real sports were, by the way, Football, Wrestling, and NASCAR - real oldschool NASCAR, not this new-fangled bs, where foreigners and California boys are driving around with dyed hair. Now those same rednecks and certainly their kids are high-fiving over Shaun Whites gold medal runs. Man. It boggles the mind.
Part of what's so amazing is the level these people take things to. The culture of these sports is to push the boundaries. If someone did a 360, well someone should try a 540. When Mike McGill did the 540 McTwist it was a real live breakthrough and the entire skateboarding community knew about it. It was big deal. He raised the bar. Now pros all had to learn 540s. If you can do a trick, why not learn it backwards? All the sudden everyones skating switch. Push push push. And why, because it works! It's fun to watch your buddy learn frontside inverts after crashing all day. Frontside inverts are insane - damn he just did one! Good way to burn time as a kid and good for you too on so many levels. Still - now the level has gone so far you wonder how much further they can go, but of course we were saying that back in the day and continually since then. The bar just keeps getting stratospheric. When I was a kid, the things that the pro skaters were doing were at least somewhat within reach. I was a good enough skater that I could do at least some of the stuff they were doing at the same amplitude as them. I had pretty good skills. It was not ridiculous to think I could skate like that one day and when I was a teen I was striving to do so. I had a local shop sponsorship and occasionally placed in the top 3 in the 1-A Amatauer Street contests. I was mildly well known for having ollied over a shopping cart and an oil drum. This was 1988.
Now the pro dudes tap their nose on the shopping cart during one of five consecutive tricks on the way down after clearing a car, three picnic tables and having started on the roof of the damned supermarket in the first place. It more than boggles the mind. I don't know how kids can go from popping ollies in the street to that. It just seems so out of reach. Also the consequences are so dire now. I was never in danger of much more than a broken limb, some severe scabbage or fat knock on the skull. These guys could definitely be killed if they miss some of the stuff they try. I mean you can't practice some of this stuff - either you make it or you don't - period.
So, on it goes. These guys in the Olympic halfpipe were watching the dudes that came after my gen, just as were were watching the Tony Hawks, Mark Gonzaleses, and Neil Blenders. Now all the kids have seen Shaun White hold the gold after shreddin the pipe in Torino. A new generation of dreams is born. By the time the kids today get into the Olympics they wont be satisfied with mere 1080s and 1260s I can assure you of that. People used to think ski jumpers were extreme. Soon we'll wonder why they dont toss in a stalefish 1080 and yawn. In fact, I wonder how much air time ski jumping even gets anymore. The halfpipe is just too rad to ignore. Oh, and those foreign drivers and California boys are pretty goddamned fast too.