“By Brian Costa Feb. 23, 2018 3:58 a.m. ET 36 COMMENTS BONGPYEONG, South Korea—Four Americans competed in Thursday’s freeski men’s halfpipe final, representing one-third of the field, and all of them were medal contenders. Two made the podium, two didn’t. But what stood out beyond the result was that not one of them appeared to be mimicking another’s tricks. “We do things differently than other people,” said David Wise, almost as a declaration of principle after he won gold for the second Olympics in a row. “As soon as I see somebody starting to pick my run apart and do things the way that I do it, I say OK, I’m going to move on.” That mind-set isn’t only indicative of how the U.S. came to dominate the halfpipe, where American snowboarders and freestyle skiers combined to win six medals here, including three golds. Wise also reflects what has become a defining American athletic strength in the Winter Olympics. It isn’t speed or strength. It isn’t precision or even skill. It is creativity. No other country is better when it comes to having the ingenuity to think of a new way and the boldness to try it. The proof is in the medal chart. In pure speed events, the U.S. has had its moments—downhill skier Mikaela Shiffrin won her second medal on Thursday—but hasn’t fared exceptionally well. Pick a winter sport that involves a stopwatch and you’re likely to see America somewhere below Norway. Power-driven sports such as bobsled, luge and skeleton have left the U.S. roughly where it is in versatility sports such as biathlon and Nordic combined: looking up at Germany. Where the U.S. stands apart is in two sports that leave room for and reward originality more than any others in the Winter Olympics. America’s 10 combined medals between snowboarding and freestyle skiing through Thursday led all countries. The halfpipe, Wise said, “caters to doing things sort of differently than everybody else does. And I think as Americans we have rebel in our blood. It’s who we are. It defines us as a culture.” Watch more Olympics videos here Watch more Olympics videos here It is not always what defined American Winter Olympians. The U.S. used to hang its medal hopes on its collective speed. Take the 1994 Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway. Of the 13 medals won by the U.S., 11 were in Alpine skiing, speedskating or short-track speedskating. America’s race for medals was literally a series of races. But Americans aren’t especially fast these days, especially on the ice. Through Thursday, there had been a combined 57 medals handed out in short-track and regular speedskating events. Americans had won two of them. “The Olympics are tough,” U.S. speed skater Joey Mantia said after an eighth-place finish in the team pursuit. “It’s how it goes.” What has saved the U.S. from embarrassment is that pushing the envelope in style and acrobatics has become an increasingly valuable trait for a country to have. The 60 medals available to snowboarders and freestyle skiers this year is more than double what it was in 1998. Red Gerard, the first American to win gold in these Games, set the tone, not just by winning in men’s slopestyle snowboarding but by how he did it. The defining move of his best run was taking a line into a jump that no other rider took: up a quarter-pipe that wasn’t even designed with snowboarders in mind. Why would he do that? “Just because it’s a little bit different,” he said. Chloe Kim, the snowboard halfpipe gold medalist, became the first woman to land back-to-back 1080s at the Olympics. Shaun White won gold in the men’s halfpipe with a combination of tricks he had never done before—not even in practice. This is where imagination meets fearlessness. “The moves are so dangerous now, it’s not like you can practice them every day like you used to,” said White’s coach, J.J. Thomas. There are limits to what American athletes can accomplish on the strength of their inventiveness alone. Of the 306 total medals up for grabs at these Olympics, about 53% are in simple timed races. Being an Olympic superpower still requires speed, strength and endurance, among other traits. But what the U.S. does well still counts for a lot. Before his final run Thursday—in which he would land double corks in all four directions to win gold—Wise stood at the top of the halfpipe and contemplated what to do. It was a technically difficult thing to try to pull off – only at the X Games last month did he become the first person ever to do it in competition. If he took one of those double corks out, he reasoned, he would have a better chance of landing his run. “I kind of mentioned that to the coaches at the top,” Wise said. “And they both looked at me like, ‘That’s not who you are. You’re here to create.’””