Our Olympic betting rundown continues with a rare event that features a dominant favorite that deserves his status.  First of all, its important to understand that the United States has dominated the Men’s halfpipe snowboarding event during the previous two Winter Olympic games–as in winning 5 of the 6 medals awarded including both golds.  In 2002, the US team swept the podium at Salt Lake City with Ross Powers winning the gold.  In 2006, Shaun White took the gold and Danny Kass won his second silver medal.

There’s really no reason that the US won’t take at least two of the three medals again including the gold medal:

WINTER OLYMPICS–MEN’S SNOWBOARD HALFPIPE

Shaun White is the overwhelming favorite in this event and with good reason.  Sportsbook.com has him listed as a -400 choice to win the gold, while a number of books aren’t even taking action on the event due to White’s dominance.  In theory, his biggest challenge could come from his US teammates but both are making their first appearance in the Olympic games.

White is not only technically head and shoulders above his competition, but trains harder than anyone else in the event.  He has his own halfpipe setup in Colorado and trains daily.  The result has been an Olympic gold medal, 15 X-Games gold medals in snowboard (and 1 in skateboarding for good measure) and comparisons within his sport to Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods.

He’s simply a ‘digital player in an analog world’ and unless he crashes badly–which is doubtful–he’s the closest thing to a lock at the Vancouver Olympic games.  White’s dominance justifies a big bet and you can take hedge positions on US teammates Scotty Lago (+1000) and Louie Vito (+1200) if you’d like.  It might not get the high profile mainstream sports media coverage of other events, but for White to *not* win the gold would be the biggest upset of the Olympic games.

PLAY SHAUN WHITE -400 TO WIN MEN’S SNOWBOARD HALFPIPE