Americans Daron Rahlves and Casey Puckett didn't fare well in the Olympic debut of ski cross Sunday, but America did get a glimpse of what could -- one day -- become the most exciting sport of the Winter Games.

No really.

While newly added Olympic sports are usually the subject of cynacism and ridicule, watch ski cross once and you'll wonder where it's been hiding ever since James Bond escaped the bad guys in the opening chase scene of "The spy who loved me."

When the Cold War ended, Europeans turned their favorite spy games into a new sport. Sunday's Olympic format is a mirror reflection of the FIS World Cup, where four guys race through a slalom course filled with all kinds of features from triple jumps and Wu-Tangs to step-offs and hard-banking turns; each is designed to throw racers off the course.

Any recreational skier who ever raced his brother down the hill on the days' last run can relate. On the way down racers bump, click, carve, poke, claw and fly through the challenging terrain battling each other. Collisions are common, and spectacular wipeouts a certainty. Only the top two in each heat keep advancing until it's over.

The best part? There are no judges. Like all real sports it's one competitor against others, a course, and a clock.

Ski cross has snowboardcrosss to thank for being included at the Vancouver Games. Snowboardcross was considered a big success in Turin. Both racing styles keep viewers on the edge of their seats, but ski cross wipeouts seem even worse with the extra ski and poles added to the yard sale.

Sunday's gold medal went to Michael Schmid of Switzerland, a dominant player on the FIS world cup circuit. While the Americans failed to make the Top 10, Christopher Del Basco, an American posing as a Canadian in Vancouver (his father really is one--which is how he ended up on the Canadian team) did make it to the final where he finished fourth.

Del Basco had the bronze medal in his hands with just a few jumps to go, but while making a pass attempt, he launched a little too tight off of jump leading into a turn and was thrown off balance in midair. The ensuing crash into the flats was an impressive one. He didn't finish. But his crash certainly gave ski cross a few more fans.

Ski cross is still in its infancy. It became an official FIS class in 2005. And it's likely to evolve in the years ahead, as snowboarding did after being welcomed into the Olympics. At Nagano in 1998, walls in the snowboard halfpipe were only 18 feet high. Regulation is now 22 feet.

For what it's worth, I've already sent off my suggestions to the IOC for making ski cross even better. First, let's honor its Cold War roots by throwing in some rifles. Why should biathletes have all the fun with guns at the Olympics? And if we can get these guys to chase each other at higher speeds, on a bigger course--think Super G Ski Cross -- this thing is going to the moon.

Jamaican ski cross rider Errol Kerr and Davey Barr of Canada jockey for position during Sunday's Olympic ski cross debut at Cypress Mountain. Photo: Spencer via Getty Images