NOW, HE CAN GO BACK TO BEING A NO-BODE.

Byline: STEVE DILBECK

SESTRIERE, Italy - And that was the last we ever saw of Bode Miller.

Failing to finish, skiing off again without speaking to the press, leaving his Olympics going 0 for 5, into the white void.

He is only 28, so he'll be around awhile. Could win some more World Cup races. Might even still prove the darling of the European ski community.

But Bode Miller, U.S. megastar, is done. Bode Miller, the cover boy, finished. Bode Miller, the Olympian wonder boy, over.

Win all the World Cups you want - and it is a phenomenal accomplishment - but in America what matters in skiing is the Winter Games. What matters is what happens every four years.

In that, Bode is a remarkable failure.

He came into Turin riding a wave of incredible, if unrealistic, hype based largely on his 2005 World Cup title, and somewhat on a fascinating personality.

Bode was entered in five races and considered a threat to medal in each. After skiing out of his first run in the slalom Saturday, he leaves Italy without a single visit to the podium.

This presumably will upset Bode not one twit, which is fine. It remains very much his life.

He remains unconventional, which is swell. He remains rebellious, which in the ski world is sometimes not so swell.

Bode is sponsored by the U.S. ski team, which has to question his more recent dedication to training, his outspokenness and love of the nightlife.

Certainly there is a great deal of appreciation for Bode within the U.S. Ski Association. Its CEO, Bill Marolt, appeared plainly fond of his man- child when speaking to a select group of reporters prior to the slalom.

``(Bode) put a face on the U.S. Olympic team, but he put a face on the Olympics,'' Marolt said. ``There's a lot of people that didn't know about the Olympics in our country until Bode started appearing on Time and Newsweek.

``He's meant a lot to the sport. He's meant a lot to the team and when you're standing on the side of that big downhill and he's ripping at you, you're damn glad he's on your team.''

But Marlot also recognizes it can only allow his unique, outspoken personality so much rope, that he must be better managed in the future. And best of luck on that.

``We've got to sit down and have a heart to heart at the end of the year,'' Marolt said. ``It's not something that we should have conversations like this in the media.

``But clearly it will be something that we'll address at year end and I don't know where that will go right now.''

As is his wont, Bode will continue to go his own way, and it will be interesting to see how his life evolves.

Yet for all his raised-without-electricity-and-running-water, anti-media, anti-establishment, maverick routine, he seems to have discovered certain benefits of wealth.

He has signed endorsement deals with Nike, Atomic skis and Barillia (an Italian pasta company) that have pushed his annual income well past six figures. He has his own stable of agents and financial planners and retirement advisors. He has clearly benefited from the commercialization, marketing and media that he so often rallies against.

But he also worried before the Olympics that success here would further increase his visibility and encroach upon his preferred lifestyle. Said that he wasn't concerned about winning medals, so you might imagine he's not contemplating anything drastic now.

Indeed, in an interview with the Associated Press sometime after skiing off Sestriere, he remained very much true to form.

``I just did it my way. I'm not a martyr, and I'm not a do-gooder. I just want to go out and rock. And man, I rocked here,'' Bode said.

Rocking here athletically consisted of a fifth-place finish in the downhill, being disqualified for straddling a gate in the combined (which he was leading), not finishing the super-G and slalom, and tying for sixth in the giant slalom.

One man's disappointment, is another's rocking.

``The expectations were other people's,'' Bode said. ``I'm comfortable with what I've accomplished, including at the Olympics. I came in here to race as hard as I could. That was my obligation to myself.''

He also came here to party as hard as he could, and on that level Bode was a raging success.

``Me, it's been an awesome two weeks,'' he said. ``I got to party and socialize at an Olympic level.''

His is an all-or-nothing approach to racing, to life. It's gotten him this far. From here, who knows?

After achieving his goal of winning the 2005 World Cup, his dedication seemed to wane this season. He was no longer the incredible World Cup force, but a dangerous skier always capable of getting it together.

He was not capable here. If he had only medaled once, he would have gone down as the greatest American Olympic skier ever (he won two silvers at Salt Lake City).

Now after all the expectations, he threatens to go down as its biggest disappointment.

Twenty years from now when he looks back upon his Turin Olympics, he might regret his approach. He might not.

But four years from now if he is again a World Cup terror, Americans will not be so eager to embrace their budding superstar. Fool us once, shame on you. Fool us twice, shame on us.

Bode Miller, American ski legend, is done.

CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo:

(1 -- color) Bode Miller looks disappointed after failing to finish the slalom, which leaves him 0 for 5 in Turin.

Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images

(2) American Bode Miller comes to a halt near the top of the course after skiing out on the first run of the slalom.

Alessandro Trovati/Associated Press