By Brett Martel

BARDONECCHIA, Italy (AP) _ The first family of snowboarding's parallel giant slalom wrapped up a second consecutive Olympic gold medal before the final head-to-head duel had even begun.

It was only a matter of which Schoch would take the title this time and defending Olympic champion Philipp Schoch pulled it out Wednesday afternoon, defeating older brother Simon.

Simon Schoch, 27, has been the stronger racer this season, but slid wide on a gate in the first run against his 26-year-old brother, leaving him with a 0.88-second deficit he could not make up on the second and final run.

A strong, flag-waving Swiss contingent in the grandstand cheered the whole run, knowing their country couldn't lose either way.

The brothers gave each other a long hug afterward, and stood with their arms around each other's shoulders and posed for a special family photo. This was the first Olympic medal for Simon, who did not make the podium in 2002. Meanwhile, Philipp became the first ever two-time gold medal winner in Olympic snowboarding, now in its third Winter Games.

Austrian Siegfried Grabner took bronze easily after Frenchman Mathieu Bozzetto fell in the first run of their head-to-head battle for the final spot on the podium.

Canadians Jasey-Jay Anderson and Philippe Berube failed to make it out of qualifying.

The Swiss brought the top four in the World Cup rankings to these Olympics _ with the Simon and Philipp Schoch ranked first and second _ and were in contention for a medals sweep after qualifying.

But Heinz Inniger fell in the quarter-finals, falling to Grabner while Gilles Jaquet was knocked out by Bozzetto in the same round.