MADISON, Wis. — Each of the last four years, something has gone wrong for Matt Bush in the Hot Saw. The six-time Great Outdoor Games medalist had never placed higher than fourth in the event, despite having a universally feared saw and the skill to handle it.

Thursday night, in the gold-medal round, Bush again flubbed just three cuts from gold. At the bell, he grabbed his 80-horsepower monster saw with his left hand, yanked the cord with his right, then slipped as he brought his right hand back to bear on the handle. His opponent, Dave Jewett, finished his first cut well ahead of Bush.

"Well, I have to get on it here," Bush thought. So he pushed. Hard. And he caught up. By the second pass, he was tied. On the third cut, he was well ahead and still pushing — enough, in fact, that the saw walked out, carving the last disk into a dish shape.

When the disk landed, it caught the chain and slung forward, crashing into the protective barrier meant to keep chain teeth from flying into the crowd and punctuating the end of a "depressing" era for Bush.

"I could have avoided it," the Croghan, N.Y., resident said afterward of the rolling disk. "But I thought, 'That will look good.'"

Bush's gold medal time of 6.180 seconds was the fastest of an event hampered by the usual slew of equipment failures and six cut-outs. Jewett, of Pittsford, N.Y., finished in 6.554 seconds for the silver, his highest finish in his 15 Great Outdoor Games events.

His goal had been merely to advance past the first round. That turned out to be academic once Dave Bolstad's chain slipped after one disk. Then Jewett eked past eventual bronze medalist Jason Wynyard, 7.016 seconds to 7.040 seconds, in a quarterfinal heat that turned out to be the evening's best.

Even with the hairsbreadth margin, Jewett pumped his fist after completing his third cut.

"The close races, you just know," he said. "They say it was three one-hundredths difference. But I think it was more than that. I saw it out of the corner of my eye."

Wynyard's medal run was the most improbable. The eighth seed, he appeared to lose by a half-second to top-seeded Harry Burnsworth in the first round. But a review revealed that both sawyers had failed to cut three clean disks. In the resulting one-disk saw-off,

Burnsworth said he planted his back foot on a knot in the plywood. His feet slipped, he couldn't get immediate purchase on the wood, and Wynyard advanced to the squeaker against Jewett.

"It was just a lucky thing," Wynyard said. "Harry's actually one of the best operators I've ever seen."

Wynyard, of Massey, New Zealand, knows luck when he sees it. He said he's thrown his chain seven times in the last year, and is now so gun-shy that he can barely bring himself to stand properly with his head over his chain.

His bronze medal time of 6.981 was a cinch over J.P. Mercier, a sawmaker from St. Etienne, Quebec, who cut only one clean disk in the consolation round. Mercier could take some solace, though, from the fact that with Jewett's second-place finish, one of his saws helped capture a silver.

Hot Saw - Final Standing

1. Matt Bush
2. Dave Jewett
3. Jason Wynyard
4. J.P. Mercier
5. Harry Burnsworth Sr.
6. Mike Sullivan
7. Dion Lane
8. David Bolstad

Results (by round)

Final Round
Matt Bush 06.180 def Dave Jewett 06.554

Consolation Round
Jason Wynyard 06.981 def J P Mercier 1:37.426

Semi-Final Round
Dave Jewett 07.016 def Jason Wynyard 07.040
Matt Bush 51.471 def J.P. Mercier 1:36.814

Quarter-Final Round
Jason Wynyard 52.085 def Harry Burnsworth Sr. 51.640
Dave Jewett 07.357 def David Bolstad 6:00.000
Matt Bush 06.182 def Dion Lane 53.442
J.P. Mercier 07.257 def Mike Sullivan 52.0