Jordan Stolz opens his bid for 4 golds by winning the 1,000 meters in speedskating

MILAN — Jordan Stolz pictured this moment most of his life, ever since he was 5 and learning to skate on a frozen pond in his Wisconsin backyard after falling in love with speedskating while watching the 2010 Winter Olympics on TV — and hoping to one day step atop the podium himself.

So what was the little hassle of a 10-plus-minute wait to make sure this first speedskating gold medal officially would be his Wednesday? Especially because, as Stolz would say later, “I didn’t think anybody was going to beat that time.”

Stolz needed to hold off on a celebratory lap with a U.S. flag until another competitor got the chance for a re-skate, then soon enough was able to smile while leaning forward to receive his gold for winning the men’s 1,000 meters at the Milan Cortina Games in an Olympic-record time thanks to a blistering closing stretch.

“It was just a feeling like, ‘You finally did it,'” said the 21-year-old Stolz, who was trailing silver medalist Jenning de Boo of the Netherlands with 400 meters to go. “It almost doesn’t seem real, right?”

Stolz’s father, Dirk, plowed away snow on their pond all those years ago so that little Jordan and his older sister, Hannah, could skate — over the objections of their mother, Jane. When they all gathered after Wednesday’s race, Dirk said, “He showed me (the medal) and said, ‘I finally got it!'”

Now Stolz will hope to keep going and add to his collection of trophies: He’s entered in three more events in Milan.

“Well, it’s hard to say, ‘Oh, I could win four gold medals,’ when you haven’t won one yet. Now that I’ve won one, I kind of know what to expect and can kind of feel like how the crowd is, with the energy, and the ice,” he said. “So it’s going to be good.”

Skating in the next-to-last pairing at Milano Speed Skating Stadium, a temporary facility constructed for these Olympics, Stolz finished in 1 minute, 6.28 seconds.

That didn’t threaten his world record of 1:05.37 but did better the Olympic standard of 1:07.18 that stood since 2002. All four long track speedskating races in Milan have been won in the fastest times ever turned in at an Olympics.

De Boo ended up a half-second slower; no one else came within a full second of Stolz. Zhongyan Ning of China got the bronze.

“He’s just a killer on the last lap,” said Bob Corby, Stolz’s coach.

Stolz’s medal was his first at this level: As a 17-year-old at the 2022 Beijing Games, he was 14th in the 1,000 and 13th in the 500.

It also was the first medal of any sort in the men’s 1,000 for the United States since the 2010 Vancouver Games. That’s when Shani Davis — a mentor and, at one point, a coach to Stolz — won his second consecutive gold in that event, and Chad Hedrick got the bronze. Dutch men had won the 1,000 at each of the past three Winter Games.

With Eric Heiden, the only speedskater to win five golds at one Olympics, sitting next to rapper Snoop Dogg in the stands, Stolz pulled ahead of de Boo by the time one full lap was done. Then de Boo moved in front and was still there at the 600-meter mark.

But Stolz zoomed ahead around the final corner and crossed the line first with his hands on his knees, then rose for an understated pump of his right hand.

“I had high hopes. But his last lap is just incredible,” de Boo said. “I heard him coming at 800 meters, and then I just knew it was too late.”

Stolz entered the day as a big favorite.

He holds the 1,000 world record and is a two-time world champion at the distance. Plus, he went 5-for-5 on the World Cup circuit this season in the event, confirming his status as the man to beat at the Olympics.

“Everything up until today was nothing. It was just: ‘Eh, it’s a regular meet.’ We get ready. We get set. We rest. And we’re skating good in practices,” Corby said. “After he sat down after the race, he was kind of like, ‘Wow. This is a pretty big deal.’ I was like, ‘Yeah, it is.'”

Up next: Stolz races the 500 on Saturday, the 1,500 on Feb. 19, and the mass start on Feb. 21.

Stolz’s name is often mentioned alongside that of Heiden, the only speedskater to claim five long track gold medals at a single Winter Games. At the 1980 Lake Placid Olympics, Heiden won the 500, 1,000, 1,500, 5,000 and 10,000.

Stolz is flattered to hear such comparisons but also quick to note that what Heiden accomplished was remarkably different, covering five distances. Stolz might add the longer events to his repertoire down the road; for now, he is the best there is in the sprints.

“One gold medal is huge enough, right? It would be super nice to have two, three, right?” Stolz said. “But just having one means a lot.”