At just 21, Stolz owns seven world championship gold medals.
If you blinked, you could have missed American speedskater Jordan Stolz at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. He competed in two events—the 500 meters and 1,000 meters—and finished 13th and 14th, respectively.
Stolz will not be able to fly under the radar at the 2026 Games in Italy. He enters having dominated this four-year cycle, with seven world gold medals to his name between the World Allround Championships and World Single Distance Championships.on Tuesday, Olympic speedskating great Apolo Ohno—an eight-time medalist between the Salt Lake City, Turin and Vancouver Games in 2002, 2006 and 2010—shared his insights into Stolz’s rise. “Jordan found his groove, really, in the past three years. There's this interesting thing that occurs in in speedskating, where sometimes you'll see a younger athlete performing, and he or she may not actually show themselves to be something that we would think to be spectacular. And then there's this shift that occurs,” Ohno said, attributing that shift in part to age and in part to gaining “a feel for the ice.” In the case of Stolz—a native of West Bend, Wisc., who grew up admiring Ohno—the result of that quantum leap has been history. No man had won three individual gold medals in the World Single-Distance Championships until Stolz did it in the Netherlands in 2023—then he did it again in Calgary in 2024. No man had won 18 consecutive World Cup races, which Stolz did in 2025 to set a record.Each of these feats have built on each other, and have made Stolz a contender for serious hardware in `26. “They start to taste what it feels like to win, and they want more of that. And they start training harder, and they get more serious,” Ohno said. “He’s been a phenom. He's been really spectacular. So genetically, he is a complete, amazing athlete. He was built to be a speed skater.”Patrick Andres is a staff writer on the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. He joined SI in December 2022, having worked for The Blade, Athlon Sports, Fear the Sword and Diamond Digest. Andres has covered everything from zero-attendance Big Ten basketball to a seven-overtime college football game. He is a graduate of Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism with a double major in history .
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
It's Time for the Jordan Stolz Era of Speedskating to BeginAlready the world record holder in the 1,000-meter race, the 21-year-old American phenom has a shot at four gold medals in the Milan Cortina Olympics.
Read more »
U.S. speedskating star Jordan Stolz begins quest for four gold medalsGreg Rosenstein is the sports editor for NBC News Digital.
Read more »
Jordan Stolz Crushes Olympic Record in Gold Medal-Winning 1000m Speedskating RaceStolz won his first gold medal on Wednesday.
Read more »
Jordan Stolz smashes Olympic record in 1000m, wins gold medal in speedskatingWisconsin-native Jordan Stolz came into the 1,000-meter speedskating race as a heavy favorite, and he didn’t disappoint with an incredible performance.
Read more »
U.S. speedskating star Jordan Stolz wins gold in 1,000 meters, setting Olympic recordJordan Stolz won gold in the men's 1,000 metres at the Winter Olympics on Wednesday, delivering the United States' first speed skating title at Milano Cortina.
Read more »
Jordan Stolz opens his bid for 4 golds by winning the 1,000 meters in speedskatingStolz received 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. Now Stolz will hope to add to his collection of trophies.
Read more »