AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
U.S. speed skater Jordan Stolz is having an amazing run in Milan. He set two Olympic records and claimed two gold medals, and he's not done yet. NPR Olympics correspondent Pien Huang has been at that oval track and joins us now. Good morning, Pien.
PIEN HUANG, BYLINE: Morning, Ayesha.
RASCOE: So it was just yesterday that Jordan Stolz won his second gold medal. What was that like for everyone watching?
HUANG: It was amazing. I mean, the crowd was so hyped. And for some context here, the crowd at the speed skating arena is a sea of people wearing bright orange. They're supporting the Dutch athletes because speedskating is huge in the Netherlands. And you hear huge cheers for the Dutch and the Italian skaters and also for Jordan Stolz. He gets a lot of respect from this crowd, and he's been delivering, though yesterday's race was very tight.
RASCOE: So what happened? Like, how did it go?
HUANG: OK. So the race was the 500 meters. It's the shortest distance in speed skating, one and a quarter laps around the track. And about two-thirds of the way through the event, Canadian skater Laurent Dubreuil got 34.26 seconds. He broke the previous Olympic record. And then just minutes later, Stolz was racing against a Dutch sprinter, Jenning de Boo, and they both skated even faster. Stolz set a new, new Olympic record of 33.77 seconds, and Canada's Dubreuil came in third. Here's Dubreuil after.
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LAURENT DUBREUIL: I think those two are the two best sprinters of all time. I don't think it happens often that you set an Olympic record, and then you lose by half a second (laughter). Just happy there is not three of them 'cause I wouldn't be talking to you if there were three of them.
HUANG: Now, when the race was done, Stolz took a lap with the American flag fluttering behind him and, of course, a drone flying next to him, filming the look on his face.
RASCOE: I mean, Stolz must've been really happy about that performance.
HUANG: He was, for sure, but he wasn't basking in it. You know, he was looking ahead to his next race, which is the 1,500 meters on Thursday.
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JORDAN STOLZ: Yeah. I'm really happy so far to win two. I think if I have a good 1,500, it should turn out well. I'm hoping for gold in that. The mass start's just kind of a toss-up. It's more like a bonus. It's so hard to say, like, what's going to happen in that.
HUANG: His last Olympic event, the mass start, is on Saturday. And out of the four events that he's competing in this time, the race that he just won, the 500 meters, that was considered to be the hardest for him to win. But he's not taking the next two events for granted, said there's a lot of things that could still go wrong.
RASCOE: So he's just halfway through, and he's chasing history.
HUANG: Absolutely. I mean, coming in, people were saying that Stolz might be the Michael Phelps of speed skating before he even won a single medal. He's also been compared a lot with Eric Heiden, who's this legendary speed skater who took home all five individual gold medals at the 1980 Lake Placid Winter Games. This is a feat that has not been repeated in the time since. And Eric Heiden himself has said that they have a lot in common. Like, they're both from Wisconsin.
ERIC HEIDEN: He grew up skating on a pond behind his family's house. I grew up skating on a lake behind my grandparents' house. I was in the Olympics for the first time at 17, and then my career took off. He was in the Olympics first time at 17. His career took off. It's scary. It's almost like Eric Heiden reincarnated, you know?
HUANG: Heiden is here in Milan to watch Stolz's race, and he sat next to Snoop Dogg the other day and said it was a blast.
RASCOE: (Laughter) I can imagine. Jordan Stolz isn't the only one breaking records, right?
HUANG: Yeah. It's been incredible here at the Olympics. I mean, there've been seven Olympic records broken in these games so far, and all of them have been in speed skating - two in short track, five in long. It all started at the first event with Italian skater Francesca Lollobrigida. On her birthday in her home country at her last Olympics, she won the first gold medal for Italy. And then it hasn't stopped. I mean, we've seen record-breakers here from Norway and the Netherlands. Eric Heiden told me that the current crop of skaters is getting faster every four years, and there's no ceiling to it yet.
RASCOE: What's coming up next?
HUANG: Today is going to be another big day for speed skating. It's on the women's side this time. So it's the women's 500 meters, and Erin Jackson from the U.S. is defending her gold medal from Beijing. So back in 2022, she became the first Black woman to win a gold medal in an individual event at the Winter Olympics. And then here in Milan, she became the first Black woman to carry the American flag at the opening ceremony, again at the Winter Olympics. She is back on the ice today, racing in her signature 500 meters. Jackson is facing tough competitors from the Netherlands and from Japan, so it'll be an exciting race.
RASCOE: That's NPR's Pien Huang at the Olympic Games. Pien, thank you so much.
HUANG: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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