Canada's long-track speed skaters look to replicate past magic on Italian ice at Milano-Cortina Olympics

As Canada’s most successful Olympic team with 42 Olympic and over 150 world championship medals through the years, the expectations are always high for the Canadian speed skating team.

Italy holds a special place in the heart of Canadian speed skaters. At the Torino Games 20 years ago, Canada won eight medals, anchored by five from the great Cindy Klassen.  

Will there be the same kind of magic at Milano-Cortina 2026?

Through five events this World Cup season, Canadian speed skaters have pulled in 18 medals (two gold, nine silver and seven bronze). In the last Olympic cycle, they’ve also been successful at the world single distance championships winning seven medals in 2023, a record 10 in 2024 and four in 2025.

Internationally, the Netherlands – the birthplace of speed skating – will once again field a team of contenders across all disciplines. The Dutch won 12 medals in Beijing four years ago, half of them gold.

Jordan Stolz is a name you will hear frequently during Milano-Cortina. The 21-year-old wunderkind from Kewaskum, Wisconsin, is expected to contend for four individual gold medals in Italy, which would put him in Eric Heiden territory (the American who won five individual gold in Lake Placid in 1980).

Gold medal hopes are high for Canada’s short-track speed skaters

Stolz competes in 500-metre, 1,000m and 1,500m and will add the mass start to his schedule, too.

One of the big questions of the competition is what will the ice be like?

The Milano Speed Skating Stadium is the first indoor temporary speed skating oval. It’s built inside the Fiera Milano Rho exhibition centre, a trade-fair hall in the outskirts of the city.

Given the undertaking, there was only one person organizers wanted for the job and that was