Jorrit Bergsma, the mullet-wearing 40-year-old speed skating legend from the Netherlands, won the men's mass start on Saturday afternoon for his second medal of the Milano Cortina Games and his first Olympic gold since 2014. Bergsma crossed first in 7:55.50, ahead of Viktor Hald Thorup of Denmark and Andrea Giovannini of Italy, denying American star Jordan Stolz in his bid to become the first man in 32 years to win three long-track speed skating golds at a single Olympics.
BRIAN KENNY: Welcome to Cold Call, the podcast where we dive deep into the groundbreaking ideas in Harvard Business School case studies. Today on Cold Call, we're looking at a sport where innovation doesn't come from flash or funding, but from rethinking first principles. The sport is speed skating and we're dropping this episode during the 2026 Winter Olympics. The US men's Speed Skating team is coming off years of disappointment, searching for a breakthrough in the team pursuit event. The innovation works.
Canada's medal count at the 2026 Winter Games stands at 11 after a gold for Megan Oldham in freeski big air and a silver for Courtney Sarault in speed skating. Oldham, 24, and Sarault, 25, are among the few Canadian Olympians to win multiple medals at these Games: they now share five medals between them. This morning, freeski aerials qualifications have been postponed to at least 6 a.m. ET due to weather. Canadian Marion Thenault is set to compete.
In between times, we've got men's large hill ski jumping and women's aerials, then Germany play France and Switzerland take on Italy for a spot in the men's ice hockey quarter-finals. But the centrepiece of our early activity comes at high noon, with the final of the women's snowboard slopestyle. Mia Brookes didn't qualify, but Zoi Sadowski-Synnott, New Zealand's reigning champion, absolutely did, likewise Melissa Peperkamp of the Netherlands; they'll take some beating.
The collective roar shakes the room I could feel it in the seats on Sunday and seems to zap right back into Malinin's veins for the rest of his skate. I asked him about it after his first Olympic backflip on Saturday. "It's honestly such an incredible roar-feeling in the environment," he said. "Once I do that backflip, everyone is, like, screaming for joy and they're just out of control."
MILAN -- Speedskater Francesca Lollobrigida won host Italy's first gold medal of the Milan Cortina Games on Saturday, taking the women's 3,000 meters in an Olympics-record time. With fans rising to their feet and roaring for her as she competed on her 35th birthday, Lollobrigida finished in 3 minutes, 54.28 seconds, more than two seconds ahead of runner-up Ragne Wiklund of Norway.
From the fashion capital of Milan to the dramatic peaks of Cortina d'Ampezzo, the Milano Cortina Games the first to be co-hosted by two cities will stretch across northern Italy blending world-class winter sport with a strong sense of history and ambition. Sixteen sports and more than 110 gold medals await, from the raw speed of alpine skiing and bobsleigh to the tactical endurance of biathlon and cross-country.
