American Jordan Stoltz broke the track record with two wins in races lasting less than two hours to open the World Cup speed skating season in Nagano, Japan on Friday.
Stolz retires at 20 years old Historic 2023-24 seasonwon the 500m and 1500m at the 1998 Olympic Stadium M-Wave.
He skated the 500 meters in 34.43 seconds, beating Canada’s Laurent Dubreuil by 15-100ths of a second. Stolz, the second-fastest 500-meter skater in history, fell three-hundredths short of the track record.
Stolz then ran the 1,500 meters in 1:43.65, beating Norway’s Sandor Eitrem by 94/100 of a second. Stolz was the third fastest 1500m skater in history, breaking that record by 1.07 seconds.
Nagano stop continues on Saturday – live broadcast peacock — Women’s and Men’s 1000 meters, Women’s 3000 meters, Men’s 5000 meters. Stolz is the 1000m world record holder.
In March 2023, Stolz became the youngest skater to win a single-distance world title and the first man to win three individual gold medals at a single world championship, conquering the 500m, 1000m, and 1500m. It became.
Last winter, he repeated the triple at the world championships, becoming the youngest athlete to win the world all-around title since fellow Wisconsin native Eric Heiden in 1978.
This winter, Stolz has a new goal: a World Cup season title. These awards go to the skaters who earn the most points per distance in the six-stop World Cup series, which runs through March.
Stolz has never won a World Cup season title at any distance, also due to the fact that he has never competed in every World Cup in a season. Stolz plans to attend every World Cup this season, including his home stop in Milwaukee at the end of January.
Stolz also believes he can challenge for the 500m world record this season. Last season, he skated 33.69 points in Calgary, eight-hundredths of a second short of Russia’s Pavel Kulizhnikov’s 2019 world record.
The Salt Lake City and Calgary ovals are the fastest in the world due to their high elevation. Salt Lake City, where most world records are set, will not host the World Cup this winter, but Calgary will host it from January 24th to 26th.
In offseason and preseason training, Stolz focused more on the three shortest races, the 500m, 1000m, and 1500m, the main events, compared to the previous year, when he did additional endurance training. Last March, he had to skate 5,000 meters and 10,000 meters at the world championships, but there will be no world championships this season.
Ariana Fontana, who won an Italian record 11 medals in short track at the Winter Olympics, will be joining the long track speed skating team.
