Perhaps not since Apolo Anton Ohno retired after the 2010 Olympic Games has speed skating been as relevant in the United States as it is today. One of the Americans’ undisputed stars these Games has been Jordan Stolz, who has won both of his events so far and set an Olympic Record in each.
Stolz won’t compete for the United States in the Men’s Team Pursuit, as he’s more of a sprinter and the 3200-meter length of the race is outside his specialty. However, the three men who will compete — Ethan Cepuran, Casey Dawson, and Emery Lehman — are stars in their own right and posted the second-fastest qualifying time in Sunday’s quarterfinals.
Tuesday’s semifinals and final begin at 8:30 a.m. ET (2:30 p.m. local), with the United States facing China and Italy facing the Netherlands for a spot in the final. The final will begin at 9:24 a.m. ET (3:24 p.m. local).
The United States has -140 odds of claiming gold at DraftKings Sportsbook, with Italy (+100) close behind. By comparison, the Netherlands (+2000) and China (+5000) are long-shots.
Men’s Speed Skating Team Pursuit prediction, pick
During the quarterfinals, there was a relatively clear hierarchy between the top teams and everyone else. While Italy and the United States, who skated together, finished less than a second apart, China trailed Italy’s 3:38.40 by 3.26 seconds and the Netherlands a further 0.19 seconds behind that. Fifth-place France, which faced the Dutch side in the fourth quarterfinal, finished a further 0.85 seconds behind. That’s not to say that it’s inherently a two-team race — it’s easy to make up three seconds if the final racer, whose time is the only one that counts, falls or makes a significant mistake. Because the athletes reach speeds of up to 30 miles per hour and winning strategies require near-perfect synchronization, falls aren’t totally out of the question.
But it’ll be tough for China to eke out a semifinals victory past the United States. Cepuran, Dawson, and Lehman have won each of the three World Cup races in which they’ve competed this season. In fact, they’ve won each of their races by at least two seconds, once each over Norway, France, and Italy. Across the three races, the United States has topped China by 17.105 seconds. The American team still benefits from the strategic revolution they started in 2020 — to transfer energy by pushing from back to front and draft off of each other instead of rotating skaters within the formation. Cepuran, Dawson, and Lehman used this strategy to win bronze in the 2022 Games, falling narrowly to the Russian Olympic Committee’s Olympic Record in the semifinals.
If any of the Americans messes up — Lehman is the weak link, as one of his two individual 5000-meter USA Championships came in 2013 — Italy has the talent to pounce in the final. Its comparative weak link, Riccardo Lorello, already claimed bronze in the 5000m race, and Davide Ghiotto, who has ranked in the world’s top five in the 5000m in each of the last six World Cup campaigns, came fourth, 2.33 seconds ahead of the lone American (Dawson). Andrea Giovannini, meanwhile, is one of the world’s best in the mass start format, so he’s used to operating in tight quarters. Italy sits just fourth in the team pursuit rankings mostly because of a fall in the first World Cup event in Salt Lake City that relegated it to last place. During the quarterfinals, Italy sped past the Americans with a fast final lap, breaking its formation on the backstretch and broke the line with all three skaters spread out across the track.
Individually, Italy may have the better skaters, but it’s hard to go against an undefeated American team that also happens to be the reigning World Champion, and it looked like the United States was holding back some during the quarterfinals, especially during the final lap, when it kept all of its skaters in formation instead of spreading them out to cross the line side-by-side. A more all-out strategy should be just sufficient for the United States to hold off its European counterpart.
