Jordan Stolz is still dreaming of the Olympics.
Following a packed Olympic schedule where the star American speed skater competed in four events, he is less stressed and sleeping more in a bigger hotel bed with his two gold medals and one silver under the pillow next to him.
“At the Games it was a single bed, so I couldn’t sleep with them under the pillow because I didn’t want to sacrifice my sleep with medals under my pillow but here its been better with one on the other side,” Stolz told The Post during a Zoom interview on Tuesday.
“I don’t want to let them out of my sight to be honest,” he added.
Who can blame him? He was the most successful American athlete to leave Milan.
The 21-year-old started hot out of the gate as expected given his World Cup success, winning gold and setting Olympic records in both the men’s 1,000m and 500m, making him the first American to win gold in the 1,000m in speed skating since 2010.
From there, things faltered for Stolz, however. He went on to grab silver in the 1,500m, for which he was the heavy favorite.
He entered the event having been undefeated during the current World Cup season, yet China’s Ning Zhongyan broke the Olympic record and Stolz came in three-quarters of a second behind. In his final race, he came up just shy of a medal, placing fourth in the mass start.
Standing on the podium, but short of the top spot, was not a more emotional moment for Stolz. It was just “different”, he explained, and admitted things “could have gone better” in the race than what occurred.
“Had the emotions for second place, which comes with negative thoughts versus a gold,” Stolz said. “It’s only positive because it’s the only thing you’ve been preparing for the last four years. So, if you win the gold, there is nothing to be negative about.
“So, there are negative sides to a silver medal, but when you look at it in the long run, my competitor earned the medal. He skated a perfect race and I cannot really take that away from him. He did really well. I should have been able to do better.”
Still, Stolz got revenge from his Olympic debut.
At 17, Stolz competed in the 2022 Beijing Games during a global pandemic without his family in attendance and did not place within the top 10 in both the 1,000m or 500m race.
In Milan, he was the only U.S. athlete to win two gold at the Games and was the only American to win three medals total. Additionally, his family could be there to watch his success this time.
“I felt the most emotions from the 1,000m because it was the first race of the Olympics,” Stolz said. “I just didn’t want anything to go wrong. I just wanted to get that one out of the way and have that gold medal. And it went that way.”
After years of preparation for the two-week spectacle event, Stolz isn’t really feeling any sort of Olympics hangover.
He didn’t even go back to the U.S. following the conclusion of the Games. He rarely spent time in the city to celebrate, although he did catch the men’s hockey team win gold over Canada, which he thought was very “impressive.”
Instead, he will be back racing on the ice in two days.
Stolz is currently in the Netherlands to compete in the ISU World Speed Skating Championships where he will compete in both the world sprint and the world all-around event across just four days starting March 5.
In the past four years, the Wisconsin native’s career has soured. He doesn’t see his skating tear ending in Milan and is continuing to push the limit to make it so.
“This will probably be one of the hardest world championships I’ve done…there is no rest or anything,” Stoz said. “Two different combinations. No one has ever done that before, hopefully I can be the first.”