Lest anyone think there’s something wrong with comparing current U.S. Olympic speedskating star Jordan Stolz to five-gold-medals-in-1980 Olympic speedskating star

At the 2026 Winter Olympics, a Wisconsin speed skating phenom has evoked Eric Heiden's name. Here's how Heiden conquered the 1980 games.

The U.S. speedskating star is on a roll at the Milan-Cortina Games.

Eric Heiden won three straight world championships heading into the 1980 Olympics. In nine days in February 1980 at Lake Placid, N.Y., Heiden accomplished what no Olympian had ever done -- he won five individual gold medals in a single Olympics, be it Summer or Winter.

For a while now, Jordan Stolz's talent and dominance as a speedskater, and his much-anticipated potential for Olympic success, prompted many to repeatedly mention his name -- prematurely, no doubt -- alongside that of Eric Heiden.