MILAN (AP) — Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara thought their chances of Olympic gold had gone by the wayside when the Japanese skaters made an uncharacteristic slip-up during their short program at the Milan Cortina Games.
Turns out they were just making it more dramatic.
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Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava of Georgia compete during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava of Georgia compete during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara of Japan compete during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara of Japan compete during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)
Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara of Japan react to their scores after competing during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
The two-time defending world champions rebounded Monday night with a world-record free skate under the current scoring system, lifting them from fifth place all the way to the top step of the podium and their country's first Olympic medal in the pairs event.
Miura and Kihara dropped to their knees in a tearful embrace when they realized they had won gold.
“My main message to them today was be the best in the world. Don't worry about yesterday,” said their longtime coach, Bruno Marcotte. “I told them that it wasn't over. Before they went out on the ice, I just said, ‘Be yourself.’”
They were the best version of it.
Miura and Kihara scored 158.13 points for the free skate and a career-best 231.24 overall, earning a gold medal to go with the silver they helped the Japanese team win last week. Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava earned the first medal for Georgia at a Winter Games with their silver, and Minerva Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin of Germany took bronze.
“It's an amazing moment for my country,” Berulava said. “I'm in shock.”
Hase and Volodin, who led after the short program, made several mistakes in their free skate and slid to third. But rather than dwell on failing to win the gold medal, Hase chose to look at the positives: “We won an Olympic medal. It doesn't suck,” she said.
“It's a medal at the Olympics. I don't think it matters the color,” Hase added. “A bronze medal in our first Olympics is amazing.”
The chaotic short program on Sunday night had left some of the best in the world skating early and out of contention.
Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps, the 2024 world champions from Canada, cost themselves about 10 points when she inexplicably fell while getting down from a lift. Stellato-Dudek also took a hard fall during their warmup for the free skate on Monday night, sliding into one of the padded barriers and then flexing her shoulder when she got back up.
The 42-year-old Stellato-Dudek, who was born in the Chicago area, was undoubtedly envisioning a much different Olympic debut. The Canadian pair wound up with 192.61 points, putting them 11th among the 16 teams that made the free skate.
“Just to be out here on and skating on the ice was a privilege and really amazing,” Deschamps said.
Emily Chan and Spencer Akira Howe, a private first class in the U.S. Army, took the lead by becoming the first team to break the 200-point barrier. Sara Conti and Niccolo Macii of Italy quickly knocked them from their perch despite a messy free skate.
But the podium contenders were just starting to take the ice.
Sui Wenjing and Han Cong, the defending Olympic champions, bounced back from Sui's fall on their opening triple loop in their short program that left them in sixth place. They still had problems in their free skate, turning a triple salchow into a double, but their score of 208.64 points put in them in first place with five pairs left to go; they finished fifth.
It wasn't a bad showing by Sui and Han, given they only began a comeback last June following a two-year retirement.
“For me, this is my last Olympics,” Han said afterward.
Miura and Kihara were next up — and they produced a score that proved impossible to beat.
They were flawless on a triple toe-double axel-double axel sequence to start their program, set to music from the “Gladiator” films, while Miura landed with grace and elegance on their throw triple loop. And as other teams struggled with their salchows, Miura and Kihara's were clean, with their throw triple loop putting an exclamation mark on the program.
Kihara was emotionless after their short program, but he erupted with a roar when their free skate score was announced.
Then he quietly dropped to his knees and hugged Miura when he learned they had won gold.
AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics
Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava of Georgia compete during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava of Georgia compete during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara of Japan compete during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara of Japan compete during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)
Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara of Japan react to their scores after competing during the pairs figure skating long program at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
PREDAZZO, Italy (AP) — A disappointing Olympics for Austria's ski jumpers turned to gold Monday on the final night of competition in the debut of the men’s super team ski jump at the Milan Cortina Games.
Jan Hoerl and Olympic rookie Stephan Embacher led through the event before a snow squall forced the cancellation of the final round of the event.
Poland took silver and Norway won bronze.
The result was redemption for Austria, which won the men’s team event in Beijing in 2022, but had not reached the podium in this Olympics.
“The last 10 days were hard for our team so it was the last chance today,” said Hoerl, who was part of the 2022 winning team. “We knew that, so we kept focused and we were able to enjoy five good jumps. It’s amazing, unbelievable.”
Hoerl's best individual finish had been a fifth on the men's large hill and Embacher's had been a pair of seventh place finishes on each hill. Both had also been on the mixed team that finished fifth.
The new format replaced the former four-man team contest on the large hill with teams of two. Seventeen nations jumped in the first round and the top 12 made the second round. The best eight moved on to the final.
But as heavy snow and wind held up competition with only a few skiers left to make their final jump, the round was canceled and the second round standings determined the winners.
Sandro Pertile, race director for the international ski federation, said the heavy, wet snow was slowing speeds on the in-run and the shift in winds was going to create unfair conditions for the remaining competitors.
Hoerl opened with a 137.5-meter (451-foot) jump and Embacher in the second round landed a 139-meter (456-foot) jump, the longest in the contest.
“My first time and to be Olympic champion is unbelievable,” Embacher said. “It was a great day.”
Austria led Slovenia, Poland, Germany and Japan after the first round. Poland moved into second and Norway into third as Slovenia slid into fifth place after the second round.
The result delivered a third medal for Poland's Kacper Tomasiak, a rookie in his first year on the World Cup circuit, who has been the surprise of men's Olympic ski jumping, winning a silver on the normal hill and a bronze on the large hill. He was paired with Pawel Wasek, whose best Olympic finish had been sixth in a team event in 2022.
“We are very happy, but I think we still can’t believe that it happened," Tomasiak said.
Norway's Johann André Forfang, who had won gold on the large hill and silver on the normal hill in Pyeongchang in 2018 but had not had a good Olympics before Monday was paired with Kristoffer Eriksen Sundal, who won silver in the mixed team event.
Forfang was suspended last year in a jumpsuit-tampering scandal that brought shame to the country that invented the sport.
Forfang and teammate Marius Lindvik were suspended for three months last year after their coaches and a staff member were caught on camera adding stitching to stiffen the crotch area to help the athletes fly farther.
Neither Lindvik nor Forfang was charged with knowing about the manipulation, but FIS said they “should have checked and asked questions about the nighttime adjustments.”
The team leaders involved were recently banned from the sport for 18 months.
Going into the final round, only a few points separated Germany, Slovenia and Japan from a medal.
Japan’s Ren Nikaido, who has won a medal in every ski jump at this Olympics, landed a third jump of 138 meters, which could have put Japan on the podium had the final round not been canceled before Ryoyu Kobayashi's final jump.
Slovenia’s Domen Prevc, the dominant skier this season, was one of the few jumpers to fly in the heavy snow, with a poor result of 124.5 meters.
Germany’s Philipp Raimund, who won gold on the normal hill, then flew 136 meters through the snow, putting his country in the lead with four jumpers — all with higher second-round scores — remaining.
Tomasiak was the last skier to fly through the flakes, coming up short and putting Poland in third behind Slovenia.
Norway, Japan and Austria’s final skiers were left at the top of the hill when the event was ended.
Raimund said it was sad ending up in fourth place.
The result meant Prevc could not add to the gold medals he won on the men’s large hill and in the mixed team competition in his first Olympics — or to his family's famous collection. He blamed his team's finish on the poor landing of his second jump.
“It was almost third place, but overall it is a bit sour for me," Prevc said. “Unfortunately, we have to take this as it is.”
He said canceling the round, though, was the right decision.
The U.S. team of Kevin Bickner and Tate Frantz made it to the final round but ended up in eighth place.
AP Winter Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics
Ren Nikaido, of Japan, left, and Philipp Raimund, of Germany, react as a snowfall interrupts the final round jump of the ski jumping men's super team competition at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Predazzo, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)
Jan Hoerl, of Austria, reacts after his final round jump of the ski jumping men's super team competition at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Predazzo, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Gold medalists Stephan Embacher and Jan Hoerl, of Austria, pose on the podium, with silver medalists Pawel Wasek and Kacper Tomasiak, of Poland, and bronze medalists Kristoffer Eriksen Sundal and Johann Andre Forfang, of Norway, after the ski jumping men's super team competition at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Predazzo, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
Pawel Wasek, left, and Kamil Stoch, both of Poland, wait while a snowfall interrupts the final round jump of the ski jumping men's super team competition at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Predazzo, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
Domen Prevc, of Slovenia, launches off the ramp during his final round jump of the ski jumping men's super team competition at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Predazzo, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
Gold medalists Stephan Embacher and Jan Hoerl, of Austria, celebrate on the podium, with silver medalists Pawel Wasek and Kacper Tomasiak, of Poland, and bronze medalists Kristoffer Eriksen Sundal and Johann Andre Forfang, of Norway, after the ski jumping men's super team competition at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Predazzo, Italy, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
