Spanish ski mountaineer and skyrunner Oriol Cardona received gold within the 2026 Olympic Video games Ski Mountaineering Males’s Dash, making historical past within the sport’s Olympic debut. The occasion befell on Thursday, February 19, on a snowy, cloudy afternoon in Bormio, Italy.
Spain’s Oriol Cardona on his option to successful the gold medal on the 2026 Olympic Ski Mountaineering Males’s Dash race. Right here, he’s proven ascending within the semi-final. Picture: Michael Kappeler/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Pictures
Cardona, who has path operating outcomes reminiscent of a sixth-place end on the 2019 Zegama Marathon, has centered extra on ski mountaineering (skimo) than path operating since 2022. He’s thought of one of many strongest skimo athletes within the dash distance, and, other than a small bobble within the semi-finals, was dominant from the preliminary spherical to the finals. He received the ultimate nicely away from the remainder of the sector in 2:34.03.
Emily Harrop of France, who comes from an alpine snowboarding background however has finished some skyrunning as lately as 2021, when she received the Tignes Path, received silver within the 2026 Olympic Video games Ski Mountaineering Girls’s Dash race behind Marianne Fatton of Switzerland.
Path runners Cam Smith and Anna Gibson, representing Group USA, each made it to the semi-final spherical.
On the sport’s debut on the Olympic Video games, skiers hailed from a wide range of athletic backgrounds. Many had finished some form of path racing, however right here we deal with these most lately concerned within the sport.
Ski mountaineer and path runner Emily Harrop of France celebrates a silver medal within the 2026 Olympic Video games Ski Mountaineering Girls’s Dash. Picture: Michael Kappeler/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Pictures
Difficult Race Situations
Skimo, which — at its very primary description — entails operating uphill on skis after which snowboarding again down, and rewards unbelievable uphill pace and the power to ski rapidly downhill on very skinny, light-weight skis. Skiers use skins, which offer grip, on the underside of their skis to climb, then take them off to ski downhill. There have been three rounds of motion: a preliminary warmth, semi-finals, and the ultimate.
The Olympic dash course took males about 2.5 minutes and ladies about 3 minutes. It was comprised of two segments of uphill snowboarding damaged up with a bootpack — the place racers put their skis on their backs and ran up a set of stairs. As soon as on the prime, they ripped the skins off their skis and raced again down the mountain. The three transitions between uphill snowboarding, bootpacking, uphill snowboarding, and downhill snowboarding take about six seconds every, they usually typically resolve the race’s end result. The entire thing is quick and livid.
Through the semi-final and ultimate heats on Thursday afternoon, racers confronted falling snow on the Stelvio Ski Centre excessive within the Italian Alps. The snow and cloud resulted in decrease visibility, flat mild, and tough snowboarding situations. The snow, which was heavier earlier within the afternoon, accrued solely slightly between the lads’s and ladies’s semi-final heats and the finals, held lower than an hour aside. The situations made transitions between the totally different segments of the race harder as snow discovered its manner into the intricate transferring components of the ski bindings.
Spain’s Oriol Cardona on his option to successful the 2022 L’Olla de Núria traditional race. Picture: L’Olla de Núria/Iván González
On Thursday morning, 18 racers squared off in three preliminary heats, the place the highest three superior to the semi-finals, in addition to the following three quickest instances. Cardona received his preliminary warmth in 2:42.40, the quickest time of the morning. Harrop set the quickest ladies’s time at 3:03.34.
Within the afternoon semi-finals, Harrop led her warmth from the beginning, the falling snow seeming to offer her no issue. Within the ultimate, Harrop led on the prime of the bootpack however was gradual within the transition again onto skis and gave up the result in Fatton, who held on for gold. Harrop completed second.
Within the males’s semi-final, Cardona led on the prime of the primary uphill ski, however was additionally gradual within the transition after the bootpack, and he positioned second in his warmth behind Switzerland’s Jon Kistler. Within the ultimate, there have been no bobbles. Whereas initially Cardona appeared caught behind the main Swiss duo of Kistler and Arno Lietha, he took the lead into the primary transition zone and by no means seemed again. A number of racers tripped on the bootpack part, whereas Cardona stayed easy all through — with quick transitions. In the long run, he had loads of time to rejoice his win as he approached the end line again on the backside of the mountain.
Path Runners on Snow
That is skimo’s debut on the Olympics, and we all know of at the very least six path runners collaborating — Cardona, Harrop, Smith, Gibson, Iwona Januszyk (Poland), and Lara Hamilton (Australia).
Cardona discovered fast success when he traded path footwear for skimo boots. In 2022, he received the lads’s dash race on the 2022 Worldwide Ski Mountaineering Federation (ISMF) European Championships. He received the lads’s dash on the ISMF World Championships in 2023 and 2025, the latter securing Spain’s spot within the Olympics skimo occasion. Cardona additionally received gold on the 2024 ISMF European Championships within the blended relay, which he raced with Ana Alonso, who received bronze within the Olympic ladies’s dash at present.
Earlier than switching to snow, Cardona was a profitable skyrunner. In 2020, he was sixth in two races on the Golden Path World Sequence Championships. In 2019, he was second on the LimoneExtreme Skyrace, third on the Extremely Pirineu Sky race, in addition to sixth on the Zegama Marathon.
Harrop has raced much less on trails than the others, however her prime consequence might be a fifth place on the 2021 La Skyrhune race. She has been dominant in ISMF World Cup and World Championships for a half decade, with three world championships wins to her identify in 2023 and 2025.
Combined Relay Coming Up Subsequent
The dash race was the primary of two skimo occasions on the Olympics, with the blended relay arising on Saturday, February 21. Gibson and Smith are hoping to medal within the barely longer occasion. Of their first time racing a blended relay collectively, they received the 2025 ISMF Solitude World Cup race in Utah in December. The win certified the pair to compete for Group USA on the Olympics. On Saturday, they may race alongside Cardona and Alonso, in addition to Harrop and her companion, Thibault Anselmet, who received bronze within the Olympic males’s dash.
Emily Harrop (France) taking fifth on the 2021 La Skyrhune race. Picture: Jean Baptiste Joly
