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After eight classical distances in which skaters compete for individual medals, it’s time for the only team event in Long Track Speed Skating at the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026. It's Team Pursuit Tuesday. 

The USA Men hope to win the one and only Team Pursuit title they haven't won yet, while the Canadian Women defend their Olympic title from Beijing 2022.

Favorites qualify second

Casey Dawson, Emery Lehman, and Ethan Cepuran, pictured above, call themselves the Pain Train. The Americans give absolute priority to the Team Pursuit event over individual distances.

After having secured the 2023 World Cup Trophy with teammates Dawson and Cepuran, Lehman explained: "If you look at each skater individually, they're all really, really good skaters, most people would probably say better than us three. We know we're really strong as a team."

The sacrifice paid off. The Pain Train won the Team Pursuit World Cup five consecutive times since the 2021-2022 season, they broke the World Record three times since 2021, and they won the World Title in 2025.

Ethan Cepuran, Dawson Casey and Emery Lehman of Team United States in training in Milan © Getty Images

Olympic gold is the only prize that eluded the illustrious trio so far. In 2022, they also went in as favorites, only to get knocked out by Sergey Trofimov, Daniil Aldoshkin, and Ruslan Zakharov (ROC), who beat the Americans skating the current Olympic record in the semi-finals. Norway eventually ran away with the title in Beijing.

To make sure that the Pain Train would be in top shape for the competition in Milan, Dawson even skipped his individual 10,000m race on Friday. Yet, Dawson, Lehman and Cepuran did not manage to qualify first for the final, with Italy's (Andrea Giovannini, Michele Malfatti, Davide Ghiotto) skating the fastest time.

Lehman said: "We've come in with the pressure of being favourites for it. Today isn't a step backwards necessarily, because sometimes you have to take a step back to go two steps forward and mean our goal to come out on Tuesday and win it all. 

"We still have the chance to do that even though we didn't come out on top today. And so we've got a semi-final and the final to go."

In the semi-finals, the USA will face China's Liu Hanbin, Li Wenhao, and Wu Yu, who surprisingly qualified third.

Italy will face the Netherlands, who will start in a different line-up after Chris Huizinga, Marcel Bosker and Stijn van de Bunt set the fourth time in the quarter finals. Jorrit Bergsma (NED) will replace Bosker in the semis.

After beating the USA in the quarter-finals, Giovannini said: "They are the favorites because they have won all the races this year. It will be very difficult to beat them. Certainly, this performance, after a year in which we have always lost, gives us a bit of confidence and perhaps also shakes their confidence a little.

"Now the focus must be on the semi-final. The first thing to do is beat the Netherlands and then, if we reach the final against the United States, we'll see what happens."

Davide Ghiotto, Michele Malfatti and Andrea Giovannini of Italy celebrate after Sunday's quarter-final performance © Getty Images

The Numbers: Men’s Team Pursuit

• World Record: 3:32.49 USA (Casey Dawson, Emery Lehman, Ethan Cepuran), Salt Lake City 16 November 2025
• Olympic Record: 3:36.62, ROC (Sergey Trofimov, Daniil Aldoshkin, Ruslan Zakharov), Beijing 08 February 2022
• Track record: no track record yet
• Number of teams competing: 8
• Number of delegations represented: 8
• Competition starts at 16:00hrs at Milano Speed Skating Stadium

Olympic Champions Canada brought the band back together

In the Women's competition, defending Champions Canada (Isabelle Weidemann, Ivanie Blondin, Valérie Maltais) qualified first for the semi-finals. The field is very competitive, with Canada, Japan and the Netherlands all having won a World Cup race this season. 

After winning in 2022, Canada have approached the 2026 Games differently. Blondin explained: "We haven't trained together consecutively these past four years. Before that, for four years straight, we were training partners.”

Maltais added: "It was good to be back here at the Olympics, training together. We laid down a good race today.

"We think about that final, but we need to get to the final first. One step at a time.”

In the semi-finals, Canada will face the United States (Brittany Bowe, Mia Manganello, Giorgia Birkeland), who set the fourth time in 2:58.32.

In the other semi-final, second qualifier Japan (Ayana Sato, Miho Takagi, Momoka Horikawa) will face the Netherlands (Joy Beune, Antoinette Rijpma-De Jong, Marijke Groenewoud), who qualified third. 

The Dutch skated a far from perfect race in the quarter-finals, with Beune saying: "I had a little scare when I touched blades (with teammate Rijpma-De Jong), but we can definitely build on this result given our opening was not great. That was my fault. I was feeling very nervous, but now this is over I feel relieved. I feel confident about our chances in the semifinal."

Japan's Sato also felt room for improvement after the quarter-finals: “Since arriving in Milan, I’ve felt day by day that our skating has been getting better in training. In terms of our unity as a team as well. But when I think about whether we delivered 100% of that today, I don’t think we did." 

Japan will take on the Netherlands in Milan on Tuesday © Getty Images

The Numbers: Women’s Team Pursuit

• World Record: 2:50.76, Japan (Ayana Sato, Miho Takagi, Nana Takagi) Salt Lake City 14 February 2020
• Olympic Record: 2:53.44 Canada (Isabelle Weidemann, Ivanie Blondin, Valérie Maltais) Beijing 15- February 2022
• Track record: no track record yet
• Number of teams competing: 8
• Number of delegations represented: 8
• Competition starts at 16:00hrs at Milano Speed Skating Stadium