NOTE: History is always changing – or rather our knowledge of historical event. The information below is accurate on the date of publication. Further research may reveal information which changes or replaces some of the details. Check later postings to keep up to date by selecting “Olympics” in the search box or tag list.
At last I can get round to sport at the Olympics. Having several personal issues that have been taking up most of the last six months I was not able to assist my friends at Outsports in compiling their Team LGBT list for Milan Cortina 2026.
What a record-breaking Olympics it has been, with 50 open members of Team LGBT, and another 2 identified since then.
But before I look at their achievements there’s someone I should have included in the first of this 3-part series.
In part 1, “The Road to Milan” I mentioned the bidding process and the awarding of the games to Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo. However, in the muddle of dealing with various issues I forgot to include Astrid Uhrenholdt Jacobsen (b.1987).
Astrid is a former Olympian, competing in cross-country skiing for Norway in 2010, 2014 and 2018, winning one gold medal in the latter. Astrid was a member of the IOC’s Co-ordination Commission for Milan Cortina 2026. A new Commission is set up for each Summer, Winter and Youth Olympics immediately after the selection of a host. In Milan’s case the commission was set up in 2017, and Astrid was one of its eleven members.
The purpose of the Co-ordination Commission is to monitor the progress being made by the host organising committee and make site visits to ensure everything is running to plan and on time.
So, what about the athletes? For full coverage of Team LGBT in Milan Cortina I suggest you consult Outsports excellent coverage – the best on the internet. You can find them here. Below you will find a more analytical approach.
Of the 52 identified (2 of them after the games ended), 15 were making their full Olympic debut, which is down 7 from Beijing 2022. The debutantes include only 1 athlete who had been an alternate at a previous games. This was Amber Glenn who was an alternate figure skater for the USA in 2022. Amber is also the only debutante in Milan Cortina 2026 who became an Olympic champion (figure skating team event). Winning gold in the team event and 5th in the individual singles also makes her the highest climber on the lgbt medal list, going straight in at number 37 out of 175 on the Winter list and 124 out of 915 on the combined Summer/Winter list.
To remind you of what an alternate is – if an Olympian is injured during training or practice before their event has begun and cannot compete, but the team has qualified for the event, then the team can put in a pre-nominated alternate athlete in his or her place. It’s not the same as a reserve in football/soccer who is already on the team. There are other rules, but we don’t need to go into them here.
Actually, there’s an example of another kind of replacement involving another athlete who was in Milan, Breezy (Breanna) Johnson. In January 2021 she was named as a member of Team USA for Beijing 2022. Unfortunately she injured her knee and could not compete. USA had qualified for three places in the downhill event Breezy was registered for. In her place the USA selected Alix Wilkinson, who was not actually an alternate. She was not registered for the downhill event but was already on Team USA for the Super-G event. If Alix had declined to enter this extra event, an alternate athlete could have been selected. Breezy was fully fit for Milan Cortina, and went on to win the gold medal.
For the 8th consecutive Winter Olympics, from the first year that women’s ice hockey took place at the Olympics in 1998, women’s ice hockey players make up the majority of Team LGBT. In Milan Cortina they didn’t quite outnumber all the others, as they had in 1996 and 2002. This includes players identified as belonging to Team LGBT after each games had finished, like the 2 ice hockey players not listed by Outsports who were identified after Milan Cortina was over.
Because of the number of ice hockey players on any one team, it means that they also top the medal list for the sport with the most medallists. However, don’t forget that this is a team sport and only counts as one medal in official records and lists no matter how many are on the team. My lists are slightly different because I register all team members. Even so, women’s ice hockey at Milan Cortina has earned the distinction of the being the second time that female members of Team LGBT have won gold (USA), silver (Canada) and bronze (Switzerland) at a Winter Olympics. The previous occasion was in Salt Lake City 2002, also in women’s ice hockey.
Even though no-one won more than one medal in Milan Cortina, 18 athletes did win one. There were 7 golds (in 5 events – ice hockey, team figure skating, ice dance, alpine skiing, and freestyle skiing), 7 silvers (in 2 events – ice hockey and curling) and 4 bronzes (in 4 events – ice hockey, ice dance, freestyle skiing and speed skating). There were 8 defending champions from Beijing 2022, of which only 2 successfully defended their titles. There were Mathilde Gremaud (freestyle skiing) and Guillaume Cizeron (ice dance).
Milan Cortina 2026 saw the first lgbt athlete to compete in 6 Winter Olympics, Czech speed skater Martina Sáblíková. Even the great Dutch speed skater Ireen Wust didn’t reach that landmark (even though Ireen is the Dutch all-time medal winner, and tops the combined Summer/Winter Team LGBT medal list). Since her debut in Turin 2006 Martina has won 3 gold medals, 2 silvers, and 2 bronzes. This places her 4th on the Winter Olympic medal table, and 9th on the combined Summer/Winter table. Martina is also the only LGBT Olympian to carry her national flag 3 times. Sadly, in what could be her last Olympics, she only finished in 11th place in the one event she entered.
That’s enough statistics for one day, I think.
Here is the updated Lgbt Winter Olympian list. I apologise for any unintentional errors.
