Casey Dawson, Ethan Cepuran and Emery Lehman won a silver medal in the men’s team pursuit in Milan on Tuesday, skating for the last time as a team to a second-place finish in the Olympic final.
The American trio completed the race in 3 minutes and 43.71 seconds, finishing 4.51 seconds behind Italy with the gold to upgrade the bronze medal they earned in Beijing four years ago. China won bronze.
For Lehman, competing in his fourth and final Winter Games before retirement, it marked the final chapter of a seven-year fight for the Olympic gold.
“There’s always going to be bitterness,” said Dawson, a Park City resident. “We came out here to win. The last four years, it was the dream to get gold at these Games. But today, we put in the effort we could. We put it all out there on the ice. Medals are medals and we’re always going to be proud about that. It’s the last go-around for us three. So we’re going out with a bang and that is still true.”
The team advanced to the final after a dominant semifinal in which they nearly lapped China, stopping the clock just behind Italy.
“Our plan when we do team pursuit is just to hunt down the other team,” Lehman said.
With three laps to go in the final, knowing they might be lagging behind the home team, Lehman tapped Dawson’s back — a signal that he and Cepuran were at their limit, but Dawson kept pushing, they said.
“He was kind of doing those last three laps on his own for all of us,” Lehman said.
Italy, buoyed by a roaring home crowd and the fastest times in every round, proved untouchable on Tuesday, and sometimes that is just the way of the Olympics, said Lehman. Regardless of how many world records (three) and World Cup wins (five) they had all season, all that counts is what you put down in the present.
“You can’t just be the best going in,” he said. “You have to be the best on the day you compete. Italy was the best today. You could say we lost gold, but I just think they won that gold medal, and we earned our silver medal.”
In the Olympic team pursuit, three skaters race together over eight laps of the oval, working as a single unit against another trio on the opposite side of the track. The clock stops when the third skater crosses the finish line. Teams advance through quarterfinals and semifinals before the two fastest teams meet in the gold-medal race.
This trio pioneered the modern technique in team pursuit, where instead of rotating the leader every lap or two, one skater, Dawson, stays in front for the entire race, propelled by timed pushes from the two behind him.
“It was a crazy idea that was brought to us,” Lehman said. “I don’t think you could ask anyone prior to seven years ago to have one person lead the whole team pursuit — they would think that’s ridiculous.”
The team became the guinea pigs for a system that required relentless training together and an extremely high level of trust, said Dawson. And it has paid off in spades.
“Look at the three of us and you’d be like, how the heck are they world champions? How the heck are they world record holders?” Cepuran joked. “Looks can be deceiving.”
Dawson added: “A bunch of average Joes. But the sum is greater than each individual.”
Inside the speed skating oval at Fiera Rho, the Dutch presence was unmistakable, with entire sections washed in orange, drums and horns echoing through the curves of the track. Italian flags dotted the sides, and within the chaos, the families and friends of the three American skaters cheered as loud as they could against the hum of 6,000 spectators.
Four years ago, Dawson’s parents watched from Park City at 2:30 in the morning, bleary-eyed and yelling at a television screen. This time they, along with Lehman’s and Cepuran’s families, were there for the team in person.
“I had a rough go around in Beijing. Not having anyone in the stands was probably one of the hardest moments, because the people that you love and that support you are everything to you,” said Dawson.
Seeing them waiting to congratulate him after the race, Dawson said, was something he had imagined countless times.
“Seeing them at the top of the stairs and giving them hugs was something you can just dream about,” he said. “It was pretty amazing. Having them there today is something to be happy about. We’re sharing this moment with them as well.”
For his mother, Tami Dawson, watching was its own emotional marathon. Even tucked behind the broadcast camera and attached to a microphone, she didn’t hold back. When the trio came down the final straight, she was still on her feet, yelling and willing them through every last lap.
“It’s nerve-racking watching him skate, to be sure,” she said. “You just never know who’s going to be on or off on that one day. But Mike and I feel pretty relaxed knowing they come to the line fully prepared.”
Volunteers lining the path into the arena danced to music blaring through the microphones of their walkie-talkies and megaphones, with Italian pop echoing through the Fiera Rho as spectators found their way in. Fueling the energy of the Milano crowds with lots of dancing and beers sloshing into the seats below, cheers would move through the oval like a wave following the path of the skaters every lap.
“Some of our best races are with a loud crowd,” Dawson said.
He pointed back to the World Cup at the Utah Olympic Oval in November, when the trio set a world record to the soundtrack of one of the loudest crowds Dawson said he has heard.
“They carry us through a race. Even if it hurts a lot, it’s like an extra percent. Having our family in the stands and everything is a little extra motivation on the line,” Dawson said. “It’s just fun.”
The Dawsons remembered the community of Park City rallying around them during the Beijing watch parties in 2022. But still, being there in person with the bond among these three families was different, they said.
That community stretches back to Park City, where Cepuran and Dawson are now nextdoor neighbors and where Dawson first laced up skates with the Youth Sports Alliance. In the weeks leading up to the Games, students at Jeremy Ranch Elementary, Dawson’s former elementary school, sent hundreds of cards along with him to Milan.
“What was cute is that they all knew what Casey’s favorite things were. One of them is pancakes, and so most of the cards that they sent to Casey talked about pancakes and going fast,” said Tami. “That was really heartwarming.”
“I’m representing the community I was raised in, Park City, and the legacy they’ve had on me in sport,” Casey said. “That’s something I’ll hold onto forever.”
For this team that has grown up together, there won’t be another Olympic start as Lehman closes out his fourth and last Olympic Games. Missing the gold is disappointing, they said, but having that community of each other and their families helps remind them that they have still succeeded.
“Seeing how happy our families are for us puts things in perspective. Watching them smile and cheer regardless of our result,” Lehman said. “We get wrapped up in our own little world about winning being the only thing that matters.”
“We have the Olympic medal around our necks,” Dawson said. “We came into these Games wanting to come out with a result we can be proud of. We did everything in our power to skate the race we could.”
Dawson, Cepuran and Lehman will return to the ice again with events on Thursday, the men’s 1500m, and Saturday, the men’s mass start.
For Dawson, who has given the last seven years to this specific team event, the next Olympic cycle will turn his attention to the individual events, hoping to pass the legacy of the team pursuit on to the next generation, training up kids like Ezra Mangum and others in Youth Sports Alliance programs with the opportunity to get involved.