If Paris was pretty, Milano Cortina promises to be, in a word, grande. The first Olympics to be co-hosted by two cities -- Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy -- next year's Winter Games will feature the largest footprint in Olympic history, with competition spread over 10,000 square miles of northeastern Italy and some of the most breathtaking terrain in Europe. The local organizing committee is utilizing mostly existing venues stretching from Milan to the Dolomite mountains and the backdrops will be spectacular.
So too will the action, which stands to feature boldface stars still competing since the last time Italy hosted a Winter Games 20 years ago in Torino -- and others who weren't even born yet. With one year to go until Milan's San Siro football stadium hosts the opening ceremony of the 2026 Olympic Games, here are the storylines heating up ahead of next winter. -- Alyssa Roenigk
Comeback stories to watch
Three-time Olympian Lindsey Vonn retired from alpine ski racing in 2019. She still had the drive, but her body begged her to stop. In February of that year, she finally listened. Six years later, with a titanium right knee and out of pain for the first time in a decade, Vonn is back. She'll be 41 in Milano Cortina, where she hopes to race the final downhill of her career. Whether or not the 2010 Olympic downhill champion medals this time around isn't the point. "I have a second chance," Vonn told ESPN. "This isn't me trying to prove anything or break records. I'm doing this for myself and because I know what I'm capable of."
That sounds a lot like Maddy Schaffrick's "why." Ten years ago, Schaffrick was an Olympic hopeful when, at 20, she quit competitive snowboarding. She'd suffered a string of injuries and, looking back now, says she didn't have the maturity or mental skills to continue competing. She returned to the sport a year later as a coach and, in 2023, was named head coach of the women's halfpipe team at U.S. Ski & Snowboard. A year into the job, she realized she had unfinished business -- as a competitor. Now 30, she's back in a bib, learning new tricks and riding better than ever.
"When I was young, making the Olympics meant a lot internally, but it was not something I spoke about," Schaffrick told ESPN. "I was fearful I didn't have what it would take to make my dream come true." After a decade away, Schaffrick returned to World Cup competition in December and finished third. She is currently ranked No. 6 in the World Cup halfpipe standings and is the third-ranked U.S. woman. (Four will make the 2026 team.) If she stays healthy, she has a legitimate shot at making her first Olympic team at 31. "Going to Italy would mean that I listened to myself and believed in myself," Schaffrick said, "which is the entire purpose of this journey."
For Lolo Jones, a return to the U.S. bobsled team is about finding out what she's capable of achieving. Sparked by her success last summer in qualifying for Olympic track and field trials at 41, and a request from up-and-coming driver Lauren Brzozowski to join her sled, Jones started training for the sport in an attempt to make her second winter Olympics 12 years after she competed in her first. "The Tom Brady retirement continues," she posted after making the U.S. national team in November. -- Roenigk
Raising the bar in halfpipe
Two-time Olympic gold medalist Chloe Kim, 24, continues to push the progression of women's halfpipe riding and, hot off a record-setting eighth X Games Aspen win, is attempting to become the first snowboarder to win three Olympic gold medals in a row. She's also pushing her competitors. U.S. teammate Maddie Mastro, a two-time Olympian, is riding better than ever and at the Laax Open in January became the first woman to land two double cork tricks -- a double crippler and a frontside double cork 1080 -- in the same halfpipe run.
"I put a lot of work into my double crippler to have more confidence in that trick," Mastro, 24, told ESPN. "I want to incorporate as many doubles as I can into my [Olympic] run and am working towards landing the dream run I have in my head."
At that same contest in Laax, Kim became the first woman to land a cab double cork 1080 in halfpipe competition and won gold. Mastro finished second but currently leads Kim in the World Cup standings. The pair will compete at world championships in St. Moritz in March and whoever finishes higher will earn the first spot on the 2026 Olympic team. (The rest of the four-woman squad will be named next January.) For Kim, her Olympic goals this time around are more internal. "I'm just hoping to walk away unscathed and with a big smile on my face," she said. -- Roenigk
Shiffrin's recovery -- and redemption story
One World Cup win shy of No. 100, alpine skier Mikaela Shiffrin suffered one of the worst, and most unusual, injuries of her career in November. She crashed in a giant slalom in Killington, Vermont, slid into the protective fence and was impaled -- she still doesn't know by what -- suffering a deep puncture wound to the muscles in her right side. After surgery and arduous physical therapy, Shiffrin returned to the World Cup circuit at a slalom race in Courchevel, France, at the end of January, focused not on wins, but on her recovery. "It was a very important step to see how I'm stacking up with the top skiers in the world," Shiffrin, 29, said after finishing 10th in the race. "And to see what I can work on to improve my skiing."
The winningest alpine skier in history, Shiffrin is a three-time Olympian and two-time gold medalist (slalom in 2014 and giant slalom in 2018) but experienced a disappointing Games in 2022. She competed in all six events, crashed in three and didn't earn a medal. She's put that experience in the rearview, but there's no doubt she'd appreciate another shot to earn Olympic hardware in Cortina. -- Roenigk
The NHL effect could be big
We're in a golden era of American hockey. But most of the top stars -- Auston Matthews, the Tkachuk brothers, the Hughes brothers -- have not played an international best-on-best tournament, because the NHL has sat out the last two Olympic cycles. That all changes as the league is set to send its players to Milan after coming to an agreement with the NHLPA and IIHF. We'll get a teaser at February's 4 Nations Tournament which will pit USA, Canada, Finland and Sweden against each other. But Olympic gold is the ultimate goal, and will feature a wider field including Germany (Leon Draisaitl, Moritz Seider and Tim Stutzle), Switzerland (Roman Josi, Nico Hischier) and Czechia (David Pastrnak, Filip Chytil).
The IIHF ruled Tuesday that it would continue to ban Russia from international events through the 2025-26 season, but the IOC will have final say over if Russia can participate in the Olympics and under what conditions. The Russians would be stacked (Nikita Kucherov, Andrei Vasilevski, Igor Shesterkin, Kirill Kaprizov and of course Alex Ovechkin headline). Canada has won nine golds, and is 45-5 all time when Sidney Crosby suits up. This could be the 37-year-old's swan song for his country, and would have a stellar supporting cast featuring the last two NHL MVP's: Nathan MacKinnon and Connor McDavid. But Team USA will field as good a team as they ever have, and will look for their first gold since the 1980 Miracle team. -- Emily Kaplan
U.S. vs. Canada ... again
Either the U.S or Canada has won gold at every Olympics since women's hockey was introduced in 1998. While the rest of the world is catching up in quality -- 22 non-North American players were on PWHL opening night rosters, including nine from Czechia, five from Sweden and three from Finland -- the Olympics once again is either the U.S or Canada's to lose in one of sport's great rivalries.
The Canadians, featuring the best player in the world Marie-Phillip Poulin in her fifth and likely final Olympic Games, have a more veteran roster. The U.S. should bring familiar names too, like Hilary Knight and Kendall Coyne-Schofield, but they'll be much younger. One player estimated that the U.S. will be 50/50 pro to college players while Canada is 95/5. -- Kaplan
The new Olympic sport
The sport of ski mountaineering -- called SkiMo in its competitive form -- will debut in Italy, where the home country will be heavy favorites. The sport combines uphill climbing (in boots and utilizing skins, or fabric that attaches to the bottom of each ski, for traction) and downhill skiing through GS gates on manmade courses. Although some SkiMo races can take several hours, in Milano Cortina, the sport will debut with men's and women's sprint races, which take around three to five minutes, as well as a mixed relay event, which features one man and one woman competing as a team. That's where the U.S. will shine.
In January, the U.S. team had a strong showing at the first mixed relay of the season in Andorra, Spain, with 29-year-old Cam Smith posting the fastest qualifier lap of the field. "We've had a national team for 15 years, but the sport has grown exponentially since the Olympic announcement," Sarah Cookler, the head of sport for USA SkiMo, told ESPN. "We're already excited about our potential next year."
The Games will also include five new events in existing sports: men's and women's dual moguls, mixed team skeleton, women's doubles luge and women's large hill ski jumping. -- Roenigk
Leading the world in figure skating
U.S. figure skating is in mourning after the horror of last week, when a plane crash killed 28 young skaters, family members and coaches. Many of the stars in the sport, from Ilia Malinin to Evan Bates and Madison Chock will perform in a benefit for the victims of the crash in Washington, D.C. on March 2.
As they look ahead to next year, Team USA could be coming home with multiple gold medals. In men's, Malinin is redefining dominance. Last week, the self-proclaimed "Quad God" won his third U.S. championship title in a row after landing six of seven quads. He is the only skater in the world to land the quad axel -- a jump with 4.5 rotations -- in international competition, and he looks to defend his worlds title next month.
In women's, 25-year-old Amber Glenn is having a breakthrough season. The two-time U.S. national champion hasn't lost a competition this season, though 2022 Olympian Alysa Liu, returning after a two-year hiatus, nearly unseated her at nationals last week. No U.S. woman has medaled in singles at the Olympics since Sasha Cohen in 2006.
In ice dance, the husband-and-wife team of Bates and Chock look to compete in their fourth Olympics and win their first medal in the dance event. (They won gold in the team event in 2022.) Watch for their innovative music selection -- check out their jazzy free skate! -- and stylish costumes Chock designed herself. Put it all together and Team USA should take home another medal in the team event. -- Elaine Teng
A family dynasty in the making?
In January, U.S. alpine skier Lauren Macuga won her first World Cup ski race, a super-G in St. Anton, Austria, and became the youngest American to win a World Cup speed race since Vonn in 2007. Only 22, Macuga is also the first U.S. woman to win a super-G at St. Anton and could become the first American woman to win the event at an Olympics. But she's not the only Macuga with her eyes on Italy.
Macuga's sister, Aly, 21, is a podium threat in moguls skiing and Sam, 23, competes on the U.S. ski jumping team. (Their younger brother is also an alpine racer, but 2030 is a more likely goal for him.) The entire family has the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics to thank for introducing them to their respective sports. The Macugas moved to Park City in 2007 and parents Dan and Amy signed up their kids for a winter sports program called Get Out and Play, a legacy of those Games. -- Roenigk
The cat T-shirt approach
Nick Goepper is a three-time Olympic medalist, was one-third of the U.S. ski slopestyle podium sweep at the Sochi Games and retired from the sport after Beijing 2022. "It felt like more of a pause," Goepper told ESPN, "but I was absolutely done competing in slopestyle." A year ago, he announced his return to freeskiing -- in halfpipe, an event in which he never competed. He also set a goal to make the 2026 Olympics and win the one medal he never earned in slopestyle: gold.
If his competitors didn't take him seriously at first, they do now. Goepper won the X Games in late January and placed second at the Aspen Grand Prix a week later. "I'd be lying if I said I didn't care about winning [the Olympics] but I'm not focused on it," he said.
Competing with few sponsors since making the switch to halfpipe, Goepper has become something of a social media sensation for spoofing the cool-guy attitude of action sports and simply being authentic. Over the past year, the Indiana native has competed wearing jeans and cat T-shirts. "I'm a nerd. I read books. I don't care about trends or the latest fashion," Goepper said. "I love the sport and some of the lifestyle aspects of it. But I'm mixing it up. I'm approaching this from the polar opposite angle of being the guy on the poster wearing glasses and looking super cool on a Southern California beach. I'm the awkward Midwestern kid who's talking about anxiety and depression on the podium at the X Games."
And he's thinking long term. Now 30, Goepper said he's looking beyond Milano Cortina. "I'm going to do this for at least another five years," he said. -- Roenigk