Xandra Velzeboer Sets a World Record on the Way to Olympic Gold

Milan-Cortina saw a string of Olympic records fall on the ice, but only one genuine world record, and it was hers.

By Miles Ashworth · 13 Feb 2026 · 3 min read · United States edition

Xandra Velzeboer, Netherlands Olympic team. Photo: Alex Sirac, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0).

Dutch short-track skater Xandra Velzeboer clocked 41.399 in the semi-finals of the women's 500m at the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics on 12 February, a genuine world record and not just an Olympic one. Later the same evening she won gold in the final in 41.609.

It turned out to be the only world record set on the ice at these Games. Several Olympic records have fallen in speed skating and short track at the Milano Ice Skating Arena and on the long-track oval, a number of them by Dutch athletes. But an Olympic record only means the fastest time ever recorded at an Olympics. It does not have to beat the outright global best. Velzeboer's semi-final did both at once.

How the final went

If the semi-final was about the clock, the final was about control. Velzeboer went to the front from the start and was never headed, with Italy's Arianna Fontana chasing her. Fontana, the two-time defending champion and the host nation's biggest star on the ice, took silver in 42.294 in front of a home crowd. Canada's Courtney Sarault won bronze in 42.427.

The margin was huge by short-track standards. Velzeboer finished almost seven tenths of a second clear of Fontana, in an event where medals are often decided by a skate length and where a single mistake in one of the four and a half laps can end a race in the barriers.

Why a world record in short track is rare

Short track is not really a sport built for records. Unlike long-track speed skating, where two skaters race the clock in separate lanes, short track is raced in packs of four or more on a tight 111-metre oval. Tactics, positioning and contact often matter more than raw speed, and many rounds are raced conservatively, with skaters trying to qualify rather than set times.

The 500m is the exception. It is short enough that the fastest starter can often lead from the gun and skate their own race, which is exactly what Velzeboer did in the semi-final. Even so, setting the outright world record in a semi-final, with the medal still to be decided, is its own kind of statement. The record was not the goal. Gold was, and the record came as a by-product of simply skating as fast as she could.

Who Xandra Velzeboer is

Velzeboer was born in September 2001 in Culemborg and comes from a Dutch skating family. Her aunt, Monique Velzeboer, won gold at the 1988 Calgary Games, when short track was still a demonstration sport, and her younger sister Michelle is also on the Dutch short-track team. The two sisters were both part of the Dutch mixed relay team that set an Olympic record earlier in these Games.

She won her first Olympic gold as part of the Netherlands' 3000m relay team in Beijing in 2022. Since then she has built one of the strongest records in the sport, with world titles over 500m, 1000m and 1500m as well as in the relays. Milan-Cortina gave her the individual Olympic gold that had been missing.

A Dutch Games on the ice

Velzeboer's win continued a strong Games for the Netherlands, who have long been the dominant nation in long-track speed skating and have become a leading force in short track too. In Milan they took on the sport's traditional powers, South Korea, Canada and China, and more than held their own.

Update: Four days later, on 16 February, Velzeboer added a second individual gold, winning the women's 1000m in 1:28.437 ahead of Sarault and South Korea's Kim Gil-li. The Netherlands finished top of the short-track medal table with five golds.