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PREDAZZO, ITALY — Particularly among the citizens of the Scandinavian nations where cross-country skiing is religion, bringing up the United States right now does not exactly elicit warm fuzzies in Europe.
U.S. President Donald Trump, after all, has done his best to shred traditional North Atlantic alliances, complained to Norway’s prime minister that he should have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and said he could take over Greenland by force.
At the Winter Olympics opening ceremonies in Italy last weekend, fans greeted Vice President JD Vance with boos.
All of which made for a confusing afternoon Tuesday in Tesero, Italy, where the Olympic cross-country ski sprint race unfolded: Rival athletes and spectators from Norway and Sweden were joining in the celebration of the silver medal won by American Ben Ogden, in spite of the stars and stripes on his uniform.
It was only the second-ever U.S. medal by a man in Ogden’s sport, and a vivid illustration of the Olympics’ potential — not always realized — to transcend political division.
“He’s the kind of president America should have,” said Tomas Pettersson, a veteran sportswriter and columnist with the Swedish tabloid Expressen. “Nobody thinks of Donald Trump and Ben Ogden in the same moment.”
The historic silver for Ogden — the first U.S. men’s medal in his sport in a half-century — comes as he and his American teammates have been navigating repeated questioning by Olympics journalists about the behavior of Trump and his administration.
On Tuesday, the questions were about Trump calling a U.S. Olympian a “loser” after the freestyle skier had said it was “a little hard” to be representing America; earlier in the Games, the questions were about the killings of protestors by federal agents in Minnesota.
“We love our country so much, especially the ideals it was founded on, and don’t really feel like those ideals are really what’s happening right now,” Lauren Jortberg, one of the female American skiers, told reporters after Tuesday’s race. “There’s a lot of personal internal conflict. I’m not going to speak for the team, but I personally think it’s been hard to represent the States right now.”
In interviews Tuesday, competitors, teammates and friends all said Ogden embodies the qualities that he and other U.S. skiers say they’ve been trying to project at the Olympics in a difficult political moment: joy, kindness, respect.
“I don’t think they could have a better poster child, at this point so far in the Games, to fly the flag,” said Zach Caldwell, an American who’s working with a ski wax company at the Olympics. “You don’t have to know Ben very well to like him. And you’d have to really dig deep not to like him.”
He added: “He just goes around the world picking up fans. He’s just an effortlessly gracious guy.”
Caldwell would know better than most: He’s known Ogden since he was a child. Both of them live in Vermont, and Caldwell went to college and ski raced with Ogden’s father, John, who was also a beloved figure in the sport in New England.
John died in 2023 at age 56 after a decade-long fight with cancer. At a news conference after his silver medal Tuesday, Ogden said it was most likely his father who’d imprinted the traits that have brought him so many friendships on the cross-country ski circuit, and elsewhere.
“He was a real community builder, and, you know, I miss him every single day, and I try to be like him,” Ogden said. “He cheered for everybody, and said hi to everybody, and tried to get everybody excited about what they were doing. And that’s what I try and do — and I hope people feel it.”
They do, if the comments from others in Tesero are any measure.
Maja Dahlqvist, the Swede who won bronze in Tuesday’s sprint: “People are really happy for Ben. Our team is happy for Ben.”
Johannes Høsflot Klæbo, the Norwegian gold medalist: “I think it’s hard not to like Ben, so I think we all do…it’s fun to be able to share the podium together.”
Klæbo’s father, Haakon: “I think it’s so fantastic that we have Ben in second place. It’s crazy cool.”
British skier James Clugnet, on his podcast, where he said he got “a little bit emotional” Tuesday watching Ogden: “I think it’s so well-deserved. He’s a super nice guy.”
U.S. coaches and staff members spent Tuesday afternoon fielding a deluge of congratulatory texts, calls and emails from colleagues on other teams — an indication that the warm feelings extend not just to Ogden. Somehow, the full American team seems to have largely detached itself from their European competitors’ perception of the American political system.
“I haven’t heard one single American skier back up Donald Trump’s craziness,” said Pettersson, the Swedish sportswriter. “They seem like totally normal people — as we thought the U.S. would be, forever.”
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Nathaniel Herz
Nat Herz is an Alaska-based journalist who moonlights for FasterSkier as an occasional reporter and podcast host. He was FasterSkier's full-time reporter in 2010 and 2011.
