Danny O’Shea’s 30-Year Journey Ends at His First Olympics

Danny O'Shea stood at the edge of the ice at the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics as one of the oldest athletes making his Olympic debut. At 35 years old, the American pairs skater had waited three decades for this moment. Born on February 13, 1991, O'Shea celebrated his birthday just days before the Games began. With his partner Ellie Kam, he delivered a clutch performance in the team event that helped secure gold for Team USA, proving that patience and persistence can reshape a career thought to be over.

Background

O'Shea's relationship with competitive skating spans nearly his entire life. He made his senior debut at the U.S. championships in 2013 with Tarah Kayne, his first major partner. Over nearly nine years together, they won the 2016 U.S. national title and the 2018 Four Continents Championship. But in December 2020, after nearly a decade as a pair, they ended their partnership. O'Shea stepped away from competition.

Retirement, however, did not last. O'Shea had been working as a real estate agent and coaching young pair skaters when he crossed paths with Ellie Kam, a skater more than a decade his junior. Kam was 17 when they began working together. The chemistry was immediate. In September 2022, they officially became a competitive pair, an unusual partnership marked by the largest age gap of any U.S. pair to compete at the World Championships in at least 35 years.

Key Details

A Slow Start That Gained Momentum

Their first season together brought a third-place finish at the 2023 U.S. championships and a 12th-place result at the world championships. Progress was gradual. The 2024 season marked a turning point. They won the U.S. national title that year and earned a bronze medal at the Four Continents Championships in Shanghai.

The 2024-25 season brought real breakthroughs. O'Shea broke the 200-point barrier for the first time in his career when they won silver at Skate America with a score of 201.73 points. They qualified for the Grand Prix Final, becoming only the fourth U.S. pairs team to do so in 14 editions. These results positioned them for Olympic consideration.

The Road to Milan

Heading into the 2026 season, O'Shea faced a serious setback. Two days before the World Championships in Boston in January, he broke his foot. Despite the injury and subsequent surgery, he competed anyway, determined to help secure three Olympic spots for U.S. pairs skating. He and Kam finished seventh at worlds.

At the U.S. Championships in January 2026, they placed second behind national champions Alisa Efimova and Misha Mitrofanov. The second-place finish was enough to earn them a spot on the Olympic team. O'Shea reflected on the moment with gratitude.

"It's been a long journey. A long time on Team USA and a long time working towards this. And it was always a goal but coming back and skating with Ellie for these past four seasons, it's been at the forefront of my mind for sure."

At 35, O'Shea became the oldest U.S. Olympic pairs skater since 1932 and the oldest figure skater from any country to make an Olympic debut since 1948.

The Team Event Victory

When the team event began in early February, Kam and O'Shea were viewed as the weakest link on the American squad. Their track record had been inconsistent compared to teammates like Ilia Malinin and Madison Chock and Evan Bates. In the short program, they placed fifth after a fall on a throw triple loop.

But in the free skate two days later, everything clicked. They delivered a clean performance and placed fourth in that segment. Their strong showing proved key. When Malinin faltered and Japan's Kaori Sakamoto dominated the women's singles competition, Kam and O'Shea's lights-out performance anchored the U.S. to a one-point victory over Japan.

"It feels amazing. We really just did that. To have that clutch performance, where you perform above expectations, in a moment like this, where our team was counting on us and we really needed to come through — it felt so good," O'Shea said after their win.

Commentators called Kam and O'Shea the MVPs of the team event alongside Chock and Bates. For O'Shea, the gold medal represented validation of his decision to return to the sport he had stepped away from.

What This Means

O'Shea's Olympic gold comes at a moment when U.S. pairs skating has struggled to compete at the highest levels. The country has not won an individual Olympic pairs medal since 1988. Kam acknowledged the pressure and significance of their contribution.

"The pairs discipline in the U.S. is definitely still a work in progress, and we're doing our best to step up to the level of the other people on the team. So, it was especially meaningful to put it out there and to contribute to the gold medal."

The team event gold does not guarantee success in the individual pairs competition scheduled for later in the Games. Strong teams from Japan, Germany, and Georgia present serious obstacles. Pairs skating remains a volatile discipline where falls and mistakes can determine outcomes in seconds.

Still, O'Shea's journey from retirement to Olympic gold represents something larger than one competition result. He spent three decades in skating, stepped away, and found his way back. His partnership with Kam, unconventional in its age gap and timing, produced results when it mattered most. At an age when most athletes have long since retired, O'Shea proved that comebacks are possible, that persistence pays off, and that the Olympics can still deliver its promised moments of joy and achievement.