Speedskating: Ohno takes bronze in the 1,000

TURIN, Italy — Four years. Two hundred and eight weeks. Fourteen hundred and 60 days of sweating, waiting and putting a normal life on hold.

All for about nine seconds, across 110 meters of ice, halfway around the world.

When the bell rang for the final lap of the men's 1,000-meter short-track speedskating race at the Palavela, Apolo Ohno — who could have walked away with two medals from Salt Lake City four years ago and called it a life — had to know the equation was as simple, and as unforgiving, as that.

In front of him was the fastest man in the world on short-track skates, Hyun-Soo Ahn of South Korea. Behind him, somewhere, was Ohno's teammate, Rusty Smith, and Ahn's teammate, Ho-Suk Lee.

But Ohno was laser-focused on Ahn, who already had claimed a gold medal in these Olympics — in a race in which Ohno never really contended. As they entered the last turn Saturday, the crowd roaring, the 23-year-old Seattle native was riding Ahn's hip, preparing to do what every instinct he had screamed at him to do.

Pass.

Turn on the patented Ohno jets and give the short-track and Olympic world what it had been waiting for since those controversial nights in Salt Lake City: America and Korea's fastest skaters in a drag race to the finish, for once in a clean race with no crashes or disqualifications.

There was one catch, and it will burn in Ohno's brain long after the rest of this night is a faded memory.

Setting up the gold-medal pass required maneuvering into position behind Ahn — and in doing so easing off the gas.

"I lost some speed previously in the corner, just trying to set up a pass," Ohno said. "And I left a little opening."

A little opening, the world was reminded Saturday night, is all a South Korean skater needs to wind up a rung above you on the medal stand in Piazza Castello. And it was all Lee, the momentarily forgotten man, needed to zip by Ohno on the inside, claiming the silver medal behind his countryman — and leaving Ohno wondering what more he could do.

Ohno, a two-time medalist who has yet to skate across the finish line first in an Olympic final, crossed for the bronze, looked up, and threw his hands in the air.

"That was like a 'Wow,' " he said. "Like, I couldn't believe it. The last couple laps, I was looking for space, looking for an opening to be able to pass. I was just looking for the slightest mistake, the slightest space to move up. And there was none."

He left it all on the ice. But it wasn't enough to stop the Korean short-track machine, which literally toyed with the rest of the world here this night.

Had not one South Korean skater been busted for impeding an opponent in the women's 1,500-meter final earlier, Ohno's bronze medal would have been the only one of six awarded at the Palavela that did not go to a South Korean.

Ohno believes he is stronger and faster than four years ago in Salt Lake City, where he won a gold and silver and briefly seized the attention of a nation. But the South Koreans are that much faster and stronger, too.

Plus a little extra.

"This is their sp... " Ohno said, almost emitting a too-painful truth by saying "sport" before realizing how it might imply ownership. "This something they thrive on."

And so he will spend the next week in a dormitory room in Italy, waiting for his last medal chances, in the 500 meters and team relay, knowing once again that he is the fastest man on the ice — outside South Korea.

That isn't quite good enough, especially on a special night when Ohno's friend, long-track skater Shani Davis, won a gold of his own just a few blocks away at Oval Lingotto. You could read it in Ohno's face after the race, see it in the way he walked up the steps to a news conference on legs that were played out.

"The race was hard. Really hard," he said. "Obviously, I wanted to win. But it didn't turn out that way. I now have a bronze, a silver and a gold. So that feels pretty good."

Ohno made a point of saying he found peace just in realizing he could turn himself around, physically and emotionally, less than a week after botching the 1,500 meters, his specialty. That loss clearly hit him harder than he let on earlier.

"For me to be able to bounce back from the 1,500 was pretty big," he said.

He didn't do it alone. Normally before a race, Ohno shuts himself off from friends and family, except for his father, Yuki. But this week, he opened the door a bit — and support flooded in, much of it from home.

"I was checking my e-mail, and I was getting some stuff from back home in Seattle, from some of the guys I train with [in Colorado Springs], and it was just unbelievable, the support I was getting," he said. "One guy said: 'Here and now. Breathe and relax.' For me to hear that stuff at the Games was very powerful."

He will ride down to the medals plaza in Piazza Castello tonight to pick up his bronze. It is not what he came for, but the Italians will make him feel welcome, and deserving.

He'll take the bronze, look for more medals, and remind himself it was all worthwhile. And for Ohno, an it's-all-in-the-journey guy if there ever was one, it clearly has been.

Four years. Even without the gold he coveted, Apolo Ohno won't regret any of them.

"It is all about winning medals, and getting on the podium," he acknowledged. "At the same time, it's all about overcoming the obstacles, whatever they may be. For me, it was coming back and trying to get on this podium tonight. So this is a huge success for what I came here to do.

"All in all, I think I'm happy. I'm very happy."

Ron Judd: 206-464-8280 or rjudd@seattletimes.com

Medal chasing
Apolo Ohno's results and remaining events:
Day	Event
Feb. 12	1,500-meter semifinal heat: 4th 1,500-meter B final: 3rd
Feb. 15	1,000-meter prelim: advanced 5,000-meter relay prelim: advanced
Feb. 18	1,000-meter final: bronze medal
Wednesday	500-meter preliminary
Saturday	500-meter final 5,000-meter relay final