Haralds Silovs

Haralds Silovs (born 7 April 1986) is a Latvian long track and former short track speed skater, who became the 2008 and 2011 European champion in short track. He has participated in three Winter Olympics. In 2018, he finished fourth at speed skating 1500 metres event.

During the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, he gained worldwide media attention after competing in the 1500 m short track, and 5000 m long track speed skating events in the same day, 13 February. He is the first athlete in the history of the Winter Olympics to compete in both short track and long track events at the same Games and the only athlete to compete in two different disciplines on the same day.

Biography Silovs was born in Riga, Latvia, on 7 April 1986. His mother, Signe, was a figure skater, his father, Edvins, was a track cyclist for the USSR, and his older brother was involved in athletics. In addition to speed skating, Silovs became involved in mountain biking, and in 2001 at age 15, he won the Latvian Junior Championship in that sport.

He first became interested in speed skating in 1996, but interest in the sport across Latvia was relatively low, and there were few training or competition opportunities. Both Silovs and his brother were invited in 2001 to a training camp in Slovakia, where they were given instruction in speed skating by Hungarian coaches. By 2003, he was competing successfully in regional events across eastern Europe, and he trained with several Belgian and French athletes over the next few years. In 2006, he began working with a personal coach, Jeroen Otter, from the Netherlands. While he continued to train in speed skating, he also began attending Ventspils University College. Only one other athlete in recent memory had attempted to compete in both sports at the same Games, American Shani Davis, but Davis did not make his country's short track team. However, with no other Latvian athletes participating in the 2010 Olympic speed skating competitions, Silovs was able to make both teams for his country. It was his first Olympic Games, and he hoped that being able to compete in multiple events would allow him to acclimate to the level of competition in the Olympics more readily. He also hoped that differences in the two disciplines, between long track which is more demanding of aerobic fitness, and short track, which is more tactically and technically demanding, would mean that he would not be too physically exhausted to be competitive in both events. He was encouraged by other speed skaters, like Apolo Anton Ohno, who recognized the feat.

Silovs currently lives in Inzell, Germany.