William Dandjinou

William Dandjinou (born October 1, 2001) is a Canadian short-track speed skater. At the 2026 Winter Olympics, Dandjinou won a silver medal in the gold in the mixed team relay. Dandjinou is a five-time World Champion. Dandjinou is noted for being "unusually tall for a short-tracker" measuring 6-foot-3 without skates, considerably above the 5-foot-9 height he considers ideal for the sport. Dandjinou later said of the experience that "I'm not here for the medals, although winning is nice. I'm here for the experience in the long run.” As part of the 2023–24 ISU Short Track Speed Skating World Cup, Dandjinou won multiple medals across various legs of the competition. At the 2024 Four Continents Short Track Speed Skating Championships in Laval, Quebec, Dandjinou won the gold medal in the 1000 metres event and was part of the bronze medal winning 5000 metres relay team.

Dandjinou would cap the season with a dramatic gold medal on last day of the 2024 World Short Track Speed Skating Championships in Rotterdam, Netherlands, after earlier missing out on medals in the 500 m, 1,500 m and relay event. With two South Korean skaters in the lead with three laps to go, the two Koreans bumped into each other which opened the door for Dandjinou to get into the lead where he stuck his skate out to beat Pietro Sighel of Italy by 0.021 seconds. After the race he said that "Honestly, I didn't expect to have this result today. After the day I had yesterday — probably the worst day I could have imagined with bad results in the 500, 1,500 and relay — I'm just happy to be back. It's not the first time I have had a bad day. It's my first world championships so I had to adjust to the calibre of the races. I wanted to make sure I was locked in for this last day and do my best. No matter what the results were today, I wanted to be happy with myself, so it's just a blessing that I finished as world champion.

At the 2025 World Short Track Speed Skating Championships, Dandjinou broke through with a three gold and one silver medal performance. In his signature 1,500 m event, he won gold ahead of Stijn Desmet and Liu Shaoang. He also won a gold medal in the men's and mixed relay events and won a silver medal in the 1,000 m behind teammate Steven Dubois. Following his four medal haul and three golds for Canada on the same day, Dandjinou said that "I was super happy with my level of execution today; it was probably my best 1,500m of the season. I am happy to share a world title with my teammate Steven and with the girls' relay team." In February 2026, he won a silver medal in the mixed 2000-metre relay.

Personal life Dandjinou was born in Sherbrooke, Quebec to an Ivorian father and Canadian mother. His mother, Mirabelle Kelly, is a medical biologist.