Maybe the purest moments are always like this.
As his skates made magic on the ice of the Utah Olympic Oval on Tuesday, with 4,800 fans cheering, friends and family calling his name and a Dutch brass band playing, Derek Parra heard only an ocean roar of sound. His lungs were bursting, his legs stiffening as he neared the end of the men’s Olympic 1,500 meters, but he felt peace and calm.
The pain was nothing. He didn’t know if he was fast enough for gold, but he did know he was strong enough to try.
“Skate well,” he told himself. “Skate well.”
He crossed the finish line gulping for air and glanced at the scoreboard. The number next to his name in white lights was incomprehensible. At best a tepid favorite for a medal, Parra had just skated one Bob Beamon jump across time. He knew he needed a world record to win. He didn’t expect to write history in such a bold way.
Parra, 31, broke two barriers at once. He is believed to be the first Hispanic to win a Winter Olympics gold medal, and he established a record so spectacular with a skate so supreme that silver medalist Jochem Uytdehaage talked of enjoying being defeated by it. The winning time was a futuristic 1 minute 43.95 seconds.
“It’s just an amazing, amazing thing,” Parra said, giddily trying to cope with his euphoria, and then alternately choking up and wiping away tears. “To be the first Mexican-American, that’s something beyond myself. If I can reach Hispanic kids, great. Soccer, speedskating, curling. Just follow your dreams.”
This was a dreamlike performance and the word amazing was mentioned often.
When the 48 skaters took aim at Salt Lake City medals, the world record stood at 1:45.20. Uytdehaage of the Netherlands, who bested Parra for gold earlier in the Games, blasted out a powerful skate in the 3 3/4-lap race on the 400-meter oval. Typically skaters fade in the last lap, but Uytdehaage held form and set a world record of 1:44.57.
As skaters followed him, Uytdehaage sat in the infield, poker faced as he watched their challenges on a brilliant day of skating that produced 13 national records on ice that is considered the fastest in the world.
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“It was a hard time for me, just waiting, waiting, waiting,” Uytdehaage said.
Parra was in the locker room when Uytdehaage skated. “That’s fast,” Parra thought. “That’s pretty hard to beat.”
He also thought, “I’m going to give him a run for his money.”
Money has been on Parra’s mind in more ways than one. He is closer to an amateur than many Winter Olympians who have big-money sponsors or professional contracts. His wife Tiffany and daughter Mia, born in December, live in Orlando with relatives because he couldn’t afford to support them while he trained in Utah and could afford to see them only every two months.
Before he skated, Parra located his wife in the stands. She had flown in Monday night, missing his 5,000 race Feb. 9 because he didn’t expect to win silver. They mouthed “I love you” to one another. She was surrounded by other relatives wearing “Team Parra” T-shirts.
Parra bent into a three-point stance for the start. When he erupted from the start, he was flying. He skated low and fast, back nearly horizontal to the ice, arms pumping hard.
“He did open up hard and he kept cranking and cranking,” said teammate J.P. Shilling, who was 14th. “Derek is one of the strongest guys. He’s a freak.”
Parra’s engine sets him apart because at 5 feet 4 inches and 140 pounds, he doesn’t have the normal lanky body type for long-track speedskating. As Parra sped around the oval he vaguely heard U.S. coach Bart Schouten yell “Finish it!”
Shilling said on the final 400, skaters have their “tongues hanging out of your mouth and your eyes are crossed” and Parra said it felt as if he were holding a 500-pound weight above his head on the last turn. But he mustered his strength and then all of the pain went away.
“It sounds stupid but I enjoyed it,” Uytdehaage said of watching Parra beat his world record. “I will remember it.”
Adne Sondral of Norway took bronze in 1:45.26, a hair ahead of American Joey Cheek’s 1:45.34 in fourth. Cheek, who skated after Parra, was on world-record pace himself but faded at the end. Nick Pearson of Vernon, Wis., placed sixth in 1:45.51.
Since winning silver in the 5,000, Parra, who bloomed into a world champion in-line skater, has been recognized by fans in the street and in restaurants for autographs. Now he has eclipsed that performance.
“You give up so much hoping for a moment like this,” Parra said, again choking up. “And it happens.”