Meryl Davis and Charlie White danced their way into Olympic history on Monday, Feb. 17. The American ice dancers took home the first-ever gold medal for Team USA in Ice Dancing at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.
Davis, 27, and White, 26, performed to music from Sheherazade, and scored a total of 195.52 points to earn them the gold, the New York Daily News reports. Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir of Canada won the silver medal, and Russia’s Elena Ilinykh and Nikita Katsalapov won bronze. Davis and White have been skating together since 1998, and won the silver medal in Vancouver four years ago.
“Seeing each other, learning from each other. Not just these last four years. We’ve grown as people over nearly 17 years,” Davis said Monday of the process that led them to gold. “When we started, I wasn’t just a young skater. I was a young girl.”
The athletes had to follow Virtue and Moir’s 190.99 point routine at Ice Berg arena on Monday. “We had some awareness that everyone skated well before us,” White explained. “It’s almost important to block it out. Those moments before you skate are difficult, as nervous as you’ll be in your lifetime. If you’re not perfect, you can forget about your dreams.”
The five-time national champs met at the Detroit Skating Club in 1998. “We were a good match from the start,” White previously told Us Weekly. “We were both very athletic on the ice.”
Though they may have great chemistry on the ice, the University of Michigan undergrads told Us they’re just friends. White has been seeing ex-Olympic skater Tanith Belbin since 2010, while Davis told Us she’s “dating a skating coach.”
For more on the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi — including personal stories from the Team USA athletes, and tons of photos — pick up Us Weekly’s special Olympics bookazine!