CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy — On the streets of Cortina d’Ampezzo, the Olympic spirit is everywhere. Bringing more than a little color to an otherwise overcast day, Ally Pleckaitis and Josh Dewey, better known as walking American flags, brought their national pride to Italy in the form of mat ching stars and stripes snowsuit onesies.  Matching head to toe, the couple stood out against the muddy cobblestone streets, and though the loud American stereotype doesn’t usually work in the USA’s favor, the pair’s love of the Olympic spirit brought a little light to the day, as if dropping red, white and blue glitter in the shape of their footsteps as they walked.  “Where does one buy a suit like this?” Pleckaitis joked. “Well, probably only in Dallas, but we bought these online. Go big or go big, right?” Pleckaitis and Dewey have a long Olympic history. Self-declared “world’s biggest Olympic fans,” the pair got engaged at the Paris Olympics in 2024, and on top of that Pleckaitis has attended the Games in London and Rio, making Milano Cortina their first Winter Games experience.  Pleckaitis said the idea for their coordinated costumes came from watching people at her first Games in 2012.  Very devoted American fans, Josh Dewey, left, and Ally Pleckaitis show their national pride on the streets of Cortina. Credit: David Jackson/Park Record “The whole point is going and, meeting people from around the world and at my first Olympics, I didn’t realize how big you could go, and we just wore normal clothes,” she said. “Oh my God, we totally missed out! It’s a mistake I won’t make again.”  With three earrings in each ear, one red, one white and one blue, plus matching crossbody bags and identical flag-print jumpsuits, Pleckaitis said they weren’t even the most enthusiastically dressed people they’d seen. “I feel like we’re mild compared to so many others, at least at the Summer Olympics. People get crazy. They’re enthusiastic! It’s great,” said Pleckaitis.  And that was true in Cortina as well. Behind them, four towering Italian men in matching Luigi costumes crossed the cobblestones, wooden shot cups tied around their necks for easy refills as they moved through the crowd. On the weekend days, the main street in Cortina is filled with restaurant patios and bars with DJs spilling people in all kinds of garb and winter gear spilling out into the streets.  A group of Germans in track suits striped with the colors of their flag and giant gold dollar sign chains and wigs dance to the beats of a DJ playing on a hotel patio. They never quite seemed to make it all the way inside the venue, but the music is plenty loud, and dancing on the street is free.  Pleckaitis said one of the loudest crowds she has seen is in the curling stadium And maybe that’s because it’s one of the only indoor venues in Cortina, but the group of Eastern European supporters came armed with organized chants and anthems that roared through the stands every night of the week. “My dad’s from Lithuania. So I’ve seen it — the Eastern European countries are wild. You should catch them in basketball. They don’t even like curling, and that’s how they are,” Pleckaitis joked.  Though she has been an Olympics lover for nearly three decades, she said she decided to make her first Winter Games with this trip to Cortina after her mother got sick. Fueled by the childhood memories of attending torch relays and family watch parties, she adopted the “you only live once” mentality and booked the tickets in her honor.  “My grandmother’s a huge Olympics fan. That’s how we got into it. That’s how I got into it. I guess I’m just a huge fan. I didn’t realize everyone wasn’t like this. It’s an expensive habit to have,” said Pleckaitis, to which her fiancé laughed. Dewey, while a lifelong sports lover, only got into the Olympics after meeting Ally, and now fully hooked, missing the Super Bowl on Sunday barely even crossed his mind.  “I’ve become more of a fan of it since meeting her because she’s so enthusiastic about it,” said Dewey. For the Super Bowl, I did nothing. I taped it, and maybe I’ll watch it again later, but, I mean, who cares? We’re at the Olympics.”  “And I’m from New England, so don’t tell anyone!” added Pleckaitis.  Though it might be costly, for these two it’s worth it. Utah will be sure to see them in 2034, they promised.  The streets are closed off for pedestrian traffic, though sometimes a police car will beep its way through the crowd. Most people don’t react, and others just throw animated gestures in Italian that suggest the car should wait its turn — generally irreverent of authority in this small mountain town.  But it starts to make sense as outside of the Cortina Sliding Center security gates, the carabinieri, Italy’s military police force, share a cigarette with some volunteers hovering at their post.  Around town, the carabinieri staff pop-up engagement tents flanked by mannequins dressed in full ski gear, and they patrol the streets in dark green Land Rover Defenders. It’s not glamorous, but it’s still Cortina.  With the world attending Cortina’s Olympics, some degree of embarrassing fun and national pride is expected. So when a group of eight full-grown adults started chanting “USA! USA! USA!” through the crosswalk, no one turned a head.  The group was saying goodbye to Cory Thiesse, American curling champion, whom they happened to run into on the street and hoped to wish well at his next match that evening.  So when the first thing they said was, “We’re friends with the curlers!” It didn’t seem that they really meant it. But no, Cory and Korey, as they call them, Cory Thiesse and Korey Dropkin, truly are their friends, solidified after Kyle and Laura Fisher offered the U.S. mixed doubles team a room in their house when they visited Charlotte, North Carolina, for a charity event.  Charlotte, North Carolina, curling club found on the streets of Cortina during the 2026 Olympics: From left, Adrienne Kruzer, Kyle fisher, Laura Fisher, Skot Miller. Patrick McKee and Lara McKee pose in their release position. Credit: David Jackson/Park Record This particular group of loud Americans all hail from Charlotte. They met through the Charlotte Curling Club, an organization they have seen rise from a membership of just eight people curling on borrowed arena ice to now more than 330 members with a dedicated facility of their own. “About curling: The sport is fantastic. It’s fun. It’s entertaining. You get to cheer loud. You get to pull for your teams. But the better part about curling is the community that surrounds it,” said Kyle. “Without curling, I wouldn’t have met these people, and these are some of the most fantastic people alive, and we have a club full of them in Charlotte.”  Scot Miller traced the club’s origin back to 2010, just after the Vancouver Games, when a handful of friends were watching curling on a television at a bar. “They were like, ‘We need to do this. This looks like fun,’” he said. “So they figured out how to start a club, and now we have over 330 people.” Now curlers in their own right, Kyle played third for the Puerto Rican men’s national team at the 2024 Pan Continental Curling Championships, and Laura represented the club at the 2026 Women’s Club National Championships. But the Fishers’ curling journey only began in 2017, when Kyle gifted Laura a Learn to Curl session for Christmas. “We went one night to learn to curl and were hooked,” she said. “The people, the community of curling in the United States and in the world, especially in Charlotte, is like nothing else.” For Adrienne Kruzer and the club, having met and gotten to know Olympians Thiesse and Dropkin changed their Olympic experience.  Having watched the pair rise through the ranks over the past few years, and then standing in the arena Tuesday to see them win a silver medal, the moment carried a different weight. “It makes you tear up,” Lara McKee said. “You just feel so proud.” Thiesse and Dropkin’s win on Tuesday marked a historic day for the United States, earning the third-ever U.S. Olympic curling medal in history, making Thiesse the first American woman to do so.  “As soon as they qualified back in May, we booked tickets. We’ve been planning this for half a year,” said Kruzer.  For McKee, the curling world operates on a kind of open-door policy, making a global community feel like a small town.  “There’s a joke among curlers that you can wear a button that says, ‘Return me to the nearest curling club,’ and you’ll find a friend,” she said. “You can lose everything you own, anywhere in the world, and someone will find you and say, ‘Come on in. You’re family.’” That feeling, she said, extends into the Olympic arena itself. “You’re sitting around with people from other countries, and even though their team may be beating yours or you’re beating them, there’s no animosity,” she said. “You’re congratulating each other on each team’s shots because they’re making incredible shots out there on the ice. You can’t hate that.” This Olympic spirit floods Cortina, from the athletes to their fans to the police. Vape clouds trail behind teenagers as they scan tickets and give directions next to older Italian women in fur earmuffs and oversized diamond earrings, standing ankle-deep in mud, pointing strangers toward the next shuttle. For these two weeks, at least, the love of the Games is the great equalizer. The post On the streets of Cortina, the Olympic spirit is everyone appeared first on Park Record. ...read more read less