How Korey Dropkin Turned Back-to-Back Heartbreak Into Olympic Silver
Korey Dropkin grew up at the curling club. Not just on the ice, but all three floors of it. Running around with friends, warming up by the fireplace, pressing his nose to the glass watching his older brother compete on the sheet beside him. "The curling club was sort of my second home," he says. It still is, in a way .
Curling was the family language of the Dropkin household. Parents, an older brother, a community of friendships that last a lifetime built on the ice. "It was easy for me to fall in love with it," he says. And once he did, he didn't just want to play. He wanted to master the game.
After high school, Dropkin took a bet on himself. He packed up and moved to Duluth, Minnesota to be around the best curlers in the country. "I felt like if I was really going to go for my Olympic dream, I needed to surround myself with the best," he reflected. "And the best curlers all lived in Minnesota." He showed up to train each day with a fire in the belly to learn everything he could.
"I don't regret anything. I love Duluth. I live here now, and have been for 13 years."
But the road to the Olympics was anything but smooth.
In 2017, Dropkin's team made it to the Olympic trials final. They won the first game of the best-of-three series. Then they dropped the second. Then the third.
Four years later, in 2021, he relived the same story of heartbreak. Same opponent. Same format. Up in the second game, with momentum on their side, Dropkin made a call. A riskier shot, a harder shot, one that would have ended it right there. "I didn't throw it quite well," he says, "and the worst case situation that could have happened, happened." They gave up a steal of a couple, the momentum swung, and the series was gone.
"Both of those cycles, both years, both instances, I was a bit of a mess afterwards. Mentally drained, exhausted, frustrated, disappointed. Feeling disheartened because we were so close to realizing one of our biggest dreams. Doing it twice in a row, back-to-back cycles, was even harder to stomach."
And yet. He came back.
What kept him going wasn't blind optimism. He started thinking about breakthroughs differently, not as miracles, but as inevitabilities. "Instead of thinking of a major breakthrough as a miracle," he says, "it's more so just a matter of time. Continuing to put in the work, staying focused on your goals, being resilient, keeping dreaming, pursuing being 1% better every day." The Olympic dream wasn't impossible nor gone. It just came with ups and downs.
When a dream became reality and he finally earned his spot on the 2026 U.S. Olympic Team, Dropkin had one goal above everything else: enjoy every single second of it.
"This is an event that I've been dreaming about for 20 years. It's an event that isn't promised that I get to compete at again. So for me, the most important thing was just that I enjoyed every single second of competing and showed the world how much I love this sport."
The mental work behind that wasn't accidental either. Years of working with sports psychologists had taught him how to stay present, shake off bad shots, and resist the gravitational pull of a moment's magnitude.
"It's always about focusing on the process and staying in the present. Not thinking too much about the magnitude of it, or the what-ifs, or the past shots that maybe we've missed. More so focusing on: how do I make this next shot as good as we can make it?"
Dropkin’s mindset was especially put to the test against Italy, the defending Olympic champions, in front of one of the loudest crowds Dropkin had ever played in front of. Before the game, he set one specific intention for his team: embrace the Italian crowd.
"The Italian crowd is super noisy, loud, fun, they show their energy, their celebrations, their cheers, they vibrate and they echo and they're monstrous. It's actually the exact thing our sport needs."
When Italy made shots and the arena erupted, he didn't tense up. He smiled. He put his hands down. "Like, settle down. We're about to strike. Just watch." Then they did. And the U.S. crowd roared back. "U.S.A., Italia, U.S.A., Italia. Those are the moments that you play for. It gives you goosebumps."
When the final stone came to rest and the U.S. was sitting two for the win, the arms went up. "I remember celebrating and getting emotional in that moment. It was pretty special."
"Pretty special" is an understatement from an athlete who had spent nearly two decades working toward this moment. He'd later describe it as the most fun week of curling he's ever had in his life.
For the young curlers now watching on, inspired by what they saw in Italy, Dropkin's message is simple and hard-earned: "Dream big. Be resilient in life. Always get back up in times of hardship and keep moving forward and believing in yourself."
And when the big breakthrough finally comes, don't call it a miracle. It was never a miracle. It was just a matter of time.
ABOUT THIS SERIES
I'm Amy Wotovich, and I am on a mission to interview 100% of Team USA's 2026 Olympic and Paralympic athletes for Back The Team's series Inside the Mental Game of the Games — the most comprehensive mindset record of a single Games cycle. What do elite competitors actually believe about pressure, identity, failure, and joy? Korey Dropkin is one of hundreds of athletes sharing their unfiltered answers. Follow the journey!
