U.S. Olympians — including Utah’s late Steve Holcomb — will be given medals they were cheated out of as Russian athletes are sanctioned

The fog surrounded Katie Uhlaender.

It was unavoidable.

In the days after she came up four-hundredths of a second short of her Olympic moment, the American skeleton athlete found herself still in Sochi, Russia, with nothing but the math in her head and the turns on the track to haunt her. There she met someone who was, at one point, in her shoes.

Uhlaender bumped into U.S. speedskating legend Dan Jansen. And one of the first questions she posed to the one-time world-record holder was one Jansen himself had to answer for years. Despite all of his accolades on the ice, Jansen didn’t win a medal until his final Olympic appearance — the 1994 Games in Lillehammer. The Olympic medal was a gold.

“How do you deal with people asking if you’re going to go again?” she recalls asking Jansen at the 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi. “I lost by four-hundredths, and I’m supposed to wait another four years? I was just like, ‘I’m tired of being the sad story.’”

It appears she won’t be the sad story much longer.

Athletes worldwide are seeing previously held Olympic medals upgraded as the International Olympic Committee (IOC) continues to hand down sanctions to Russian athletes convicted of doping. In the case of Uhlaender, those four-hundredths of a second that led to her fourth-place finish in Sochi will be a part of the long story she’ll tell about her first Olympic medal.

Russia’s Elena Nikitina finished third in Sochi, but Nikitina is one of several athletes recently disqualified. The bronze instead eventually will come Uhlaender’s way.

“I’m just even more motivated and honored to be part of this movement, and I want to be on that podium in Korea and prove it was not a fluke,” Uhlaender told The Associated Press last week. “I’m just overwhelmed right now.”

The emotions will not wane around USA Bobsled & Skeleton.

The most decorated American bobsled athlete ever certainly will have his bronze medals in the two- and four-man bobsled events in Sochi upgraded to silver medals, but Steven Holcomb won’t be there to celebrate with his teammates, friends and family members. The Park City born-and-raised driver passed away unexpectedly in May at the age of 37 in Lake Placid, N.Y.

Russia’s Aleksandr Zubkov soon will be stripped of the gold medals he won on his home track in both the two- and four-man events.

“He was more of a team guy than more of ‘me’ guy,” said Brant Feldman, who was Holcomb’s long-time agent. “And he really wanted his guys to get their moment and get the medals that they earned or deserved because they were clean. That was more important to him.”

Holcomb, Feldman added, was “always selfless like that.” He won the bronze medals alongside close friends and teammates Chris Fogt, Steven Langton and Curt Tomasevicz.

The Holcomb family likely will have to give up the two bronze medals Holcomb wore around his neck and held in his hands on the podiums in Sochi. The Utahn was one of the first Olympians worldwide to step in front of a camera and call for heavy sanctions on potential dopers. In an interview with The Tribune in May 2016, Holcomb said it was shocking to see Zubkov named in a New York Times report of widespread doping allegations.

“I know Aleksandr Zubkov,” Holcomb said last year. “I consider us friends, and he’s been a decent guy to me. It would be really disappointing to hear he’s been cheating me the whole time.”

“He never thought that the IOC would get to his point,” Feldman said. “He always thought that this would, somehow, go away. I know he would feel satisfied with anyone who doped being disqualified and for others to, sort of, get their moment.”

U.S. men’s skeleton athlete Matt Antoine soon will see his bronze from Sochi upgraded to a silver, too. When the disqualifications were announced, Antoine tweeted last week, “A day that I was never entirely sure would come, finally happened.”

“Steven would be very happy right now for the potential Matt and Katie,” Feldman said. “For Katie, her first [Olympic medal], and Matt, getting a better color.”