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Viewers around the world have been drawn to Heated Rivalry like moths to a flame. Now, the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics are keeping it burning by choosing the show’s stars, Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie, as official torchbearers. <\/p>\n
The news was announced on Thursday by HBO Max, which owns the streaming rights to Heated Rivalry and will broadcast the Winter Olympics live. <\/p>\n
The torch relay, which started in Greece<\/a> on 26 November 2025, is due to conclude on the 6 February, when the opening ceremony begins at Milan’s San Siro Stadium.<\/p>\n Details of the exact time and date of Williams and Storrie’s appearance are yet to be confirmed. <\/p>\n Since premiering late last year in the United States, Heated Rivalry has become one of the most-talked about shows of 2026. <\/p>\n Based on a popular series of LGBTQ+ novels by Rachel Reid, it follows a passionate romance that develops between two rivalling hockey players, IIya (Storrie) and Shane (Williams). <\/p>\n It’s been especially popular with female audiences, who have praised the six-part series’ focus on emotional connection over sexual explicitness<\/a>. It also continues an upward trend in romance fiction, with sales of romance books more than doubling in the US last year, according to a report by Circana BookScan.<\/p>\n Alongside Storrie and Williams, attendees can expect to see a fantastical, sun-like structure inspired by Leonardo da Vinci<\/strong><\/a>‘s complex knot patterns – known as fantasia dei vinci. Two of these will be simultaneously lit and extinguished in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo. <\/p>\n They might be the buzziest, but Storrie and Williams certainly aren’t the biggest names to inaugurate the upcoming Winter Olympics. <\/p>\nWho else will perform at the opening ceremony?<\/h2>\n