Metal detector finds $10,000 Cartier rings at Olympic gold medalists' party

Two Cartier rings worth more than $10,000 combined have been dug up from the backyard of an Olympic gold medal-winning couple. The discovery came down to Ed Rogers, a man who calls himself a metal detecting specialist. He got a call last month asking for help with two missing gold rings. He had no idea the caller was Tara Davis-Woodhall or her husband Hunter Woodhall.

Rogers showed up with his detector while the pair threw a house party. Guests formed what Rogers called a cheering section as he swept the yard. He found the first ring in just five minutes and the second one twenty minutes later. It took nearly two hours before he realized who owned the jewelry. When he got back to Kansas City, the truth came out.

'I had no idea that she was a gold medalist. I didn't have any idea that he was a gold medalist,' Rogers told The Kansas City Star. 'I didn't know any of that until after the fact... I had no idea they were married.'

Davis-Woodhall explained how the accident happened. Three rings flew off her finger while she tossed a grapefruit into the yard to feed a deer. She managed to save one ring on her own, but the other two remained lost until Rogers arrived. The missing pieces are from Cartier's iconic Love collection. One is a chunky gold band and the other is encrusted with diamonds.

Davis-Woodhall wears this jewelry while competing in races. She won Olympic gold in the long jump at the 2024 Paris Games before taking the world title last year in Tokyo. Her husband, Hunter Woodhall, claimed Paralympic gold in the men's 400m T62 at the same 2024 Games after a bronze medal in Tokyo 2020. The couple married in 2022 and continue to train together under Davis-Woodhall's coach, Travis Geopfert, who directed track and field at Kansas State.

Rogers works as an independent specialist through RingFinders.com. He started this path after getting a metal detector for Christmas in 2019. 'I like the whole idea of finding things,' he said. For him, it is almost more about the act of finding than the object itself. He compares his passion to fishing that began when he was a child.

'It's just so much fun to do ... as soon as I find something and clean it off ... then I want to go find the next thing,' Rogers said. 'And it goes back to my childhood. I've been a fisherman all my life, so we call this dirt fishing.'

He charges a flat $100 fee for travel costs and takes an additional reward if he recovers an item. The value depends on what the owner can afford. Davis-Woodhall rewarded him for his work, though she did not say exactly how much they paid. Rogers said his drive comes from knowing valuable items return to their rightful owners.

Could a simple grapefruit toss have cost thousands of dollars? The Woodhalls found their rings again, but the relief was only possible because a stranger walked into their backyard. Without Rogers, those expensive pieces might still be buried in the dirt.