FIRSTS
The first Winter Olympic Games begun at Chamonix, in the French Alps on January 25, 1924, in connection with the Paris Summer Olympic Games held three months later. 16 nations took part and the host country failed to win any gold medals.
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| Dusan Zinaja at 1924 Winter Olympics Chamonix |
The 1924 event in Chamonix was run by the French Olympic Committee but only recognised by the International Olympic Committee as official Winter Olympics after they had finished.
Ice hockey made its Olympic debut at the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp, Belgium. The first Winter Olympics didn't take place until 1924.
The 1956 Winter Games in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, were the first to be shown on television. The 1968 Games in Grenoble, France, were the first to be broadcast in color.
Man-made snow was used in the Olympics for the first time at the 1980 Games in Lake Placid.
When Australian short track speed skater Steven Bradbury won the 1,000 m event at the 2002 Winter Olympics, he became the first athlete from the Southern Hemisphere to win a Winter Olympic gold medal. Bradbury won because his four rivals all collided and he skated alone past the finish line. He named his autobiography Last Man Standing.
Norwegian cross-country skier Marit Bjørgen has won the most Winter Olympic medals of any athlete: 15 (8 gold, 4 silver, and 3 bronze).
Norwegian professional biathlete Ole Einar Bjørndalen has won more Winter Olympic medals than any other male (8 gold, 4 silver, and 1 bronze).
The oldest man to receive a Winter Olympics medal is 83-year-old Anders Haugen. The Norwegian-American actually received his ski jump bronze medal 50 years after he competed in 1924 when a scoring error was discovered in 1974.
Russian figure skater Yulia Lipnitskaya won gold in the team event at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, aged 15 years, 249 days. However, she is not younger than South Korean short track speed skater Kim Yun-Mi, who won gold medal in the 3000 m relay at the 1994 Lillehammer Winter Olympics aged 13.
Christa Luding-Rothenburger (East Germany) is the only athlete to ever win medals in both Winter and Summer Games in the same year: In 1998 she won speed skating gold at 1,000m (winter) and match sprint cycling silver (summer).
Until 1992 Winter Olympics were held in the same year as Summer Games. Since then it has been in years midway between Summer Olympics.
RECORDS
Norwegian cross-country skier Marit Bjørgen has won the most Winter Olympic medals of any athlete: 15 (8 gold, 4 silver, and 3 bronze).
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| Marit Bjørgen 2013 By Frankie Fouganthin |
Norwegian professional biathlete Ole Einar Bjørndalen has won more Winter Olympic medals than any other male (8 gold, 4 silver, and 1 bronze).
The oldest man to receive a Winter Olympics medal is 83-year-old Anders Haugen. The Norwegian-American actually received his ski jump bronze medal 50 years after he competed in 1924 when a scoring error was discovered in 1974.
Russian figure skater Yulia Lipnitskaya won gold in the team event at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, aged 15 years, 249 days. However, she is not younger than South Korean short track speed skater Kim Yun-Mi, who won gold medal in the 3000 m relay at the 1994 Lillehammer Winter Olympics aged 13.
Christa Luding-Rothenburger (East Germany) is the only athlete to ever win medals in both Winter and Summer Games in the same year: In 1998 she won speed skating gold at 1,000m (winter) and match sprint cycling silver (summer).
FUN WINTER OLYMPIC GAMES FACTS
Until 1992 Winter Olympics were held in the same year as Summer Games. Since then it has been in years midway between Summer Olympics.
The USA is the only country to have won at least one gold medal in every Winter Olympics. But Russia and Norway have both won more Winter Olympic medals and Winter Olympic golds than the USA.
No country in the southern hemisphere has ever even applied to host the Winter Olympics.
Philip Boit, became the first Kenyan to participate in the Winter Olympics, when competing in the 10 KM classic cross-country race at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano. He came in last. The winner, Bjørn Dæhlie, waited for Boit to reach the finish line in order to hug him. The moment affected him so much Boit named his son after Dæhlie.
Steven Bradbury, a speedskater and Australia’s first gold medalist in the 2002 Salt Lake Winter Olympics, won his medal by purposely going slower than the other four skaters and hoping that one or more of them would crash to secure at least a bronze. All four crashed near the finish line.
Sources Daily Express, WKYC
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