Quite recently, we rejoiced at the victories and experienced the failures of our athletes at the Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo, as after only six months we can again observe the successes of our best of the best only now at the Winter Olympics in Beijing.
On February 4, the opening ceremony of the 2022 Winter Olympic Games took place at the Bird’s Nest National Stadium in Beijing.
Beijing has become the only city in history to host both the Winter Olympics in 2022 and the Summer Olympics back in 2008.
After two weeks of competition, the Olympics will end with a closing ceremony, after which the Olympic flag will be handed over to the mayors of the Italian cities of Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo, which will become the host cities of the 2026 Winter Olympics.
The program of the Olympic Games in Beijing included 7 sports, combining 15 disciplines:
- Biathlon
- Curling
- Figure skating
- Skating sports
- Hockey
- Ski sports
- Bobsleigh
- Luge
109 sets of medals will be awarded at the Games.
The cherished Russian jump and the missed second in ski racing.
On February 7, Russian ski jumpers won an Olympic medal in this sport for the first time in 50 years. This time Slovenia has the gold, and Canada has the bronze.
Soviet athletes won and took the award for the last time in Grenoble in 1968, that is 54 years ago.
By the way, the national teams of Japan, Austria, Germany and Norway received fines for equipment, that is, athletes did not count one jump each. The reason was that, according to the rules of discipline, jumpsuits for jumping should fit the body in a special way so that the “parachuting effect” is not created.
On the fourth day of the Olympic Games in Beijing, the parallel giant slalom snowboard competition started. In this type of program, the Russian team has the strongest composition in both men and women.
Dmitry Loginov and Sofia Nadyrshina were considered the favorites of the tournament, but did not reach the quarterfinals. Russia’s performance could be considered a failure if not for the hero of the Sochi Olympics — Vic Wild. He competed and won his third medal for Russia at the Olympic Games — bronze.
In figure skating in the men’s singles program, Russia did not show the best results — American figure skater Nathan Chen won gold, and the best of the Russians was Evgeny Semenenko, who took eighth place.
But the incident with Alexander Bolshunov, a Russian skier, happened on the first lap of the race. Bolshunov was in the group of leaders, along with other athletes from Russia, however, he could not keep his balance on one of the steep descents, but he managed to quickly orient himself.
If it was not possible to fall correctly, then the Russian could get back on the track for a long time, and these are valuable seconds. It was even possible to get serious damage. As a result, Alexander is the owner of gold in skiathlon.
In the individual race in biathlon, Maxim Tsvetkov became the best among Russian athletes at the Winter Olympic Games in Beijing. He took fourth place.
“Today Maxim had a golden miss. I think he will call him that all his life”, — said Dmitry Yaroshenko, a two-time world champion in the relay.
On February 10, the women’s 10 km classic style ski race with a separate start was held.
Natalia Nepryaeva, a Russian athlete, fought for the second Olympic medal in Beijing, but she was only 0.1 seconds short of third place!
But do not be upset, Russian athletes got into the top 15, which means there is a chance to win back.
The «rising star» of single figure skating, Russian figure skater Mark Kondratyuk took second place in the free program at the team tournament, scoring 181.65 points.
The first place was reserved by the representative of Japan Yuma Kagiyama (208.94 points).
In the free program, he suddenly improved his result, beating a very experienced American Vincent Zhou. It was with this that Mark predetermined the victory of the Russian team in the team competition, he helped to increase the gap from the USA on the second day of the competition.
Back at the beginning of the Olympic Games, Nikita Katsalapov told about the conflict with the American couple Hubbell and Donohue during the warm-up before the ice dancing competition. The Russian couple was the first to start making a bundle and the Americans who saw them, according to unwritten rules, had to give in to avoid a collision, the rule was violated, so Katsalapov flared up.
“I don’t even remember whether it was in English or in Russian, but I said something. It has accumulated, it has boiled over,” — Nikita Katsalapov shared the details.
However, after such a collision, the guys did not lose their fighting spirit and took second place in ice dancing in team competitions. In the free program, the pair also took silver.
The second place was also taken by the Russian couple Anastasia Mishina and Alexander Gallyamov. In pair skating, the guys showed an excellent result, despite the fall.
On February 7, the pair of Minina and Gallyamova took first place in the free skate, not losing to the Japanese pair skaters.
On Wednesday, February 9, short-track athlete Semyon Elistratov added the 11th award to the Russian piggy bank. At his crown distance, namely 1500m, he fought for gold to the last, but was forced to retreat.
The Olympic champion finished with a small margin, he was only 0.013 seconds short of silver!
In speed skating at a distance of 5000 meters, the 2020 world champion and world record holder Natalia Voronina could not get in shape after an operation in the fall and showed not the best time.
In luge at the relay race, the Russian team became the fourth, losing to Germany, Austria and Latvia.
We will not find it, but we will morally crush the sportsmen.
The Russian figure skating team won a triumphant victory in the team championship at the 2022 Olympics. The ROC team included Mark Kondratyuk, Kamila Valieva, Anastasia Mishina and Alexander Gallyamov (pair skating), Victoria Sinitsina and Nikita Katsalapov (ice dancing).
But neither the athletes nor the fans had time to rejoice at the victory, as on February 9, the Inside the Games portal suggested that the awarding ceremony for the winners of figure skating at the Olympics was postponed due to Kamila Valieva’s dubious doping test.
According to the media, a suspiciously positive doping test showed the presence of a small dose of trimetazidine (a heart drug that is banned at the Olympic Games), which could have been recorded before the Olympics, in December 2021.
Since Valieva is not yet 16 years old, WADA considers her a «protected person», that is, it makes a decision whether a child at that age is able to realize what exactly he is taking or not.
“There is always a hunt for leaders. This is an absolutely normal thing, another question is that the Western media is used to working with such methods. Sometimes we attack them, then we poison them, now we beat them,” — said three-time Olympic champion Irina Rodnina.
On the morning of February 10, Russian journalists reported that all charges were dropped from the athlete, so she will continue to compete in single competitions.
During the proceedings, the head of the US Olympic Committee, Suzanne Lyons, also spoke out, who made very loud statements about the purity of sports and the reputation of the entire Olympic movement.
“In fact, the reputation of the entire Olympic movement has been shaken on the verge of our words that we actually believe in the values we stand for and follow them. It is very important for athletes all over the world that these values of the Olympic movement survive, and one of the most important values is the purity of sports. It’s very upsetting for athletes today that this wound may have been reopened,” — Lyons said.
On February 10, Russia dropped to ninth place in the medal standings. The German national team is leading in the medal standings, and Russia has dropped to the ninth place — there are 2 gold, 3 silver and 6 bronze medals in the collection of the national team.
On February 11, the national team of our country rose to the eighth place in the team competition. The impetus was the receipt of a silver medal by Alexander Bolshunov in the men’s 15 km ski race.
