The Winter Olympic Games are fast approaching. It’s an exciting opportunity for countries to compete against each other in a variety of winter sports, to see who will come out on top in each sport and who will win the most medals overall.
Whether you have a keen interest in any of the sports, you will surely want to watch your country compete and hopefully win medals.
In the interest of keeping you informed of exciting topics, listed below are 20 interesting bits of information about the Winter Olympic Games Beijing 2022.
1. What are the Winter Olympic Games?
The Winter Olympics are a significant and long-running international sporting event for sports played on snow or ice. Each team represents one country and is then broken down into their respective sports.
2. When are the next Winter Olympic Games?
The next Winter Olympic Games are fast approaching; they will start on February 4, 2022 in Beijing, China.
Usually, the Winter Olympics happen every four years, and usually two years after the Summer Olympic Games. However, due to delays and a pandemic, the Summer Olympics occurred in 2021, but the Winter Olympics stuck with their planned date and will proceed as scheduled.
3. What Country hosts the Winter Olympic Games?
Beijing, China, will host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games. Events will be held in three different areas to ensure the best location is available for each event and reusing infrastructure already available in Beijing.
Beijing will be hosting the ice events, and four snow events will be held here as well. Beijing already had many great arenas and venues available with minimal changes required for the Winter Olympics.
Yanqing, a suburb of Beijing surrounded by mountains, will host alpine skiing, luge, and bobsleigh. This location is perfect because the high mountains have excellent drops and slopes required for the speed and elevation needed for these events.
Zhangjiakou, home to many high-end skiing resorts in Hebei procince north of Beijing, will host snow events due to the excellent terrain and already terrific infrastructure and work done by the resorts.
After the Winter Olympics conclude, all areas will be returned to their former duties or used for the Winter training of Chinese athletes.
Countries interested in hosting either the Summer or Winter Olympic Games will bid or compete to win the honor of doing so. The governing body for the Olympics, the International Olympic Committee (IOC), will then vote on who wins.
Countries that win are given ample time to set up everything needed for hosting the Olympics. This often includes building stadiums or arenas to ensure each sport has a professional area to compete.
4. What sports are competed in for the Winter Olympic Games?
Not every winter sport has a place at the Winter Olympic Games. The IOC has the final say on which sports will be included.
Current sports in the Winter Olympics are: Alpine Skiing, Freestyle Skiing, Cross-Country Skiing, Biathlon, Bobsleigh, Curling, Ice Hockey, Luge, Nordic Combined, Skeleton, Ski Jumping, Snowboard, Figure Skating, Short Track Speed Skating, and Speed Skating.
Some of these sports you may be very familiar with, while others you may need to look up, such as, what is Skeleton?
5. When did the Winter Olympic Games start?
You probably have an idea that the Summer Olympic Games started way back in Ancient Greece. However, the Winter Olympic Games first appeared in 1924 in Chamonix, France.
6. Does Beijing get enough snow to host the Olympics?
Beijing certainly gets cold and does get snow, however like many cities, you can’t guarantee you’ll get enough snow at the right time.
Like many host cities before, Beijing will be using powerful snow cannons to make artificial snow, which can then be stored or moved to where it’s needed.
Artificial snow is a smart and standard move to ensure there are no delays due to lack of snow.
7. Has Beijing hosted the Olympics before?
The 2022 Winter Olympic Games is the first time a city has hosted both Winter and Summer Olympic Games. The 2008 Summer Olympic Games were also held in Beijing.
8. What is the mascot for the 2022 Winter Olympic Games?
Beijing has decided on a giant panda called Bing Dwen Dwen (冰墩墩) to be the official mascot of the 2022 Winter Olympic Games.
In Chinese (Mandarin), “Bing” (冰) means ice, as well as purity and strength. While “Dwen Dwen” (墩墩) means robust and lively.
9. How will covid affect the Winter Olympic Games?
The 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics will have strict COVID precautions similar to the Summer Olympics in Tokyo 2021.
Unvaccinated athletes will need to quarantine for 21 days. All participants will be in a closed-loop management system, which means they won’t travel around or interact with the general public. However, they will be free to move around the arenas and Olympic Village.
10. Has anything changed for the 2022 Winter Olympics?
With the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, we will see seven new events added.
Most new events are mixed, meaning both men and women will be competing together. These new events include: big air freestyle, women’s monobob, mixed freestyle skiing aerials, mixed ski jumping, mixed snowboard cross, and a mixed short track speed skating.
11. Can fans attend the 2022 Winter Olympics?
Only fans from Mainland China will be able to buy tickets and attend events. This policy is an improvement over the Summer Olympics in Tokyo that did not allow any fans to attend at all.
12. Is Beijing ready for the Games to start?
All venues for the Beijing Winter Olympics are ready and have already hosted test events. Beijing has also built a high-speed rail system to ensure timely transport between events in different areas.
13. What is the Winter Olympic Games symbol?
The Olympic rings are the symbol of both the Summer and Winter Olympic Games. Each ring represents a different continent, and the colors represented colors on participants’ flags when the rings were created.
The rings are a symbol of inclusion and cooperation between all countries.
14. Who makes the Winter Olympic Games medals?
Each host city is responsible for designing and creating the Olympic gold, silver, and bronze medals given to the top finishes in each event.
So every Olympics has a unique design from the host country.
15. Does the Winter Olympics have a flame?
Part of the ceremonies of both the Winter and Summer Olympic Games is the lighting of the torch ceremony. This ceremony symbolizes the start of the games, and at the conclusion, the flame is extinguished.
The ceremony starts before the games, where a flame is taken from the original ancient Greek Olympics site. After that, the torch is relayed to the host city by various people that often have a historical connection to the Olympics. There, a large cauldron is lit from the flame, and it stays lit until the closing ceremony.
16. Who can compete in the Winter Olympics?
It takes hard work and dedication to make it to the Olympics, and not just anybody can attend as an athlete.
Each country has a national Olympic organization. This organization sets up qualifying events that you must compete in and place high enough to be selected. They will then compete in an Olympic qualifying event and, if successful, the athlets then join the Olympic Games.
So you must be more than good enough, and you must be selected to represent your country.
17. Can all countries participate in all sports for the Winter Olympics?
Any country that has an approved National Olympic Committee can send athletes to the Olympics. If you then meet the standards set by the IOC for each event, and your country selects you to represent it, then you’re ready to go.
18. What is the “Eddie The Eagle” rule?
Eddie The Eagle was a British ski jumper. He attended the 1988 Olympics as a competitor because he was the ONLY British ski jumper.
Eddie finished last in both of his Olympic events and was scored well behind the next lowest scored competitor.
The IOC enacted a new rule, dubbed the “Eddie The Eagle” rule, which placed much stricter requirements on entry into the Olympics.
19. Which countries do the best in the Winter Olympic Games?
The Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics will see 95 countries compete. Of those 95 countries, some stand out as likely to win most of the medals. You may even be able to guess who they are.
Historically Norway has won the most medals and the most gold medals, so it’s likely to do well at the 2022 Winter Olympics.
Looking at the 2018 Winter Olympics medal tally, Norway, Germany, and Canada were the top three medal-winning countries.
On the other hand, China won nine medals, one gold, six silver, and two bronze.
20. What is the most popular sport at the Winter Olympics?
Fans will hotly debate which Winter Olympic sport is the most popular. Depending on who you ask and what sports their country does well in will probably dictate the answer.
Generally, figure skating comes in near the top. On the other side of winter sports, hockey will often be the next most popular sport.
Final Thoughts
The Winter Olympics are a time when countries can come together and compete to see who comes out on top. You have the opportunity to see the best athletes in the world compete against each other, which can be pretty amazing to see.
The 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics are shaping up to be a fantastic event. Beijing has completed everything on time, which is not always the case with host countries. In addition, they have implemented transportation, housing, and everything needed to make the games a success.
No matter what country you’re from, or if your country is even competing, it’s still going to be an incredible event to watch to see who comes out on top this year.
