2002 Winter Olympics

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XIX. winter Olympics
Logo of the 2002 Olympic Winter Games
Venue: Salt Lake City ( United States )
Stadion: Rice-Eccles Olympic Stadium
Opening ceremony: February 8, 2002
Closing ceremony: February 24, 2002
Opened by: George W. Bush (President of the USA )
Olympic oath : Jim Shea (Athlete)
Allen Church (Referee)
Disciplines: 15 (7 sports)
Competitions: 78
Countries: 77
Athletes: 2,399, of which 886 women
← Nagano 1998
Turin 2006 →
Medal table
space country G S. B. Ges.
1 NorwayNorway Norway 13 5 7th 25th
2 GermanyGermany Germany 12 16 8th 36
3 United StatesUnited States United States 10 13 11 34
4th CanadaCanada Canada 7th 3 7th 17th
5 RussiaRussia Russia 5 4th 4th 13
6th FranceFrance France 4th 5 2 11
7th ItalyItaly Italy 4th 4th 5 13
8th FinlandFinland Finland 4th 2 1 7th
9 NetherlandsNetherlands Netherlands 3 5 - 8th
10 AustriaAustria Austria 3 4th 10 17th
11 SwitzerlandSwitzerland Switzerland 3 2 6th 11
Complete medal table

The 2002 Winter Olympics (also known as the XIX Winter Olympics ) were held in 2002 in Salt Lake City , the capital and largest city of the US state of Utah . It was the fourth Winter Games and the eighth Olympic Games in the United States . Five months after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 , the games were marked in many ways by commemorating the victims and by patriotic manifestations, but also by increased security measures. In terms of sport, the successes of athletes such as Ole Einar Bjørndalen or Samppa Lajunen on the one hand and several doping cases in cross-country skiing on the other hand are remembered.

It was also the first Olympic Games under the aegis of IOC President Jacques Rogge . The local organizing committee was headed by Republican politician Mitt Romney , later Massachusetts governor and presidential candidate .

Choice of venue

For the first time, an IOC commission chaired by German member Thomas Bach selected four of the original nine applicants for the actual vote. The three other recognized candidate cities besides Salt Lake City were Sion (Switzerland), Östersund (Sweden) and Québec (Canada). Graz (Austria), Jaca (Spain), Poprad (Slovakia), Sochi (Russia) and Tarvisio (Italy) were not allowed to vote . Salt Lake City was elected host on June 16, 1995 at the 104th IOC session in Budapest in the first ballot with 54 of 89 votes. In early January 1999, a bribery scandal became known. Ultimately, a 300-page document published by the IOC Ethics Committee on February 10, 1999, stated that at least 24 IOC members were bribed by the Salt Lake City bid committee. As a result, four IOC members resigned and six others were suspended on March 17, 1999. It was the first time in IOC's 105-year history that IOC members were expelled by vote.

Results of the election:

place country Ballot
Salt Lake City United StatesUnited States United States 54
Ostersund SwedenSweden Sweden 14th
Sion SwitzerlandSwitzerland Switzerland 14th
Quebec CanadaCanada Canada 7th

Logo, mascot and slogan

The logo of the games showed a three-colored snow crystal, which was formed from three Cs for Contrast , Culture and Courage .

The Olympic mascots were Powder (a snowshoe hare ), Copper (a coyote ) and Coal (an American black bear ). They should symbolize the Olympic motto Citius, Altius, Fortius (faster, higher, stronger).

The motto of the games was Light the fire within 'kindle the inner fire'.

Torch relay

Torch relay at the Pentagon: 184 US flags commemorate the 184 victims of the attack in Washington; the son of the torch-bearer pictured was one of the dead.
Route of the torch relay through the USA

The Olympic flame was lit on November 19, 2001 by the actress Thalia Prokopiou in the Sacred Grove of Olympia . On December 4th, a special plane from Delta Air Lines called Soaring Spirit brought it from Athens to Atlanta . On the site of the 1996 Summer Olympics , the last torchbearer at the time, Muhammad Ali , opened the torch relay at a ceremony in the Centennial Olympic Park .

In the roughly two months leading up to the opening ceremony of the Winter Games, the torch passed through the United States in all states with the exception of South Dakota , North Dakota , Minnesota and Hawaii . The torch used was 84 centimeters long and shaped like an icicle.

On December 21, the torch reached Washington, DC and Arlington County, where in a ceremony at the Pentagon the terrorist attacks of September 11 has been thought and where President Bush was among the torchbearers. She stayed in New York City over Christmas and was put on display at Rockefeller Center after another memorial ceremony at the Statue of Liberty on Christmas Eve with relatives of the victims of September 11th .

Other stations included the other former US Olympic cities of Lake Placid (December 29/30), St. Louis (January 8/9), Los Angeles (January 15/16) and Squaw Valley ( January 20) ./21th January). On January 24th, the fire also made a quick detour to Alaska . It finally reached the state of Utah on February 4th.

Competition venues

The Olympic competition cities were spread across the metropolitan area of ​​Salt Lake City and the Wasatch range to the east . In the city itself, apart from the opening and closing ceremonies, only the figure skating and short track competitions took place. Further indoor competitions were held in the suburbs of Kearns and West Valley City , which are directly adjacent to Salt Lake City, and some ice hockey games in the city of Provo, around 80 kilometers south . The open-air competitions were hosted by Ogden, north of Salt Lake City on the Great Salt Lake , and the winter sports areas of Park City and Soldier Hollow, east of the Wasatch Mountains .

Soldier Hollow during the games

Salt Lake City

Kearns

West Valley City

Provo

Ogden

Park City

Attendees

Participating states

78 nations registered for the Salt Lake City Winter Games. For the first time were Hong Kong , Cameroon , Nepal , Tajikistan and Thailand . Puerto Rico withdrew its two starters - a bobsleigh team - during the Games. As a result, athletes from 77 nations took part in the competitions.

Europe (1,670 athletes from 44 nations)
America (400 athletes from 13 nations)
Asia (296 athletes from 15 nations)
Oceania (38 athletes from 3 nations)
Africa (3 athletes from 3 nations)
(Number of athletes) * Participation in winter games for the first time

Ceremonies

Opening ceremony

The Olympic flame is lit.

The opening ceremony of the Winter Games took place on the evening of February 8, 2002 at Rice-Eccles Stadium at the University of Utah . After ice skaters had carried flags with the names of all previous Olympic Winter Games venues into the stadium, the IOC President, the Chairman of the Organizing Committee and - accompanied by the melody Hail to the Chief - the US President entered the stadium interior. At the beginning of the ceremony, a US flag found in the ruins of the World Trade Center was carried into the stadium in almost complete silence . Originally it was intended that this should be carried forward to the American team when they marched in, which was rejected by the IOC with reference to the protocol. The American national anthem was sung by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and accompanied by the Utah Symphony Orchestra .

The motto of the games "Light the Fire Within" was staged with an ice show . The athletes marched in; As usual, Greece's team marched first and host nation USA's last. The subsequent cultural program included references to the Indian and Mormon past of Utah. After the athletes marched in, representatives of Utah's five Indian tribes - Ute , Gosiute , Shoshone , Paiute and Diné (Navajo) - moved into the stadium. The five chiefs greeted representatives of the athletes in their respective languages, followed by a show with dances by the Indians and a performance by the Indian-born Canadian rock musician Robbie Robertson .

The next part of the program dealt with the colonization of the American West by the white pioneers. Their treks of settlers, their encounters with western wildlife - such as elk , rattlesnakes and bison - and the lives of settlers in the west were staged.

Later there was a joint appearance by Sting and Yo-Yo Ma .

US President George W. Bush was the only head of state to date to deviate from the traditional opening formula of the Olympic Games by adding the preliminary remark "On behalf of a proud, determined and grateful nation" ("In the name of a proud, determined and grateful nation") ) added. He was not in a special grandstand as usual, but in the middle of the US athletes.

The Olympic flag was carried into the stadium by eight well-known personalities, five of whom represented the continents: John Glenn (America), Lech Wałęsa (Europe), Desmond Tutu (Africa), Kazuyoshi Funaki (Asia) and Cathy Freeman (Oceania). In addition, the former alpine skier Jean-Claude Killy embodied sport, film director Steven Spielberg embodied art, and researcher and film producer Jean-Michel Cousteau embodied environmental protection.

For the first time in history, the Olympic flame was lit by a team: the US ice hockey team from the 1980 Winter Olympics , made famous by the Miracle on Ice - defeating the favored Soviet Union and then winning the gold medal. It was spearheaded by its then team captain Mike Eruzione .

The Olympic oath was taken by skeleton Jim Shea and alpine referee Allen Church from the United States.

Closing ceremony

At the graduation ceremony Bon Jovi performed with their hit "It's my life". There were also performances by Kiss and the former Olympic figure skating champions Katarina Witt and Kristi Yamaguchi .

The Olympic flag was presented by Rocky Anderson , Mayor of Salt Lake City, to Sergio Chiamparino , Mayor of Turin.

Competition program

78 competitions (42 for men, 34 for women and 2 mixed competitions) in 7 sports / 15 disciplines were held. That was 10 competitions and 1 discipline more than in Nagano in 1998 - the number of sports remained the same. The changes are detailed below:

  • At the biathlon , the 12.5 km pursuit for men and the 10 km pursuit for women expanded the program.
  • In Bob the women's bobsleigh was added. In addition, the discipline of skeleton was included in the Olympic program with one for men and women - skeleton had been Olympic twice for men by 1948.
  • The 1500 m for men and women were added to the short track .
  • In cross-country skiing , the 15 km has been reintroduced for men and 10 km for women. In addition, the individual sprint replaced 10 km cross-country skiing and the 10/10 km pursuit race replaced the 10/15 km pursuit race for men - for women, the individual sprint replaced 5 km cross-country skiing and 5/5 km chase the 5/10 km chase.
  • In the Nordic Combined the sprint - large hill 7.5 km Gundersen - extended the program.
  • In snowboarding , the giant slalom has been replaced by the parallel giant slalom for men and women.

Olympic sports / disciplines

Number of competitions in brackets

Time schedule

Time schedule
discipline Fri.
8.		 Sat.
9.		 Sun
10.		 Mon.
11.		 Tuesday
12		 Wed.
13.		 Thursday
14.		 Fri.
15.		 Sat
16.		 Sun.
17.		 Mon.
18.		 Tuesday
19.		 Wed.
20.		 Thursday
21.		 Fr.
22.		 Sat.
23.		 Sun.
24.		 Decision-
disk-
applications
February
Olympic rings without rims.svg Opening ceremony
Biathlon pictogram.svg biathlon 2 2 2 1 1 8th
bobsleigh
sport		 Bobsleigh pictogram.svg bob 1 1 1 3
Skeleton pictogram.svg skeleton 2 2
Curling pictogram.svg Curling 1 1 2
Ice hockey pictogram.svg ice Hockey 1 1 2
Ice skating Figure skating pictogram.svg figure skating 1 1 1 1 4th
Speed ​​skating pictogram.svg Speed ​​skating 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 10
Short track speed skating pictogram.svg Short track 1 2 2 3 8th
Luge pictogram.svg Luge 1 1 1 3
ski
sport		 Freestyle skiing pictogram.svg Freestyle skiing 1 1 1 1 4th
Alpine skiing pictogram.svg Alpine skiing 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 10

Nordic skiing		 Nordic combined pictogram.svg Nordic combination 1 1 1 3
Cross country skiing pictogram.svg Cross-country skiing 2 2 1 1 1 2 1 1 1 12
Ski jumping pictogram.svg Ski jumping 1 1 1 3
Snowboarding pictogram.svg Snowboard 1 1 2 4th
Olympic rings without rims.svg Closing ceremony
decisions 4th 5 6th 4th 6th 4th 5 6th 4th 4th 5 7th 5 4th 7th 2 78
Fri.
8.		 Sat.
9.		 Sun
10.		 Mon.
11.		 Tuesday
12		 Wed.
13.		 Thursday
14.		 Fri.
15.		 Sat
16.		 Sun.
17.		 Mon.
18.		 Tuesday
19.		 Wed.
20.		 Thursday
21.		 Fr.
22.		 Sat.
23.		 Sun.
24.
February

Color legend

  • Opening ceremony
  • Competition day (no decisions)
  • Competition day (x decisions)
  • Exhibition running (figure skating gala)
  • Closing ceremony

    • Competitions

    biathlon

    The outstanding biathlete of the 2002 Winter Games was Ole Einar Bjørndalen from Norway, who won all three men's individual competitions as well as the relay competition (with Halvard Hanevold , Frode Andresen and Egil Gjelland ). The most successful nation in biathlon competitions, however, became Germany. In all eight competitions German starters won at least one medal, in the women three out of four gold medals went to German participants. The fourth Olympic victory was achieved by Olga Pyljowa (Russia) in the 10 km pursuit.

    bob

    The medal winners in the four-man bobsleigh

    Both men's bobsleigh competitions were won by Germany. In the two-man bobsleigh, Christoph Langen and Markus Zimmermann won ahead of the Swiss duos Christian Reich and Steve Anderhub as well as Martin Annen and Beat Hefti . In the four-man bobsleigh, André Lange won his first Olympic competition with Enrico Kühn , Kevin Kuske and Carsten Embach in front of the host USA's bobsleigh, which were controlled by Todd Hays and Brian Shimer . The reigning Olympic champion Langen had to give up after the second run due to a foot injury.

    The first ever women's Olympic two-man bobsleigh competition was won by the Americans Jill Bakken and Vonetta Flowers ahead of the German duos Prokoff / Holzner and Erdmann / Herschmann .

    Curling

    The men's curling competition was won by the Norwegian team led by Pål Trulsen , ahead of Canada ( Kevin Martin ) and Switzerland ( Andreas Schwaller ). In the women’s category, Great Britain and its Skip Rhona Martin won ahead of Switzerland ( Luzia Ebnöther ) and Canada ( Kelley Law ).

    ice Hockey

    As in 1998 it was achieved that the North American professional league NHL released its players for the duration of the Olympic Games. This benefited all the North American teams: Canada won 5-2 over hosts USA . North American dominance was even clearer among women. Both the USA (10: 0 against Germany; 12: 1 against China; 5: 0 against Finland; 4: 0 against Sweden) and Canada (7: 0 against Kazakhstan; 7: 0 against Russia; 11: 0 against Sweden; 7: 3 against Finland) moved into the final after a series of clear victories. Here, too, the USA could not use their home advantage: Canada won 3-2.

    figure skating

    The decision in pair skating was one of the most controversial in Olympic history: the judges rated the performance of the Russian couple Jelena Bereschnaja / Anton Sicharulidze slightly higher than that of the Canadians Jamie Salé / David Pelletier . The French judge Marie-Reine Le Gougne was finally proven to have illegal agreements. The ISU finally decided to award a second gold medal to the Canadian couple, which it did six days after the first award ceremony.

    In the individual competitions, Alexei Jagudin (Russia) won the men’s competition and Sarah Hughes (USA) won the women’s . The French couple Marina Anissina / Gwendal Peizerat won the ice dance competition .

    Speed ​​skating

    The Netherlands was the most successful nation among men; they won six medals in five competitions, of which two gold (5000 and 10,000 m) and one silver medal (1500 m) went to Jochem Uytdehaage . With women, on the other hand, Germany was the most successful, among others Claudia Pechstein won the 3000 and 5000 meters and thus became the most successful winter Olympic champion in the Olympic history of Germany after two earlier Olympic victories in 1994 and 1998.

    Freestyle

    Both men and women had a competition on the moguls (moguls) and jumping (aerials). Janne Lahtela (Finland) and Kari Traa (Norway) won the moguls, while Aleš Valenta (Czech Republic) and Alisa Camplin (Australia) won the jumping . Two days after the surprise victory of short tracker Steven Bradbury , Camplin became the first woman to win an Olympic win at the Winter Games for Australia.

    Luge

    In the men's singles, the German Georg Hackl had to admit defeat to the Italian Armin Zöggeler after his Olympic victories in 1992, 1994 and 1998 and won silver. The women's competition, however, was completely dominated by Germans: Sylke Otto won gold, Barbara Niedernhuber silver and Silke Kraushaar bronze. The Olympic victory in the men's two-seater also went to Germany: Patric Leitner and Alexander Resch won ahead of the US teams Mark Grimmette / Brian Martin and Chris Thorpe / Clay Ives .

    Short track

    The most successful nations were South Korea and China for women and Canada for men. The Canadian Marc Gagnon won gold over 500 meters and the relay as well as bronze over 1500 meters, the Chinese Yang Yang (A) won the 500 and 1000 meters and came second in the relay. As in previous years, the European starters were outsiders. Of the 24 medals awarded, only three went to Europe: the Italian men's relay won silver, Bulgarian Evgenija Radanowa won bronze over 1500 meters and silver over 500 meters.

    The Olympic victory of the Australian short tracker Steven Bradbury over 1000 meters is one of the strangest in history. He only managed to qualify for the semi-finals and finals because other athletes fell in the last corner. In the final, Bradbury was way behind on the last lap; But since someone fell again in the last corner and pulled everyone else with him, Bradbury was able to cross the finish line unhindered.

    skeleton

    In the Olympic skeleton competitions, which were held again for the first time in 54 years, the host nation was able to prevail on both occasions. Jim Shea , who had sworn the athletes' Olympic oath at the opening ceremony, became the men's Olympic champion ahead of Martin Rettl (Austria) and Gregor Stähli (Switzerland). Tristan Gale won the women ahead of Lea Ann Parsley (also USA) and Alexandra Coomber (Great Britain).

    Alpine skiing

    The Snowbasin in Ogden during the men's Super G competition

    The Norwegian Kjetil André Aamodt became Olympic champion in the Super-G and in the combination and thus advanced to become the most successful alpine skier at the Olympic Winter Games. He had already won five medals in 1992 and 1994. Stephan Eberharter missed victory in the Super-G after a driving error by a tenth of a second, but was then Olympic champion in the giant slalom. Before that he had already won bronze in the descent behind Fritz Strobl (Austria) and Lasse Kjus (Norway).

    The medal decision in the slalom was controversial: behind the French Jean-Pierre Vidal and Sébastien Amiez , the British Alain Baxter surprisingly came third, but had to surrender his bronze medal later after traces of methamphetamine had been detected in his urine . It turned out that he had taken the substance through his nasal spray, which he had bought in the USA, without knowing that it was composed differently than the version he was using in the UK. It would have been Britain's first Olympic medal in alpine skiing after British female runners won various medals at the first Alpine World Ski Championships in the early 1930s. The Austrian Benjamin Raich benefited from this mishap of the Scot Baxter. For the time being, Baxter appealed, but the Supreme Court of Justice (CAS) rejected it on October 16, 2002. Benjamin Raich was only able to receive the bronze medal in a small ceremony in Vienna on December 10, 2002. On March 6, 2003 the “British Olympic Association” (“BOA”) upheld the objection of the Scotsman, who lives in Lofer im Pinzgau (Salzburg / Austria), that he was allowed to participate in the Olympics again; he had been able to make credible that he had taken a cold medicine in Salt Lake City that, in contrast to the product commercially available in Europe, contained metamphetamines which are banned in the USA.

    The outstanding athlete in the women's competitions was 20-year-old Janica Kostelić , who won the first Olympic winter medals for Croatia. She won in the alpine combination, in the slalom and in the giant slalom and was second in the Super-G, whereby the giant slalom victory achieved her first ever victory in this discipline at this high level (only several years later she was able to win the World Cup in this discipline). - The Olympic victories in the other disciplines went to outsiders: In the downhill, Carole Montillet became France's first Alpine Olympic champion since 1968. Daniela Ceccarelli from Italy won the Super-G .

    Nordic skiing

    Cross-country skiing

    The cross-country skiing competitions in 2002 were overshadowed by several doping cases: Johann Mühlegg , who started for Spain after his exclusion from the German team , first won the freestyle race over 30 kilometers with a lead of over two minutes, then also the 10 + 10 kilometer hunting race and the classic 50-kilometer run. He was then convicted of doping, whereupon the gold medal over 50 kilometers and then the other two Olympic victories were revoked. Subsequently, the Russian Michail Iwanow (50 km classic), the Austrian Christian Hoffmann (30 km freestyle) and the Norwegians Frode Estil and Thomas Alsgaard (hunting races), who finished exactly at the same time behind Mühlegg, were named Olympic champions. Norway also won the relay competition and, with Tor Arne Hetland, the first ever Olympic sprint competition.

    The women's competitions were not spared from doping cases either: the Russians Larissa Lasutina and Olga Danilowa were subsequently disqualified. Danilowa lost gold in the 5 + 5 kilometer hunting race, silver over 10 kilometers classic and eighth place over 30 kilometers classic, Lasutina gold over 30 kilometers classic, silver in the hunting race and over 15 kilometers freestyle and fourth place over 10 kilometers classic. Immediately before the relay competition, the teams from Russia and Ukraine were excluded from the start due to elevated blood values ​​in Lasutina and Walentyna Shevchenko .

    Ski jumping

    The surprise winner of the ski jumping competitions was Simon Ammann from Switzerland . The 20-year-old, who had never won a World Cup before, won on both the normal and the large hill. Sven Hannawald (Germany), who was the first ever to win all four competitions of the Four Hills Tournament earlier this season , came second on the normal hill. Adam Małysz (Poland) came second on the large hill and third on the normal hill; Matti Hautamäki (Finland) third on the large hill.

    In the team competition, Simon Ammann had no chance because of the poor performance of his teammates. Here the German team won with Sven Hannawald, Stephan Hocke , Michael Uhrmann and Martin Schmitt ahead of the Finnish and Slovenian teams. The German victory came with the narrowest possible lead of 0.1 points over Finland. - The Austrian team had to be looked after by their sports director Anton Innauer. After "head coach" Alois Lipburger had a fatal accident a year earlier in a car accident (as a passenger), Innauer had taken over the coaching position on an interim basis, but for reasons that were difficult to understand he was unable to (re) track the athletes who were very successfully looked after by Lipburger bring to.

    Nordic combination

    Samppa Lajunen (Finland) won all three competitions in the Nordic Combined: in the individual competition in front of his compatriot Jaakko Tallus and the Austrian Felix Gottwald , in the first sprint competition in front of Ronny Ackermann (Germany) and Felix Gottwald and in the team competition with Jari Mantila , Hannu Manninen and Jaakko Tallus in front of the teams from Germany and Austria.

    Snowboard

    In the parallel giant slalom, which was held for the first time, Philipp Schoch (Switzerland) won ahead of Richard Rikardsson (Sweden) and Chris Klug (USA) for the men, and Isabelle Blanc (France) for the women ahead of Karine Ruby (France) and Lidia Trettel (Italy). In the men's halfpipe competition, there was a US triple victory: Ross Powers won ahead of Danny Kass and Jarret Thomas . Kelly Clark (USA) won the women ahead of Doriane Vidal (France) and Fabienne Reuteler (Switzerland).

    Outstanding athletes

    Ole Einar Bjørndalen won all four biathlon competitions and became the most successful athlete of the games.
    The most successful participants
    rank athlete country sport gold silver bronze total
    1 Ole Einar Bjørndalen NorwayNorway Norway biathlon 4th 0 0 4th
    2 Janica Kostelić CroatiaCroatia Croatia Alpine skiing 3 1 0 4th
    3 Samppa Lajunen FinlandFinland Finland Nordic combination 3 0 0 3
    4th Frode Estil NorwayNorway Norway Cross-country skiing 2 1 0 3
    Jochem Uytdehaage NetherlandsNetherlands Netherlands Speed ​​skating 2 1 0 3
    Kati Wilhelm GermanyGermany Germany biathlon 2 1 0 3
    Yang Yang China People's RepublicPeople's Republic of China People's Republic of China Short track 2 1 0 3
    8th Marc Gagnon CanadaCanada Canada Short track 2 0 1 3
    9 Kjetil André Aamodt NorwayNorway Norway Alpine skiing 2 0 0 2
    Thomas Alsgaard NorwayNorway Norway Cross-country skiing 2 0 0 2
    Simon Ammann SwitzerlandSwitzerland Switzerland Ski jumping 2 0 0 2
    Andrea Henkel GermanyGermany Germany biathlon 2 0 0 2
    Claudia Pechstein GermanyGermany Germany Speed ​​skating 2 0 0 2
    • The biathlete Ole Einar Bjørndalen emulated Eric Heiden and won all disciplines of a sport. He won gold four times and became the most successful biathlete at the Olympics. He also moved up to sixth place in the list of the most successful Winter Olympians . He was fifth in cross-country skiing.
    • Samppa Lajunen from Finland achieved the same in Nordic combined. He won all three competitions.
    • Janica Kostelić dominated the women's alpine skiing competitions. She won gold in slalom, giant slalom and combined. She also secured the silver medal in the Super-G. Only in the downhill did she go without a medal.
    • With his two gold medals, Kjetil André Aamodt has now become the most successful alpine skier at the Olympic Games.
    • Frode Estil and Thomas Alsgaard came second in the cross-country pursuit at the same time and, after Johann Mühlegg's disqualification, have so far become Olympic champions together. They won their second gold together in the season.

    Worth mentioning

    • A German pair of siblings won Olympic gold in various sports: Manuela Henkel was Olympic champion in the cross-country relay, Andrea Henkel won the biathlon relay as well as the 15-kilometer individual race.
    • Olympic skeleton champion Jim Shea (USA) took part in the third generation of the winter games: his grandfather Jack Shea was two-time Olympic champion in speed skating in Lake Placid in 1932; his father Jim Shea senior took part in cross-country skiing and Nordic combined in Innsbruck in 1964.
    • In the Chinese short track team there were two runners named Yang Yang. After their birth months August and September, they were named Yang Yang (A) and Yang Yang (S) for the statistics . Yang Yang (A) became Olympic champion over 500 and 1000 meters (and was the first winter Olympic champion in China), Yang Yang (S) won bronze over 1000 meters. Both together won silver with the relay.

    Safety precautions

    The Salt Lake City Winter Olympics took place five months after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and four months after the US attack on Afghanistan . In addition to the numerous patriotic expressions such as at the torch relay or in the opening address of the US President, this also ensured greatly increased security measures: 15,000 police officers and soldiers were present in the vicinity of the games. The athletes were also repeatedly screened by the FBI and CIA .

    reporting

    8418 accredited journalists reported on the games, including 2514 press workers and photographers and 5904 television and radio employees. The television images were broadcast by 80 official rights holders in 160 countries, with the images of ski jumping, figure skating and the opening and closing ceremonies also being shown in HDTV for the first time .

    In the host country, after the disappointing audience ratings at the 1998 Winter Olympics, NBC took over the broadcasting rights from competitor CBS . Unlike in the case of the 2000 Summer Olympics , this time the broadcasts were a success for NBC: The opening ceremony saw 72 million viewers in the USA, and the first day of the competition was the most-watched Saturday evening program for the broadcaster in six years. In Germany, Das Erste had the highest audience rating in the ski jumping competition on the large hill with 13.73 million viewers (46.9 percent market share); and the biathlon competitions also proved to be a quota racer (11 million viewers in the men's sprint competition). In Austria, the men's alpine downhill race was the most successful with 2.463 million spectators (76 percent market share); In Switzerland, the ski jumping competitions with Simon Ammann reached 1.3 million viewers (68 percent market share).

    Tickets

    The competitions were almost exclusively attended by Americans: of 1.58 million tickets, only around 100,000, or less than seven percent, had been sold abroad by a week after the start of the games.

    literature

    Web links

    Commons : 2002 Winter Olympics  - collection of images, videos and audio files

    Individual evidence

    1. ↑ Flame Arrives In US In: ksl.com. December 4, 2001, archived from the original on September 27, 2011 ; Retrieved February 3, 2011 .
    2. ↑ Baxter's heartbreak. In: BBC.co.uk. March 21, 2002, accessed February 3, 2011 .
    3. ↑ a b c d Duncan Mackay: Chariots of ire: is US jingoism tarnishing the Olympic ideal? In: The Guardian. February 15, 2002, accessed February 7, 2012 .
    4. ↑ Katarina Witt / Heinz Florian Oertel: Salt Lake City 2002. Our Olympic book, Berlin 2002, p. 218.
    5. ↑ a b Katarina Witt / Heinz Florian Oertel: Salt Lake City 2002. Our Olympic book, Berlin 2002, p. 214.
    6. ↑ Katarina Witt / Heinz Florian Oertel: Salt Lake City 2002. Our Olympic book, Berlin 2002, p. 215.